IELTS Writing Task 2
IELTS Writing Task Achievement
Last updated on September 25, 2020 by Scott Somerville
In our last lesson we took a general look at the four categories that the examiner is looking at in your essay and what you should focus on. Today we will look at Task Achievement and discover what this means and how you can use it to make your essays better.
What is Task Achievement?
So first we will start with a question: what is the task? What is it asking you to do? To answer these questions we need to look at an example of an IELTS Writing Task 2:
WRITING TASK 2
You should spend about 40 minutes on this task.
Write about the following topic:
In the modern world there is a movement away from written exams to more practical assessment.
Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of this trend.
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge and experience.
Write at least 250 words.
What are the important parts of the instructions? What kind of essay do you need to write? Is your opinion important?
In this example the important parts of the instructions are: discuss the advantages and disadvantages of practical assessment, give reasons for your answer, include any relevant examples and write at least 250 words. You need to write a discursive essay, so one that discusses a particular topic. And yes your opinion is important.
The Individual Criteria
The Task Achievement category is broken down into three specific criteria:
Do you address all parts of the task?
Do you present a clear position?
Do you support your main ideas?
Addresses all parts of the task
So what exactly are all the parts of the task? If we look back at the example task, they are the same parts that we have already decided are important: discuss the advantages and disadvantages of practical assessment, give reasons for your answer, include any relevant examples and write at least 250 words. So if you only write 200 words rather than 250, you are not addressing all parts of the task. On the other hand, 300 words would be acceptable as the instruction says “at least”. Again if you don’t discuss both sides of the argument, you are not addressing all parts of the task.
When we start at look at the different Bands, then we can see that the requirements change. For a Band 9 you have to fully address all parts of the task, for a Band 8 you have to sufficiently address all parts of the task. Dropping down to a Band 5 then you only need to partially address the task.
In order, therefore, to get a higher band on this point you need to be clear on what the task is asking you to do and make sure that you do this fully. Thankfully the instructions to every IELTS writing test are the same meaning that by practising you should be able to get the higher bands here.
Presents a clear position
Taking a clear position is about your opinion and making sure that the examiner knows what your opinion is. Sometimes students think that they should present a completely balanced essay where they don’t say whether they particularly agree with one side or the other. Unfortunately this will not lead to a high band.
Looking at the different ways in which this is assessed, the Band 7 states that you should present a clear position throughout your essay, for a Band 6 you need a relevant position and for a Band 4 you only need an unclear position.
Now you might be wondering how do I present a clear position throughout? And the answer is in fact quite easy: decide which side of the argument you agree with, say this in your introduction and use the rest of the essay to explain why you think this. A common mistake that students make is to discuss both sides of the argument and wait until the final sentence to give their opinion. This approach will rarely be good enough to get a Band 7, 8 or 9 in Task Achievement.
We will look more at how to present a clear position in our next lesson on structuring your essay.
Supporting your main ideas
The final part of Task Achievement that the examiner is looking at is how you support your main ideas. So you’ve taken a clear position and have stated this in the introduction, well the job of the rest of the essay is to say why you think this.
For a Band 9 in this category you need fully supported and extended ideas and for a Band 6 those ideas will be inadequately developed or unclear.
Your strategy for your essay should then be that you limit yourself to only to two or three ideas that explain your position. You then support these ideas with examples and reasons. When students try to include too many ideas, they are inevitably underdeveloped and this makes a higher band less likely.
What do I need to do in my essay
Taking all of what we have discussed in this lesson, this is what you need to do in your exam:
Be clear about what the task is asking you to do
Make sure you present a clear position throughout
Fully support the reasons you give for that position
This seems like a good point to consider what you are actually being tested on in Task Achievement: is it your level of English or your ability to write an academic essay? By now you should have concluded that it is the latter and it is your ability to write an academic essay that is being assessed.
If you practise writing essays, use all the points discussed in this lesson, then there is no reason why you can’t get a Band 9 for Task Achievement. You are not being assessed here on your language ability.
Just to be clear, though, this is only one category and there are three more that form your final Band. These will be discussed in future lessons.
You can download the full requirements for Task Achievement here.