General Training Writing - Model Answer (Task 2)

According to those in the travel business, the nature of the average ‘holiday’ is changing. Rather than seeking a relaxing break in a far-away place people now want excitement on their holiday and are keen to participate in unusual and challenging activities.

Do you agree or disagree?

While we all need a break once in a while, what a person chooses to do on holiday depends on many factors such as an individual’s income, their character and what they do for a living. With the development of the travel industry, holiday-makers have a host of destinations to choose from as well as a range of holiday types.

A young person, for example, may prefer to go to a busy city where there is a buzzing nightlife or on an adventure holiday which includes extreme sports. On the other hand, an adult who is under pressure at work will opt for a quiet place to relax with his or her family and forget about their problems for a while.

Unusual holidays are becoming popular with youngsters as they involve risk, adrenaline and an opportunity to act recklessly. Even though these types of holidays might be costly, you will often see people traveling to destinations like South Africa to dive with sharks, going to winter resorts to ski on dangerous slopes, sky diving and bungee jumping off high bridges. As daily life is mundane and lacks any sense of excitement, a few days spent on a thrilling holiday is likely to bring back a person’s enthusiasm for life.

Concluding, while in theory an unusual holiday involving challenging activities must sound inviting to many youngsters, there are many who still prefer to switch off and do absolutely nothing for a week.

Question taken from Insight Into IELTS Extra p.105

General Training Writing - Model Answer (Task 1)

You recently took a part-time job working for a local company. After a few weeks, you realised there were some problems with the job. Write a letter to the manager of the company. In your letter

• explain why you took the job
• describe the problems that you experienced
• suggest what could be done about them

 Dear Mrs Jackson,

Last month I was given a part-time job in your company as a filing clerk. As I am a full-time university student, working on Tuesdays and Thursdays was an ideal way for me to cover some of my expenses and learn about the world of work.

As I did not receive any formal training when I was employed I have experienced some difficulties with the complex filing system that your company operates. I cannot always locate the correct file and I am not always sure where I should place the documents that are put in the filing tray.

Due to the fact that much of the information is confidential, it is important that is gets filed in the correct way. I would like to ask if it is possible for you to arrange a short training course for me. I still have many documents that need to be filed appropriately and this would help me greatly.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yours Sincerely,

Lindsay Cohen

Question taken from Insight Into IELTS Extra p.86

General Training Writing - Model Answer (Task 1)

For the past year you have been a member of a local club. Now you want to discontinue your membership. Write a letter to the club secretary. In your letter

• State what type of membership you have and how you have paid for this
• Give details of how you have benefited from the club
• Explain why you want to leave

Dear Mrs Bishop,

I am a member of the Aqua Aerobics Club which meets on Mondays and Thursdays at the local council swimming pool. I have an annual membership which I paid for using my credit card.

I have enjoyed my time at the club immensely over the past year. My health has improved and my doctor has informed me that my back problems have been reduced. I have also made some wonderful and supportive friends at the club and it has given me a chance to improve my self-image.

Unfortunately I will have to cancel my membership due to personal reasons. My daughter has just given birth and I will be moving to Spain to look after her child. I will be sad to leave the club behind and the friends I have made there but hopefully I will be able to continue taking part in aqua aerobics lessons when I am in Barcelona.

Regards,

Eva Green

Question taken from Insights into IELTS Extra p.91

General Training Writing - Model Answer (Task 1)

You recently bought a computer from a reputable computer store. The store agreed to deliver the computer and set it up for you in your home but when it was delivered the delivery man claimed that this was not part of his job.

Write a letter to the manager of the store. In your letter

• Say when you bought the computer and what the price included.
• Express dissatisfaction about what occurred.
• Find out what they intend to do about it.

Dear Sir/Madam,

Last Monday I purchased a desktop computer from your store. I was informed by the sales assistant that the price of the computer, €600, included delivery and set up fees. I agreed to buy the computer under these conditions.

Unfortunately, when the computer was delivered on Wednesday, the delivery man informed me that it was not his duty to set it up. As I do not have the technical skills to do this on my own, I kept the computer and all the accessories in the box. I am extremely dissatisfied with the lack of communication between your shop and delivery staff which has kept me behind on my work schedule.

I would appreciate it if you could inform me about the course of action that you propose to take and how you expect to keep to the agreement that was made on your premises regarding the set up of the computer.

Yours faithfully,

Taylor Swift

Question taken from Insights into IELTS Extra p.91

Approaching IELTS Reading - Short answer questions

Costa Rica is one of the most prosperous countries in Central America. There are high educational standards and a high life expectancy (about 74 years for men and 79 years for women). Agriculture employs 19% of the people. Costa Rica’s natural resources include its forests, but it lacks minerals apart from some bauxite and manganese. Manufacturing is increasing. The United States is Cost Rica’s main trading partner.

 

Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

 

1. How long, on average, does a Cotsa Rican woman live? 79 years
2. What proportion of Costa Ricans are farmers? 19%
3. Which natural resources does Costa Rica have few of? Minerals
4. Which economic activity is growing in Costa Rica? Manufacturing
5. Which country does Costa Rica do most business with? The United States

 

Tips

• The questions are in passage order.
• Use the exact words that are in the passage.
• Question words include: who, how many, for what purpose, how much, how often, what, why, how, what proportion?

Sample reading passage taken from Skills for IELTS Foundation p.39

Approaching IELTS Reading - Matching sentence endings

Talk your way into another language

Need to learn another language for a job abroad?

Textbooks and tutors may be the worst approach.

 

Go into a coffee bar, sit down, relax and try to talk to someone. It may look to others as though you are wasting your time. It may even feel that way to you. But so long as you are doing this in a foreign country, where you speak the language badly or not at all, you are probably acquiring a new language better than you ever could by formal study with a teacher and a textbook.

 

The social situation, properly used, beats the classroom hollow. It is full of native speakers asking you questions, telling you to do things, urging you to take an active part in conversation, and using gestures freely to make their intentions clearer – just like your parents did when you were an infant. So plunge in. All you have to do it talk back.

 

The proposition that infants can acquire languages by prolonged exposure to them is self-evidently true: it is the only way available to them. Older children and teenagers who move to a different country can pick up a new language with a speed that baffles their parents. But in adulthood we find ourselves envying our rare contemporaries who can still acquire languages easily.

 

There may be biological reasons why the capacity to learn languages falls away with age, even more than the capacity to learn other things. The brain may be designed to do its best language-learning in infancy, and then to redeploy its resources at puberty. But psychological factors play a big part too. As we get older, we get more self-conscious, more inhibited, more dependent on other people’s judgements. This process may undermine our capacity to acquire a new language, because language underpins our sense of personality and identity. We fear to make mistakes in it.

 

Stephen Krashen, an expert on second-language acquisition, makes a strong case for the dominance of psychological factors. According to Mr Krashen, people with outgoing personalities do best at learning a new language because ‘they have the ego to make the necessary mistakes involved in learning’.

 

When we want to learn a new language in mid-life for reasons of career or curiosity, we commonly but wrongly tackle it with the sense of doing something difficult and unnatural. We turn to grammar books and compact discs expecting a fight. We are going to ‘struggle’ with the language. We will ‘master’ it, unless it defeats us. And with that sort of attitude, it probably will.

 

All other things being equal, the best learner will be the person who is most relaxed in conversation, and the most self-confident.

 

Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-H, below.

 

1. For adult language leaners, an informal setting is better than D
2. It is obviously the case that children learn languages as a result of H
3. Adults who have a natural talent for new languages are generally B
4. Confident people learn languages fast because they are not afraid of F
5. Middle-aged language learners are often unaware that they are A

A. Taking a negative approach.
B. Demonstrating an unusual ability.
C. Worrying about the views of others.
D. Being in a classroom situation.
E. Losing all sense of identity.
F. Producing errors in front of others.
G. Moving to another country.
H. Living with other speakers of the language

 

Tips

• The sentences are in passage order.
• Grammatically,  all the sentence beginnings match all the endings. There are some extra endings that you don’t need to use.

Sample reading passage taken from New Insights into IELTS - Student's Book p.71

Approaching IELTS Reading - Finding information in paragraphs

The social life of mammals

 

A When it comes to social behaviour, mammals are far more highly developed than other creatures. Some birds may form pairs or even co-operate to hunt, but the complexity of their relationships can hardly compare to those within a group of dolphins, elephants or humans. What makes mammalian social groups different from, say, a flock of starlings or a shoal of fish is that in many cases the individuals recognise each other. Although we may think that elephants look pretty much the same, we can easily tell individuals of our own species apart, and it has become clear through studies that the same is true of other species of mammals. Dolphins have their own signature whistles that act like names, and elephants can recognise and greet other individuals they have known but not seen for many years. This is something that only a few species of birds appear to be able to do.

 

B Mammals in complex social groups not only recognise each other as individuals, they also remember a lot of information about that individual. Social groups often rely on this memory – such as knowing who is dominant to whom, who is related to whom, and who has done what to whom in the past. They have to learn who to trust, who their friends are and who to watch out for.

 

C All this remembering goes on in a particular part of the brain called the neocortex. If you compare the size of a mammal’s social group with the size of this part of the brain, you find they are remarkably closely related. This area, though, seems to take a long time to develop fully, and animals in which it is very large take a long time to grow up to adulthood. During this time, the youngster has to learn all the rules of social behaviour in their group and to piece together all the relationships between the group members: knowledge that will be needed to avoid getting into trouble.

 

D Like all the advanced and specialised features that mammals have, social behaviour has developed because of the one defining characteristic that mammals possess: the production of milk, allowing baby mammals to have a period of childhood in which they can develop their own distinctive and successful characteristics.

 

The passage has four paragraphs labelled A-D. Which paragraph contains the following information? You may use any letter more than once.

 

1. A reference to possible harmful effects of not knowing about other individuals C
2. Examples of what individuals need to know about connections between group members B
3. A reference to human beings sharing a social skill with other mammals A
4. What makes it possible for mammals to spend time growing up D
5. How individual members of a species identify themselves A
6. Where knowledge is located in the individual C
7. A contrast between the social organisation of mammals and of other species A
8. A suggestion concerning a connection between length of childhood and the amount of learning the individual requires C

Tips

• Look at the statements first as you may use a paragraph letter more than once. This saves time as you might find the answer to two statements in the same paragraph.
• Note key words in the statement (a reference to, examples of, a contrast between, a description of, the names of, a comparison between, an explanation of, the reasons why, the number of, details of, the purpose of, etc.)

 Sample reading passage taken from Intermediate Objective IELTS Workbook, p.25

Approaching IELTS Reading - Paragraph headings

List of Headings

i Trying it yourself
ii Buying the right ingredients
iii Mixing your seafood
iv Watching the experts at work
v A changing student base
vi Rationale for a seafood school
vii Picking the fish for your dish
viii How to enrol
ix A range of levels

The reading passage has six paragraphs, A-F.
Choose the correct headings for each paragraph from the list of headings above.

Example Paragraph A Answer vi

Paragraph B v
Paragraph C ii
Paragraph D iv
Paragraph E i
Paragraph F ix

Everybody loves fish but do they love cooking it or know how to, for that matter?

A The Seafood School, located at the fish market, first opened its doors in 1989 to provide advice to consumers on how to prepare a wide variety of seafood dishes at home. The School is now widely regarded as one of the country’s leading cooking schools with over 10,000 students a year attending classes.

B The classes were initially aimed at the local residents who regularly shopped at the fish market, but more recently the school has found a market in teaching visitors from other states, as well as from overseas.

C While fish are still the main focus of most classes, recipes involving mussels, octopus, crabs and lobster are also very popular. Asian flavours are in high demand and one very popular class begins with a shopping expedition to Chinatown to find out where to purchase the best herbs and spices for each individual recipe.

D All classes commence with a demonstration of how the dishes are prepared. As anyone who has ever observed a good chef knows, it may look easy in their skilled hands but prove much more difficult at home.

E This is where the Seafood School is unique. After the demonstration, students roll up their sleeves, put on an apron and, in groups of five, recreate the dishes they have just seen being prepared. Under the watchful eye of the demonstrator and assistants, each student helps to create a meal to be proud of, and then they all sit down to sample their seafood feast.

F The Seafood School conducts a wide range of classes for all degrees of competency, from a four-session course in seafood basics to the more complex weekend workshops with some of the nation’s leading chefs taking the classes. A vast array of cuisines and cooking styles is covered, including the School’s most popular class, ‘Seafood BBQ’, which is scheduled up to four times a month to keep up with demand!

Tips

• There is one heading for each paragraph. You should use each heading only once. You do not need to read the paragraph which is given as an example or use the answer provided. There are always more headings than there are paragraphs.

• First look at the list of headings then read each paragraph as fast as possible. The faster you read the greater your understanding of the passage. You should try to understand the general meaning of the passage and not look for words that you can find in both the heading and the passage.

Sample reading passage taken from New Insights into IELTS - Student's Book p.81

Approaching IELTS Academic Reading - Flow-chart

Walking with dinosaurs

Falkingham uses computational techniques to model a volume of mud and control the moisture content, consistency, and other conditions to simulate the mud of prehistoric times. A footprint is then made in the digital mud by a virtual foot. This footprint can be chopped up and viewed from any angle and stress values can be extracted and calculated from inside it. By running hundreds of these simulations simultaneously on supercomputers, Falkingham can start to understand what types of footprint would be expected if an animal moved in a certain way over a given kind of ground. Looking at the variation in the virtual tracks, researchers can make sense of fossil tracks with greater confidence.

Complete the flow-chart below.
Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.

PETER FALKINGHAM’S COMPUTER MODEL

Mud is simulated with attention to its texture and thickness and how much 1. moisture it contains. [contains=content]

↓

A virtual foot produces a footprint in the mud.

↓

The footprint is dissected and examined from all angles.

↓

Levels of 2. stress are measured within the footprint. [measured within the footprint=calculated from inside it ]

↓

Multiple simulations relate footprints to different types of 3. ground. [types=kind]

↓

More accurate interpretation of 4. fossil tracks is possible. [more accurate interpretation=greater confidence]

Tips

• First look at the heading of the flow-chart. This will help you locate the paragraph where you can find the information. e.g. Capital letters, numbers, unusual words etc.
• The answers in the passage follow the flow-chart order.
• The missing words you choose should make grammatical sense. Most of the missing words are nouns.

Sample reading passage taken from Cambridge IELTS Trainer p.24

Approaching IELTS Reading - True/False/Not Given

Do the following statements agree with the information given in the Reading Passage? Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

Visit the island state of TASMANIA

Getting there
Tasmania is well serviced by air, but the cost of flights varies enormously, so make sure you shop around for the best price. The over-sea route to Tasmania is covered by two fast ships from Melbourne. These vessels offer an overnight service in both directions, seven days a week, all year round, with additional daytime services in the high season (December-January). Ships also sail from Sydney and ticket prices vary seasonally. The ferry takes cars and motorbikes.

Getting around

Coach services link all the main towns, as well as bus tours geared for independent travellers, though services can be limited in the low season, so check with the bus company. Cycling is a good option for people with strong legs, and several excellent tours cater for cyclists throughout the island. Car rental is sometimes the best choice to go further and at your own pace.

Q.1. It is a good idea to investigate the airfares carefully. TRUE [= shop around for the best price]Q.2. There is a reduced ferry service from Melbourne in December. FALSE [=opposite 'additional daytime services']
Q.3. The price of travelling by boat from Sydney is the same throughout the year. FALSE [=opposite  'prices vary seasonally']
Q.4. There is a charge for transporting vehicles. NOT GIVEN [vehicles = cars and motobikes but charge not mentioned]
Q.5. The buses may run less frequently when there are fewer visitors. TRUE [=services can be limited in the low season]
Q.6. Renting a car is recommended for longer trips. TRUE [=car rental...best choice to go further]

Tips


• First look at the statements then find the answers in the passage.
• Look for key words in the statements that will help you locate the information in the passage e.g. capital letters, numbers, unusual words etc.
• The answers in the passage follow the statement order.
• This type of question is the same as Yes/No/Not Given but the difference being that in Yes/No/Not Given you are asked about the writer’s opinion in the passage.
• It is important to understand the meaning of the statement.

Sample reading passage taken from New Insights into IELTS – Student’s book p.76

Approaching IELTS Academic Reading - Summary Completion

Soft centres – hard profits

Are you being seduced by the sweet industry?

If chocolate were found to be seriously addictive, then the UK would need major therapy to kick the habit. The British lead the world in their love of the cocoa-based treat. As a product, chocolate has a lot going for it, appealing to all ages, both sexes and all income brackets. In 1997, the value of the total UK confectionery market increased by 3% to a staggering £5.2bn, with chocolate sales accounting for 70%, at £3.6bn, and sugar confectionery the remaining £1.6bn.

The UK market has shown consistent growth – increasing over the last decade by around 16%. ‘Chocolate confectionery is a market that seems to be remarkably resilient,’ says Pamela Langworthy, marketing director for Thorntons, the luxury chocolate producer and retailer. It also increasingly transcends national boundaries. In 1997, Swiss Nestle, the largest confectioner, exported over a quarter of its production to more than 100 countries. Nestle has recorded particularly fast growth in confectionery sales in Asia, with the expansion of KitKat into several countries in the region. Eastern Europe provides another promising market. But few markets challenge the UK in terms of current confectionery consumption. In the US, the land associated with excess, each American devours a mere 10kg of confectionery per person a year, whereas UK consumers each manage 16kg. In Europe, where the chocolate market is estimated to be worth over £12bn ($18.5bn), the UK accounts for almost a third of that total, followed some way behind by Germany, France and Italy.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

Chocolate - the figures

The chocolate market in the UK in 1997 was worth 1. £5.2bn, having shown a steady increase during the preceding ten-year period. Overall, the manufacturer Swiss Nestle supplies chocolate to over 2. 100 countries and the company has seen rapid sales increases in the markets in 3. Asia. Nevertheless the UK market remains the biggest – surprisingly, British people eat more than 4. American consumers. Within the European market their consumption amounts to 5.  a third of the total revenue.

[Q.1. Look for key words ‘UK’ and ‘1997’. In the summary ‘worth’ = value, so you are looking for an amount of money.]
[Q.2 Look for key word ‘Swiss Nestle’. ‘Over’ in the summary = more than.]
[Q.3 Preposition ‘in’ before the gap means you are looking for a location. Look for a word with a capital letter.]
[Q.4. British people eat more than…this must be another nationality. Look for a word with a capital letter.]
[Q.5. You are looking for a part of the total revenue.]

Tips

• First look at the summary then find the answers in the passage.
• Don't read the whole summary. It is usually very long. So just look for key words that will help you locate the information in the passage.
• The answers in the passage follow the question order but they may be scattered around the reading passage.
• On most occasions the missing information is a noun. You can understand this if there is a/an/the/of/a number etc. before a word.
• Follow the instructions for the amount of words needed. NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER = two words or less/you can use a combination of a word and a number/you can use a number on its own.
• Copy the words onto your answer sheet exactly as you find them in the passage.
• Don't try to understand every word you read. The level of difficulty is high.

Sample passage taken from New Insights in IELTS – Workbook p.32

Approaching IELTS Academic Reading - Sentence Completion

Complete the sentences below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

 

Power-packed fliers

 

For their size, birds are tremendously powerful creatures. We know this thanks to an ingenious series of tests performed by researchers at Duke University in North Carolina. The researchers placed a specially trained budgerigar in a wind tunnel and measured how much muscle power it needed to maintain flight at various airspeeds up to 50 kilometres per hour. The small bird had to be trained, not only because it had to fly in the artificial environment of the wind tunnel, but also because it had to do so while wearing a tiny oxygen mask.

 

The mask allowed zoologist Vance Tucker and his colleagues to monitor the budgerigar’s oxygen demand, and thus the amount of mechanical energy it was producing. What they discovered was experimental proof of the incredible power-to-weight ratio of birds. Tucker’s team found that the 35-gram budgerigar’s flight muscles were delivering a peak power of one to four watts to maintain continuous flight. That might not sound very much on its own, but it’s pretty impressive when the bird’s size is taken into account: it works out as 200 watts of continuous mechanical power for every kilogram of the bird’s muscle mass.

 

And that’s the reason that people have always failed when they tried to fly by flapping wings attached to their arms: the average human can only produce around ten watts per kilogram of their muscle mass. It’s not that we never had the time to fly – we have simply never had the energy. To fly, people need machines and to make a flying machine, we need to understand how birds control their flight.

 

Q.1. Scientists have done experiments on birds in a wind tunnel. [Where did they put the bird? 'A' before the gap means you are looking for a noun]

Q.2. The birds reached a maximum hourly flight distance of 50 kilometres. [Distance = number. If the numbers are written digitally e.g. 50 it is easy to locate them in the passage]
Q.3. The aim of scientists was to calculate the amount of energy they needed to fly. [Search for the word 'amount' in the passage]
Q.4. Machines are the only solution to human flight. ['Are' after the gap means the missing word is plural]

 

Tips

• First look at the questions then find the answers in the passage.
• The answers in the passage follow the question order.
• On most occasions the missing information is a noun. You can understand this if there is a/an/the/of/a number etc. before a word.
• Follow the instructions for the amount of words needed. NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS = three words or less.
• Copy the words onto your answer sheet exactly as you find them in the passage.
• Don't try to understand every word you read. The level of difficulty is high.

Sample reading passage taken from Action Plan for IELTS p.35

Idioms with 'right'

Keep on the right side of someone = to have friendly relations e.g. He has a lot of power in the company so I want to keep on his right side.

Be on the right track = act or think in a way that will lead to a correct conclusion e.g. Unfortunately, we haven’t found a solution yet but we’re on the right track.

Get something right = understand something correctly e.g. Did I get it right? Are you actually going to refuse the position?

Go right = to happen successfully e.g. I hope everything goes right with our new company.

In one’s right mind = to be sensible e.g. Why did you tell all those lies? Are you in your right mind?

In the right = to be legally or morally correct e.g. I think that driver was in the right. He stopped at the traffic lights.

Mr Right = a woman’s ideal marriage partner e.g. She thinks she is going to find Mr Right on the internet so she’s joined an on-line dating service.

Set someone right = to correct a mistaken idea e.g. We need to set the committee right. The budget we have is low so we can’t spend so much money.

Right away = immediately e.g. I’ll call Mr Chen right away. He’s expecting you.

Right-hand man = trusted deputy e.g. If you can’t find Mr Li try his right-hand man, Mr Wang.

Serve someone right = to be what someone deserves e.g. It serves him right that he didn’t pass. Can you believe that he didn’t open a single book?

Give one’s right arm = pay any price or make a sacrifice e.g. I’d give my right arm for the new i-phone. I’ve dreamt of having that for a long time.

Have one’s heart in the right place = to be kind despite seeming not to be e.g. Everyone seems to think he is rude and unapproachable but he’s got his heart in the right place.

Two wrongs don’t make a right = A second error does not cancel a first e.g. I don’t think it’s a good idea to seek revenge. Two wrongs don’t make a right.

Too right! = I totally agree e.g. Too right! He should have won an Oscar for his performance.

Academic Writing - Model Answer (Task 2)

Some people believe that it is good for a country to host a major sports competition. Others think it causes many problems for the country. Discuss both points of view and give your opinion.

Whenever there is a major sporting event, there is great competition amongst countries to host it. For some it is an opportunity to increase revenue, promote a country and a chance to invest in the infrastructure of a city.

When a country hosts an event, it gets free publicity and once the event is over, tourists still visit the city. This can be seen in Manchester which hosted the Commonwealth Games in 2002. Once a country wins a bid to host an event, building work begins bringing in revenue for architects, engineers, construction workers etc. Cities get a face-lift, as in the case of Barcelona which hosted the Olympic Games in 1992. It not only gives a chance for a city to show the rest of the world what is great about it and encourage its athletes to do well but helps with the infrastructure, provides jobs and improves a city.

On the other hand it might cause hostility amongst nations that are not friendly with each other. Hooliganism might break out damaging public property and leading to fights amongst rival fans. Racism might be another danger. What is more, stadiums and large buildings might not be utilized when the competition comes to an end or some cities might have over spent on the budget like Athens and this will burden taxpayers.

All in all, I believe the benefits of hosting competitions are greater than the drawbacks and if the government plans ahead, uses funds appropriately and has adequate security measures in place, then the games will run smoothly.

Question taken from Focus on Skills for IELTS Foundation p. 59