Are your ideas marked in IELTS Writing and IELTS Speaking? How do you find and prepare ideas for your IELTS essays and for IELTS Speaking topics? Certainly, both IELTS writing and speaking tests are topic based and require you to have ideas to write about and talk about, but are those ideas marked and how do you prepare properly?
Ideas & Knowledge in IELTS Writing Task 2?
In IELTS Writing Task 2, you will be marked on
- Task Response (addressing the task, ideas, developing ideas and relevancy)
- Coherence & Cohesion (organisation & linking)
- Grammar
- Vocabulary
As you see, the key marking criterion for ideas is Task Response. That is all about your answer and the ideas you use in your answer. It counts for 25% of your writing task 2 marks. For more information & tips, see this page: IELTS Writing Task 1 Marking Criteria & Band Score Tips.
Let me explain more about Task Response:
Task Response: Your Answer & Ideas
This is about answering the question with relevant ideas, which are well-developed and supported. This means the ideas you present are marked. How relevant and developed your ideas are will affect your band score:
| Band Score 8 | ideas are relevant, well-extended and supported |
| Band Score 7 | ideas are extended and support, but may be over-generalised or slightly lacking in focus. |
| Band Score 6 | ideas are relevant but may not be sufficiently developed and may lack clarity |
| Band Score 5 | ideas are limited, not developed enough and may contain irrelevant details |
As you see, the more relevant, focused, detailed and well developed your ideas are, the higher your band score. People who get a low score present ideas that aren’t explained well or connected to the task or that lack focus.
Finding Ideas for IELTS Essays
Here are some things you should do to improve your band score relating to ideas:
Step 1: Have knowledge of common IELTS Writing Task 2 topics. You must know what type of topics you are likely to be given and what the questions are likely to be. You must check if there are any topics that you don’t know much about. If there are topics you don’t know about, learn about them before your test. For example, are you familiar with these topics: factory farming (intensive farming), package foods and preservatives in foods? All these topics are part of the main topic of Food for IELTS essays. See this page for a list of topics and essay questions: 100 IELTS Essay Questions
Step 2: You must prepare ideas for as many topics as you can. In the writing test, you only have around 40 mins for writing task 2 so you can’t waste time thinking about ideas – you must have those ideas already in your mind. You can learn ideas for topics from looking at model essays online, but that takes time.
To speed up learning ideas for topics, I created an e-book to help you. You can find it in my store: IELTS Essay Topics E-books. This e-book contains ideas for over 150 common essay topics with relevant vocabulary so you can learn ideas for topics. Click here to see a sample: Ebook Ideas for Topics Sample Chapter
Ideas for IELTS Essay Topics E-book
Step 3: You must be ready to think about how to present those ideas to address the points in your essay. This means you think carefully how to explain those ideas and link them to the task given. This means both ideas and how you present them are important.
Step 4: You must explain those ideas thoroughly in your essay. You can add extra details, further information, more explanation, illustrations, examples and more. You add whatever you need to add to explain the idea fully. This is required for a high score.
Step 5: Planning your essay before you start writing is essential. Because you are marked on your ideas, you should spend time to think carefully about which ideas you will use and how you will present them. You should also plan how to explain those ideas fully for a high score. Plan all mains ideas and supporting points, then start writing.
