• The purpose of an essay is for you to discuss a subject, express your opinion and give reasons for

your opinion.
• You are given an essay title and some notes.
• You must write an essay answering the essay question and using all the notes
o The notes outline three areas you must cover. The final note will always be your own idea.
• The title will ask you to write one of 2 types of essay:
o An essay in which you are asked to discuss a statement and give your opinion, e.g. Private
cars should be banned from city. Do you agree?
o An essay in which you are asked to discuss which of two things is better, e.g. Is it better for
students to study something they really enjoy when they leave school, or something which
will give them a good job?
• You should:
o cover the two points you are given in the notes as well as your own idea in the third point
o organise your answer in a logical way using paragraphs and linking sentences and
paragraphs appropriately
o express your opinion clearly on the subject of the essay
o give reasons and examples to support your ideas
o use a style appropriate for the situation (this should be quite formal, as it is an essay for your
teacher)
o write grammatically correct sentences
o use accurate spelling and punctuation.
• You have 40 minutes to do this part (the Writing paper lasts 1 hour 20 minutes, so if you spend
more time on this part, you will have less time for the other part).
 1. Read the instructions, i.e. the task (what you have talked about in class, the essay title and the
notes) carefully.
2. Underline the areas you must deal with in the essay title and in the notes. You’ll lose marks if you
don’t deal with them all.
3. Think and decide what your opinion or position is on the subject of the essay and why you have this
opinion.
4. Think and make notes about how you can cover the points listed in the notes.
5. Organise your notes into a plan. When writing your plan, decide how many paragraphs you need
and what each paragraph will cover. Your plan should include short introductory and concluding
paragraphs
6. Before writing your essay, check that your plan covers the three areas.
7. Write your essay following your plan.
8. Make sure you express your opinion clearly in your answer and that the arguments you express
support your opinion.
9. When you have finished, read your answer carefully. Check you have written between 140 and 190
words and correct any mistakes you find.

: If you write fewer words than the minimum, you probably haven’t answered the question/task
completely and you will lose marks. If you write more than the maximum number of words in the time, you
may make too many mistakes and risk being irrelevant.
• The purpose of an essay is for you to discuss a subject, express your opinion and give reasons for your
opinion.
• Your essay must be between 220 and 260 words.
• A question you have to answer + 3 options to choose from and BUT you have to pick two of them
o You discuss and compare them
o explain (with reasons!) which option you think is better, more suitable, nicer or whatever the
task asks you to do
o a few ideas in the smaller of the two boxes
o not compulsory to use them
o don’t copy them word for word
• Read the whole task very carefully and then choose wisely based on what feels best for you in any given case
• Keep your language formal
o no contractions (I’m, don’t, etc.),
o no colloquial expressions (Hey, what’s up?, I liked it heaps., etc.),
o no slang or phrasal verbs that convey informality (I’m bursting vs. I have had enough to eat; carry
on vs. continue).
• organisation and structure of a good essay
o Introduction
o First topic point
o Second topic point
o Conclusion
The 3 options are museums, sports centres and public gardens. Museums and sports centres are both buildings and
probably similar to talk about so I’m going to choose sports centres and public parks, just because we can contrast
them better in my opinion.

1. Introduction
2. Sports centres
3. Public parks
4. Conclusion

➢ organise your thoughts and ideas making a plan

➢ take the list we created above and add a couple of thoughts to each point so you know what you want to
write about
o Introduction (panel discussion, local authorities, sports centres & public gardens –> Which one is
more important?)
o Sports centres (public health, wide variety of activities, social aspect)
o Public parks (green lung of the city, place to relax from city life, social outdoor activities)
o Conclusion (sports centres better choice –> more variety, more social, greater health benefits)
➢ Brainstorm some specific vocabulary
➢ Check out these different ways of saying the same thing

o It presents the topic/question to the reader and puts it in context,

o introduces the topic points you are going to discuss
o creates interest and anticipation in the reader
Your topic paragraphs should be longer than the introduction and conclusion, but at the same time balanced and
about the same length between the two of them.

A couple of characteristics that are useful and important for every topic paragraph are the following:

o Start with a topic sentence that makes it clear what the paragraph is about.
o Always support your arguments with reasons and/or examples.
o Avoid being too personal unless you give your own opinion at the end of the paragraph.

o it immediately becomes clear what to expect from the paragraphs

o all the points from the plan are covered supported by arguments with some examples
o no use of ‘I’ in these paragraphs but the opinion on each point is clear → more general
statements (“It is widely known that…”, “considered by many as…”, “…can be seen”)
o balanced in terms of their length

o Summarise
o give your opinion on the topic
o answer the question in the task

Your opinion can be nuanced and doesn’t have to be simply black or white as long as you can justify what you say
 ✓ Participle clauses
When writing your essay, bear in mind what you’ll be marked
✓ Conditionals
on:
✓ Modal verbs
✓ Passive with reporting verbs
✓ Inversion
Have you answered all parts of the question? Is everything ✓ Cleft sentences
relevant to the question? ✓ Comparatives
✓ Relative clauses

Is the style and tone appropriate? Remember it should be

semi-formal and neutral.

✓ spelling
Does it follow a logical order? Have you used paragraphs ✓ subject + verb agreement
and linking devices? ✓ singulars / plurals
✓ articles
✓ question formation
Are you using a variety of grammar and vocabulary? Is it ✓ variety of tenses
accurate? ✓ dependent prepositions

Quick tip: Visit Thesaurus.com to study more synonyms!

• advantage = benefit, positive, upside

• disadvantage = downside, drawback
• effect = influence, impact, result, outcome
• problem = issue, challenge, difficulty, obstacle, setback, complication
• important = valuable, essential, beneficial
• expensive = costly, dear, high-priced, extortionate
• cheap = inexpensive, affordable, economical
• big = great, large, sizeable, considerable, wide, vast
• small = slight, tiny, little
At first sight, the essay has a title and 5 paragraphs (introduction + idea 1 + idea 2 + idea 3 + conclusion).
The paragraphs are visual and well defined, which is very important.
• The title summarises the topic of the essay. Another option is to use the question (What can people
do to help protect the environment?) as title. However, it usually tends to be too long, so I prefer to
summarise it into a shorter heading.
• Each paragraph has a clear purpose:
o Introduction: it introduces the topic in a general way, and it leads to the second paragraph
(first idea).
o Paragraph 2: it deals with idea 1.
o Paragraph 3: it deals with idea 2.
o Paragraph 4: it deals with idea 3.
o Conclusion: we express our opinion to conclude and summarise the essay.
• It uses connectors to define the development of the essay
• It doesn’t use contractions

• It is widely believed that…

• … is a common talking point./ It is a common view that…/ It is commonly thought that…/
• There is a common opinion that…
• There has been a change in…
• …is a controversial topic./ is very controversial.
• Over the last few years/ decades…
• There has been a lot of discussion of…/ There has been a lot of debate over…/ There has
• been a lot of controversy over…
• The majority of people (who I know) seem to think that…
• In modern life,…
• … has been getting a lot of newspaper coverage recently./ … has been in the news a lot
• recently. .
• For people nowadays,…/ (In my country) many (older/ younger) people (think/ say that)...
• It is often said that…
• In today’s society,…
• There are two very different points of view on the topic of…
• In our globalised world,…

• I will examine both sides below and then give my own opinion./ After looking at this matter from
both sides, I will…
• I have divided my essay into three parts.
• I will give three reasons for that below.
• I will look at/ write about/ examine/ consider/ discuss … and then …

• I’m absolutely certain that…/ I’m absolutely positive that…/ I’m absolutely convinced
• that…/ There can be absolutely no doubt that…/ I have absolutely no doubt that…
 • I am certain that…/ I certainly don't believe that ...
• It seems clear to me that…/ It is clear to me that…
• I would definitely say that…
• I have (absolutely) no doubt that…/ There can be (absolutely) no doubt that…/ I don’t
• think anyone can doubt that…/ Without (the shadow of) a doubt…
• In my honest opinion,…
• It seems obvious to me that…/ It is obvious to me that…/ Obviously…
• I really think that…
• I strongly believe that…/ I strongly object to (the idea that)…

• Although the arguments for/ against are also quite convincing,…/ Although there are also
arguments for/ against…
• Although there are both advantages and disadvantages,…
• I don’t have much experience of this, but…/ In my limited experience,…
• I’m no expert on this, but…
• In my humble opinion,…
• As far as I know,…/ I don’t know (very) much about this topic, but…/ To the best of my knowledge,…
• In my personal opinion,…/ I personally feel that ...
• I would guess that…/ I would imagine that…/ I would probably say that…
• Strongly agreeing
• I strongly/ totally/ wholeheartedly agree that…
• I couldn’t agree with… more.
• … is absolutely right.
• …makes complete sense.
• … is exactly/ just what I think.

• I can probably accept that…/ I might be able to accept that…

• I partially/ partly agree with…
• … seems to make sense.

• There’s no way I can accept that…

• I can’t agree with the idea of…/ I don’t agree at all with…/ I really don’t agree with…
• I can’t see any merit in…

• I don’t really agree with…/ I don’t think I agree with…/ I’m not sure that I agree with…
• I can see why some people might think that, but…/ I can understand why people think that, but…

Personal experience
• A relevant experience I had was…
• Although I don’t have (much) experience of this…,…
• Experience has shown me that…
• From personal experience, I would say…
• I (once) experienced this when…/ In my (personal/ limited/ own) experience,…
• This is supported by my own experience in that…
• I have (generally) found that…

• A (good) example of this is…/ An example from my own experience is…/ For example,…/
• To give an example,…/ One (typical/ well known) example of this is…
• For instance,...
• …, such as…
• Other people opinions and knowledge/ Things you heard and read
• According to an article that I read last week,…/ According to one of my professors…
• I once heard that…/ I once read that…/ I once saw a television programme in which…/
• Someone once told me that…

• This is caused by…

• As a consequence of this,…/ One consequence of this is…
• This is due to…
• … in order to…
• For that reason,…/ The main reason for that is…
• As a result of that,…
• Further explanation
• In other words…/ To put that another way,…
• That is to say…

• … but you could also say that…

• On the other hand,…
• It is also possible to argue the opposite point that…
• Looking at the other side of the argument,…
• Despite (all) this…/ In spite of all this,…
• Turning to the opposing argument,…/ Turning from the pros to the cons,…

• As should be clear from the arguments above,…/ For (all) the reasons given above,…/
• Taking (all) the things above into account,…
• Overall,…/ All in all,…
• Although the arguments against are also quite convincing,…/ Although there are also arguments for
(such as…)/ Although there are both advantages and disadvantages above,…
• On balance, I would say that…
• I therefore conclude that…./ In conclusion,…
• Having considered (all) the points above,…/ Having weighed up both sides of the argument,…
• The benefits of ... outweigh the drawbacks.
• To restate the arguments above,…
• As I said in the introduction, I am convinced that…
• To sum up what I have written above,…/ To summarise the points above,…
• On the whole,…

• The best idea is to…/ The best solution is…/ The best thing to do would be…
• We have (absolutely) no choice but to…
• The government should do something about/ find a solution for/ put more effort into/ work
towards/ deal with/ take action on/ take care of/ try to solve…
• We really must…/ We really need to…/ We really have to…/ We really should…
 Advantages of spending public money on space exploration:
• countries work together to further our understanding of the universe
• we may discover raw materials.
• possible new living space for the world's growing population.

Some opinions expressed in the documentary:

• It's human nature to want to understand where we come from.
• We should stop exploiting natural resources.
• The world's growing population needs further space to live.

SEE EXAMPLE WITH NOTES HERE