The IELTS Academic Task 1 question is the main reason many candidates fail to get the IELTS score they need.
One reason for this is that there are many different types of Task 1 questions, and this makes it hard for the candidates to master.
Below you will find a model essay describing a bar chart. This particular bar chart contains data about the past and a projection for the future.
The essay follows the following format:
Introduction: paraphrasing the description given with the task
Body Paragraph: containing all the main data
Overview: stating the main trends [this is something many candidates get wrong]
The Question
The Answer
The bar chart details how many students applied for PhD study at four Australian universities between 2009 and 2019, and also how many are anticipated to apply in 2029.
Queensland is consistently the most popular among the four, having seen almost 3,000 applications in 2009. Although that figure fell slightly in 2019, numbers will likely rebound to 2009 levels by 2029. Adelaide saw only a third as many applications as Queensland in 2009, but numbers have since risen steadily – increasing by around half by 2019 and projected to rise by half again. At Newcastle, applications were about 200 hundred below Adelaide in 2009; growth remained near flat in 2019, although looks to be rising sharply to exceed 1,500 applicants in the next decade. In Canberra, meanwhile, just 750 or so students applied for study in 2009 and numbers remained relatively stable in 2019 – but will, however, likely fall sharply to only a couple of hundred in the next decade.
Overall, there was no discernible trend between 2009 and 2019, with two universities seeing an increase in applications and two a decrease. In the next decade, though, three of the four expect to see a moderate to sharp uptick in interest; only Canberra is forecasting fewer applications in the coming years.
What Next?
If you would like to answer the same question, and receive professional feedback, purchase one of our Writing Correction Packages.
If you would like to buy a video about how to write IELTS General Task 1 essays, visit this page.
Or purchase our Academic Task 1 eBook, which gives you many more model essays with detailed explanations and exercises.
More Links
See how an examiner marks a Task 1