five academic words for IELTS hi there my name is Ben Worthington and we're
going to look at five words you can use in your IELTS writing task 2 and
fortunately for you these are collocations and collocations are
fantastic because they help you sound like a native speaker or writer in this
case also we're going to use them in examples using academic essays or
academic paragraphs we're also going to use these collocations to answer
recent IELTS task 2 questions or just to show you how you could have used them to
answer or how you could have incorporated them into your answer for
your IELTS writing task 2 so let's start with the first one
seismic shift I like this one it's a strong collocation and it's quite
descriptive as well and it means a big change
massive fundamental change like the internet was a seismic shift in one
example I've just written the phrase here the one in white it's the
government's attitude to immigration has undergone a seismic shift in recent
years most likely as a result of the perceived job insecurity of the
electorate so here I like this sentence and I'm not praising myself okay and
I seem like I'm praising myself oh you're so good Ben but what I'm actually doing is
I just want to highlight why this is a good sentence not only have we used less
frequent vocabulary such as undergone just like this has happened basically
but it's a little bit more sophisticated but we've also got topic-specific
vocabulary here which is job insecurity that's another collocation
you can use when we're talking about employment
and electorate as well this is like upper level and if you want to get a
band 7 or above you need to be using this type of vocabulary and constructing
sentences coherent sentences and ideally with these academic
collocations that I'm sharing with you so some recent questions that have
appeared on exams some people think that robots are important for human's future
development others think that robots have negative effects have a negative
effect on society discuss both views and give your opinion now interestingly
we're only going to use seismic shift once in our essay don't keep on using it
and sticking it in every paragraph just use it once so in this case we could say
undoubtedly robots and technology in general have had a seismic shift on
society or have brought about a seismic shift in society nowadays it's quite
simple I think to be honest okay this is why I like this one a lot because we can
use it in context once we get to grips with it i.e. once we
master it it is quite flexible but we do have to use it in the
right context next question houses should be built in
the same style as older houses in the local areas others disagree simple as if
we can just simplify it it makes my task much easier so we could just say
now this one might be a little bit trickier to use seismic shift we could
say that there's been a seismic shift in tastes and architecture in recent years
but that's a good example of me forcing that collocation into the sentence
because it's not really appropriate so I wouldn't use it I'd have
to think of a different one next one some people spend a lot of money
attending cultural or sports events is it a good thing or a bad thing
now here I would I could possibly say this I could possibly use this
because the example I would give I would talk about globalization and how the
winners have the amount the winners are increasingly gaining more and more
money and this is a seismic shift for sportscast over the last 30
years okay and anybody who knows anything about history will know that
sports 40 years ago the earning potential or the earning power of sportscast
30-40 years ago is nothing compared to nowadays so there has been a
seismic shift and here if I fashioned the sentence correctly there wouldn't be
an issue with using seismic shift in this context let's move on coupled with
this is more versatile and which is where we can say we're using two arguments at
the same time job insecurity coupled with increasing prices on a national
scale has caused widespread concern among the politicians in London so
it's like and in this case job security and increasing prices but what we're
doing is we're combining these arguments by using coupled with and also pay
attention we've got to use the preposition 'with' afterwards so job
insecurity coupled with increasing prices on a national scale has caused
widespread concern widespread concern that's a lovely phrase we can
incorporate into our academic writing once again widespread concern it's
similar to what I was using before as undergone you know these kind of phrases
this is what we're aiming for when we're writing our essays so some people
think that robots are important for human's future development easy paragraph 1
I'd say the rise of technology coupled with the increasing
importance of technology is definitely cause for concern among
many leaders politicians in society in general okay so coupled with
it's a good way of saying and/or both but use it in context and also make
sure you're using it grammatically correct one tip to make sure you are
using it grammatically correct is to write out about 10-20 sentences using
this phrase and get feedback on those sentences and then you realize you
you basically quickly get mastery over this useful phrase and do the same with
seismic shift if you're feeling ambitious combine them both next one some people
think that new houses should be built in the same style as older houses okay so
let's see so I don't know increasing technology the increasing technology
build increasing building technology coupled with increase coupled with
rising environmental concerns is a strong argument to not build houses in
the same fashion as previous as they were previously built okay so once again
I'm stretching it a little bit but it's not impossible okay next one some people
spend a lot of money attending cultural or sports events is it a good thing or a
bad thing let's see coupled with I probably
wouldn't include it here because it's only kind of one issue okay cultural
and sporting events so I wouldn't use it here I wouldn't force it's not
coming naturally and that's another good tip as well usually the first word
that pops into your head when you're searching for the word is the right one
and stick with that one if you see if you can find an opportunity to upgrade
it and you know and you're certain that it is the right one is correctly
used then do it and especially if you're in the exam it's usually better not to risk
it so to that end to that end it's similar
to in order to or so pollution as a consequence of economic growth has long
been considered inevitable to that end a lot of governments have shunned
considering alternatives shunned what does shunned mean
shunned means turned their back on they didn't want to consider these
alternatives to that end okay this is useful and it's quite versatile as well
so some people think that robots are important for human's future so
paragraph 1 I'm going to talk about the importance of robots for human's
future and let's say okay undoubtedly robots and technology in general have
become increasingly important for our future to that end people
have often considered the over-reliance
or to that end regulations have been considered I'd need to get the whole
paragraph together first before I actually use in 'to that end' okay so
likewise once again don't force it if it's not coming immediately let's
move on to the next one some people think that new houses should be built in the
same style as older houses in the local area so here for this question
some people think new houses should be built we could say body paragraph 1 we
could say the houses should be built in the same style should be built in
the same style actually in order to would be still better so I'm not going
to force it I was going to say in order to maintain the value and I think
I'd just say to that end to maintain the value no I'm going to stick with in order
to that's all yeah so likewise write out 20 sentences experiment with it get
some feedback and that's the best way you'll know
we'll move on to the next one I'm not going to do it I'm not going to do the
sports events another important fact thing to remember another important
thing to remember now I would use fact if you can and the reason why is because
thing doesn't sound very academic for example there are many things to
consider no there are many factors there are many components and also if we're
using thing there's probably a more accurate word we can use you know like
issue or aspects there's usually a better word than thing so anyway how do we use
this it's quite obvious I think it's like an additional point which is useful when
you're constructing your paragraphs so however another important fact to
remember the politicians are more likely to get re-elected for economic
performance than environmental protection now there are three reasons why
I like this sentence the first one is once again we're using topic-specific
vocabulary assuming this is about politics this essay but we're also using
collocations okay so we've used reelected we've used
economic performance and environmental protection but we've also introduced an
advanced writing technique called parallelism which I'll go into in
another video but basically it's like economic performance and sorry than
environmental protection we didn't say I'm more likely to get
reelected for economic performance and the environment it sounds it's
grammatically okay but it's not as smooth and it doesn't have as much style
as balancing it with economic performance environmental protection
okay and I'll go into it in more detail in another video so and this is quite
versatile to implement into your essay because we can use it if we've used
further more or in addition to okay but just remember
if you are going to use fact try and make sure it is a fact okay
perhaps a less risky version would be another aspect to remember because if it
is fact it has to be if you're using fact it has to be a fact obviously okay so I
think we're done it's going to detail with these it's quite obvious another
important fact to remember is that these robots cost money and the ROI has to be
interesting etc okay additional points detrimental effect I like this one I
like this one because we can use it instead of saying something like bad
which is rather basic so it' detrimental effect negative consequences
so an example I give Brexit will undoubtedly have a detrimental effect on
the national economy furthermore the impending implications
are still entirely unknowable okay detrimental effect so if you can say
that if you're reviewing your essay when you see a word like a basic word like
bad try and substitute it for something like detrimental effect okay so maybe
you've written the effects of the environment the effects of global
warming are very bad for society that can easily be upgraded to the effects of
global warming have numerous detrimental effects on society nowadays okay and so
these are just five ways on how you can improve your language and how you can
incorporate academic words into your essay okay
my name's Ben Worthington thank you very much for watching leave a comment if you
want any specific videos made and I'll try and do my best to produce that
specific video if you need any more help with your IELTS preparation then
you can go to I have ieltspodcast.com and yeah we can get some IELTS
materials and lots more assistance with your IELTS preparation okay
all the best and good luck and thank you for watching