what do those mysterious Band 9 IELTS essays look like and why do so many candidates fail to
achieve even Band 7 in IELTS writing that's what you're about to learn in this lesson
we'll have a look at a full Band 9 sample answer which you can also download as PDF
it's Asiya let's get started [Music] our topic is coming from the official Cambridge practice tests
nowadays many people choose to be self-employed rather than work for a company organisation why
might this be the case what could be the disadvantages of being self-employed give
reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience
write at least 250 words the subject of employment or self-employment is regularly used in real exams
let me clarify one word self-employed are people who work for themselves rather than for a company
these are Freelancers for example an English tutor or an accountant an entrepreneurs who open a
business for example a shop owner now you can only get a high score in IELTS writing I mean from band
7 and up if you fully answer the question it may be easier for you to understand what's required
if you first determine what type of task you're looking at generally there are five types of tasks
advantages and disadvantages two views in your opinion opinion essays problem Solutions and two
direct questions take a moment to think about what type we have here the first question is why might
this be the case in other words why do people choose to become self-employed what are their
reasons or what advantages does self-employment offer in this particular case reasons and
advantages are the same thing the second question is what could be the disadvantages well this is
not a problem Solutions question as we need to provide the disadvantages not the solutions and
actually we don't have a problem the fact that people are becoming self-employed is not a problem
the two closest are number one and number five let's have a look at them a bit closer
so far we've agreed that we need to provide the advantages and disadvantages in our biasing
in the advantages and disadvantages question type the most common question is do the
advantages outweigh the disadvantages or which are greater so we must clearly
express our opinion explaining why the advantages are greater or the disadvantages
not giving a clear opinion when it's required is a major mistake do we need that in our essay
no all we need is to say what the reasons or advantages and the disadvantages are
our type is two direct questions in my courses we look in detail into each question type their
differences and learn how to express your opinion and how to answer each question type
I'll link the courses in the description if you'd like to check them out now let's concentrate on
the topic at hand for our question type the essay structure is quite straightforward an
introduction an answer to the first question and answer to the second question and a conclusion
but I'd like to draw your attention to the two keys to getting anything from band 7 and up
first key is to explore each question sufficiently in depth without adding any irrelevant information
the second key is to logically organize ideas in the essay so that each sentence follows from
the previous and all ideas are connected let's have a look at how it was done in this essay the
introduction an increasing number of people today opt to work for themselves instead of having a job
in this first sentence I directly paraphrase the task sentence you may choose to introduce
the topic more generally first but I decided that it's not needed in this case
this Choice has a number of benefits and drawbacks but will be discussed in this essay
as we concluded our task doesn't require an opinion so I'm just giving an overview of what
this essay is about I prefer not to give a summary of ideas in the introduction and instead keep it
for my conclusion otherwise it's hard to avoid repeating yourself the important point is that
your introduction is short and to the point keep your time for the body paragraphs in the first
body paragraph we're answering the first question why might this be the case I have two main ideas
to present self-employed May potentially earn more money than someone working for a salary
and they have more flexibility I mean they can choose their working hours holidays and
where to work from before you get into all the details and examples make sure you have a topic
sentence that introduces the whole paragraph here's mine some of the most common reasons
for self-employment are the income and lifestyle that it may provide so I introduced both my ideas
now I'm going to talk about the first unlike employees whose responsibilities and income
are determined by their employers people who work for themselves are free to implement their ideas
as quickly as they can and they receive all the revenue let's develop it further what does it mean
that means that self-employed people can potentially earn much more than those with
similar skills and experience who work for a salary now the second idea and a Linker moreover
not having a boss means that people can choose their own working hours and number of holidays
among other things this reason is clear don't think that you have to clarify everything if your
idea is clear don't repeat it several times make your point and move on to wrap up or to finish
this paragraph I'm going to sum up my ideas and Link this paragraph back to our initial question
not surprisingly more and more people are leaving the safety of a salary job to become self-employed
most IELTS candidates know they need to have several paragraphs in the essay
but it's equally important to have a logical structure inside each paragraph in this paragraph
it's clear what it's about when it begins and when it ends and it's very important for a good skull
in my courses we pay a lot of attention to this and learn formulas that can help you write each
paragraph of your essay but now let's have a look at body paragraph two now we're answering the
second question what could be the disadvantages of being self-employed here make sure that your essay
is balanced it doesn't matter whether you think that being self-employed is great or terrible you
need to give several reasons why people choose it and several disadvantages of it my disadvantages
or downsides are Financial uncertainty they don't know how much they will earn more responsibilities
and higher level of stress and the paragraph is despite the obvious appeal this phrase links this
paragraph to the previous one where we discussed the appeal or the reasons why people choose it
being self-employed is riskier than working for someone else a simple statement that describes
the whole paragraph the sentence is short but it's highly complex from the grammatical point of view
first I use the introductory phrase with the Linker despite
and put a comma where it should be despite the obvious appeal comma next being self-employed
being is gerund again a complex piece of grammar and finally I have a comparison with that
a complex sentence doesn't have to be long okay I've introduced the paragraph now the first idea
one of the risks is financial uncertainty simple and to the point band 9 essays can
have simple sentences let's clarify this idea entrepreneurs and Freelancers are not
guaranteed a certain level of income nor are they eligible for a pension paid holidays or sick leave
this is more complex nor are they eligible this is called an inversion
the verb ah is coming before the subject they nor are they next the workload may be higher too
a simple sentence and noun unlike employees who can specialize in one function
the self-employed are responsible for role of their business operations from attracting
clients to delivering products and services to Preparing their financial accounts to name a few
this is probably the longest sentence in my essay
various sentence structures one sentence may be simple and short the next may be long and complex
the multitude of issues that self-employed people have to manage so I'm already
summarizing the disadvantages I've named so far may cause them more stress and anxiety
than full-time employees tend to experience this is my last idea which also summarizes
my paragraph self-employed people face a number of issues which cause stress
so it's clear that the paragraph is finished all we need is a conclusion here is mine
to conclude more and more people are becoming self-employed so I'm restating what this
essay is about choosing the flexibility and unlimited potential this career path provides
that's the summary of the reasons now the summary of the disadvantages on the downside
these people are not guaranteed any income and must take full responsibility for themselves
short and to the point okay this essay is 286 words long I must say that I've spent a fair
amount of time on making this essay more concise on making it shorter while keeping all the ideas
if your English is Advanced and you can write fast your essay may go above 300 words that's not
a problem you need enough space to develop your ideas if however there is a risk that you may run
out of time before you finish keep your answer under 300 words of course this is just one way
to write an essay on one topic for your exam you should learn what types of tasks exist in Task 1
and task two how to answer each of them and what to write about in each part of your answer and
more generally what the IELTS writing requirements are and how to meet them I've designed my online
courses specifically to teach you all this these courses can help you prepare for IELTS
writing and speaking in less time and achieve a higher score I'm linking them in the description
actually you haven't seen the essay in full you can download it in PDF right now
thank you so much for watching me today good luck with your preparation and your exam bye