structure of agree or disagree essay

Free IELTS lessons signup

• Academic practice
• General practice
• Task 1 Academic
• Task 1 General
• Task 2 (essay)

IELTS agree or disagree essay - band 9 guide

This is a band 9 guide to writing agree/disagree essays in IELTS Writing. Agree or disagree essay questions are very common for IELTS Writing task 2 . This type of questions asks you to say whether you agree or disagree with a given statement and justify your opinion .

In this lesson you will see IELTS writing task 2 sample question + model answer and learn

• how to choose an opinion for agree/disagree question
• how to generate ideas
• how to give a band 9 answer for agree/disagree question

IELTS agree/disagree question sample

Let’s look at an example of IELTS writing task 2:

Big salary is much more important than job satisfaction.

Do you agree or disagree?

Provide relevant examples if necessary.

This is a classic example of agree or disagree question that you may get on IELTS Writing task 2.

You can watch our video tutorial on how to tackle agree/disagree questions in IELTS Writing:

Choose your opinion & generate ideas

Agree or disagree question asks you to clearly determine whether you agree or disagree with the statement. Unlike questions that ask you to what extent do you agree or disagree , this question asks you to have a super-clear opinion. After you’ve decided your opinion, generate 2-3 supporting points for it .

For the task above you have two possible options:

• You fully agree that big salary is more important than job satisfaction
• You completely disagree that big salary is more important than job satisfaction

 Now let’s generate supporting points for each of the opinions:

• Big salary is more important
• Having a job with a high salary makes people feel satisfied no matter what kind of job they do
• Money is essential for survival and good living
• Job satisfaction is more important
• Job satisfaction gives you a sense of fulfillment
• Doing what you like keeps you motivated and therefore leads to a career growth
• Money can’t buy happiness and it’s more pleasant to pursue what you’re interested in

For our essay, we’ll choose the second opinion.

Band 9 answer structure

After you’ve decided whether you agree or disagree and generated your supporting points, it’s time to start writing your essay.

There are a lot of ways to structure your essay, but we’ll use a structure that has been approved by many IELTS examiners to be high-scoring and coherent.

Band-9 essay structure :

Introduction

Body paragraph 1 - the 1st reason you agree/disagree

Body paragraph 2 - the 2nd reason you agree/disagree

Let’s take a look at each of these sections in detail.

Write your introduction in two sentences:

It is often argued that it is more advantageous to choose a job with high wage, even if it doesn't appeal to you at all.

I completely disagree with this opinion and think that job satisfaction is much more important than salary.

• Sentence 1 - state the first reason you agree/disagree .

First of all, I believe that job satisfaction gives people a sense of fulfillment that no money can guarantee.

To explain the reason effectively, you can imagine that your examiner has no knowledge of this subject at all and you have to explain every detail:

Even if someone is earning a high salary, but feels tensed and compromises with his conscience, this person won’t enjoy his life. While pursuing one’s interests will always bring pleasure and feeling of satisfaction.

For example, a lot of famous researchers made their career choices not because of appealing wages, but because they were passionate about science.

That’s why it’s more important to choose the kind of work that makes you happy than to look only at a high salary.

Secondly, doing what you like keeps you motivated and therefore leads to a career growth.

In other words, there is a strong relation between job satisfaction and productivity. People who love their jobs can easily excel in their fields of work and achieve better results than those, who put salary on the first place.

• Sentence 4 - support your idea with an example :

For instance, Henry Miller decided to leave his everyday job despite a good wage and ventured to become a writer. And after enduring years of ups and downs he became one of the most famous and well-paid authors of the twentieth century.

Thus, advantages of jobs that keep you satisfied outweigh the drawback of a low salary in a long-term perspective.

You can write the conclusion in one sentence that summarizes your opinion + 2 reasons for it :

To conclude, I strongly believe that job satisfaction is more beneficial than high salary because it makes people happy and motivated.

DO NOT write new ideas in the conclusion!

IELTS agree/disagree model answer

This is a full band-9 answer for IELTS agree or disagree question above:

It is often argued that it is more advantageous to choose a job with high wage, even if it doesn't appeal to you at all. I completely disagree with this opinion and think that job satisfaction is much more important than salary.

First of all, I believe that job satisfaction gives people a sense of fulfillment that no money can guarantee. Even if someone is earning a high salary, but feels tensed and compromises with his conscience, this person won’t enjoy his life. While pursuing one’s interests will always bring pleasure and feeling of satisfaction. For example, a lot of famous researchers made their career choices not because of appealing wages, but because they were passionate about science. That’s why it’s more important to choose the kind of work that makes you happy than to look only at a high salary.

Secondly, doing what you like keeps you motivated and therefore leads to a career growth. In other words, there is a strong relation between job satisfaction and productivity. People who love their jobs can easily excel in their fields of work and achieve better results than those, who put salary on the first place. For instance, Henry Miller decided to leave his everyday job despite a good wage and ventured to become a writer. And after enduring years of ups and downs he became one of the most famous and well-paid authors of the twentieth century. Thus, advantages of jobs that keep you satisfied outweigh the drawback of a low salary in a long-term perspective.

(277 words)

Ultimate IELTS Band 7+ Structure for Agree or Disagree Essay

The ultimate answer format that guarantees a 7+ Band in Agree or Disagree Essay

General Structure For Agree Or Disagree

When it comes to writing an agree or disagree essay in the IELTS exam, it is important to structure your essay effectively to present a clear and coherent argument. Here's a suggested structure to follow:

• Paraphrase the question.
• Begin with a captivating opening statement to engage the reader.
• Clearly state your position on the given statement, indicating whether you agree or disagree.
• Provide a brief overview of the main points you will discuss in the essay.
• Start with a strong topic sentence that presents the main reason supporting your agreement or disagreement.
• Provide supporting evidence, examples, or data to justify your position.
• Elaborate on the implications or consequences of your viewpoint.
• Address any potential counterarguments or opposing perspectives.
• Begin with a clear topic sentence that introduces another reason supporting your agreement or disagreement.
• Present supporting evidence, examples, or data to reinforce your stance.
• Analyze the implications or consequences of this perspective.
• Respond to any counterarguments or opposing viewpoints.
• Summarize the main points discussed in the essay without introducing new information.
• Restate your position clearly, emphasizing the strength of your argument.
• Provide a concluding statement that reinforces your stance and highlights the broader significance or implications of the topic.

Remember to use appropriate vocabulary and linking words to express agreement or disagreement effectively. Examples of words and phrases for agreement include "indeed," "undoubtedly," "clearly," and "it is evident that." For disagreement, you can use words and phrases such as "however," "on the contrary," "it can be argued that," and "despite." Additionally, maintain a balanced and logical approach, supporting your position with well-reasoned arguments and evidence.

Fill In The Blanks

Here's a fill-in-the-blank structure for a Band 7+ Agree or Disagree essay to memorize as a backup.

Introduction: In today's complex society, the topic of ___________ has sparked intense debate. While some individuals espouse the view that ___________, others staunchly disagree, positing that ___________. This essay will meticulously examine both perspectives, evaluating their merits and demerits, in order to arrive at a well-founded position.

Body Paragraph 1: Proponents of the statement argue that ___________. They contend that ___________ because ___________. For instance, ___________. This exemplifies how ___________.

Body Paragraph 2: Conversely, critics maintain that ___________. They assert that ___________ due to ___________. Additionally, ___________. This highlights the viewpoint that ___________.

Body Paragraph 3: In my considered opinion, I (agree/disagree) with the statement. I firmly believe that ___________. Firstly, ___________. Moreover, ___________. Additionally, ___________. Thus, based on these cogent reasons, I (agree/disagree) with the statement.

Conclusion: In conclusion, the multifaceted debate surrounding ___________ embodies robust arguments from opposing perspectives. While proponents emphasize the advantages of ___________, critics raise pertinent concerns about ___________. After meticulous evaluation, I am inclined to (agree/disagree) with the statement. It is crucial to (support/oppose) ___________ in order to ___________.

Remember to fill in the blanks with relevant points and provide supporting evidence or examples for each argument you present. Incorporate advanced linking words and phrases to establish strong connections between your ideas. This structure, combined with comprehensive analysis and a well-reasoned position, can help achieve a Band 8-level essay.

Example Essay: Impact Of Social Media On Mental Health

Question: To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statement: "Social media has a negative impact on mental health"?

In today's society, the topic of social media's impact on mental health has sparked significant discussion. While some argue that social media enhances connectivity and provides a platform for self-expression, others contend that it contributes to detrimental effects on mental well-being. This essay will delve into both perspectives, examining the potential benefits and drawbacks of social media on mental health.

Supporters of social media argue that it fosters connectivity and community. They contend that platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter allow individuals to stay connected with friends and family, especially over long distances. Moreover, social media provides a space for marginalized communities to find support and representation. For instance, individuals struggling with mental health issues can connect with others who share similar experiences, offering a sense of belonging and understanding. This highlights the positive impact of social media on mental health.

Conversely, critics assert that social media contributes to various negative effects on mental well-being. They argue that excessive use of social media can lead to feelings of loneliness, inadequacy, and anxiety. The constant exposure to carefully curated and filtered versions of others' lives can create unrealistic expectations and trigger feelings of social comparison. Furthermore, cyberbullying and online harassment are prevalent issues that can significantly impact individuals' mental health. These concerns highlight the potential harm that social media can inflict.

In my perspective, it is essential to recognize both the benefits and drawbacks of social media on mental health. While social media has the potential to foster connection and support, it is crucial to use it mindfully and with awareness of its impact. Firstly, individuals should curate their online experiences by following accounts that promote positivity and well-being. Moreover, setting boundaries on social media usage, such as limiting screen time and taking breaks, can help maintain a healthy relationship with these platforms. Additionally, promoting digital literacy and educating users about responsible online behavior can mitigate the negative effects of social media.

In conclusion, the impact of social media on mental health is a complex issue with compelling arguments from both perspectives. While proponents emphasize the connectivity and support social media can offer, detractors raise valid concerns about its detrimental effects. It is crucial to approach social media use mindfully, curating positive online experiences, setting boundaries, and promoting digital literacy. By doing so, we can maximize the potential benefits of social media while safeguarding our mental well-being.

• IELTS Academic Writing Task 2: Agree or Disagree Essay – Structure and template

One of the FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS of an IELTS essay. “To what extent do you agree or disagree? You can FULLY agree, agree BY HALF, or disagree.

To what extent do you agree or disagree? OR Do you agree or disagree?

For instance: After leaving school or university, young people should choose a job or career that they love, rather than one that pays the best salary. To what extent do you agree with this statement?

Below is an excellent Agreement / Disagree Essay structure.

There are 5 options – choose the one which  suits your ideas:

1) IF YOU AGREE (STRONG POSITION)

1§ Introduction: Paraphrase the Task + My Opinion: I agree that … (2 SENTENCES!)

2§ The first reason why I agree + Explanation + Example

3§ The second reason why I agree+ Explanation + Example OR result

4§ Conclusion: sum up the reasons + My Opinion: I agree ... (PARAPHRASE THE INTRO) (2 SENTENCES!)

2) IF YOU AGREE (BALANCED POSITION)

3§ The second reason why I agree + Explanation + Example OR result

4§ On the other hand, + why people disagree? + Explanation + Example

5§ Conclusion: sum up the reasons + My Opinion: I agree … (PARAPHRASE THE INTRO) (2 SENTENCES!)

3) IF YOU DISAGREE (STRONG POSITION)

1§ Introduction: Paraphrase the Task + My Opinion: I disagree that … (2 SENTENCES!!)

2§ The first reason why I disagree + Explanation + Example

3§ The second reason why I disagree + Explanation + Example OR result

5§ Conclusion: sum up the reasons + My Opinion: I disagree (PARAPHRASE THE INTRO) (2 SENTENCES!)

4) IF YOU DISAGREE (BALANCED POSITION)

1§ Introduction: Paraphrase the Task + My Opinion: I disagree that …(2 SENTENCES!!)

4§ On the other hand, + why people agree? + Explanation + Example

5) IF YOU AGREE AND DISAGREE AT THE SAME TIME

1§ Introduction: Paraphrase the Task + My Balanced Opinion: I accept that … , but I disagree that…(2 SENTENCES!)

2§: What I agree with +The reason(s) why I agree + Explanation + Example

3§ What I disagree with +The reason(s) why I disagree + Explanation + Example OR result

4§ Conclusion: Sum up + My Opinion: why I agree and disagree (2 -3 SENTENCES!)

Some IELTS examiners may prefer, when after your point of view, you also give the opposite - option 2) and 4). Here you will definitely write 250 words and will satisfy the examiner by stating different positions. Your point in the first and last paragraph should be as clear as a daylight. Choose a structure to suit your ideas and topic + what is easier to write personally for you. All 5 options are good. The best are 2 and 4.

How to master IELTS Writing: Task 1 & Task 2

• How to write an answer to ANY type of Essay task
• How to write an answer to ANY type of Graph task
• How to structure your answer
• What to write in each paragraph
• What grammar to use
• How to link your ideas
• What vocabulary to use
• What you should write to get a high score

Bonus: IELTS Punctuation PDF Guide Everything you want to know to have correct punctuation in your IELTS Writing for 7.0-9.0 Score (31 pages, .PDF)

• You are here:  
• Prepare for IELTS
• IELTS Writing
• Essay Structure
• How to check IELTS Results
• IELTS Academic and IELTS General: differences and similarities
• Computer delivered IELTS
• IELTS Band Scores and English levels comparison chart
• IELTS Exam: Test structure and Format
• Detailed Analysis
• Academic Task 1
• Academic Task 2
• IELTS Vocabulary
• IELTS Listening
• IELTS Reading
• IELTS Speaking
• IELTS Writing Course
• Punctuation Guide
• Teacher Training: How to Teach IELTS
• Teacher Training: IELTS Writing for Teachers
• IELTS Training Sessions for Teachers
• Master IELTS General: Letters

• Skip to primary navigation
• Skip to main content
• Skip to primary sidebar
• Skip to footer

IELTS Advantage

IELTS Preparation Courses

IELTS Writing: Agree or Disagree Lesson with Sample Answer

Agree or disagree essays: ielts writing task 2 lesson.

This lesson will teach you how to write ‘agree or disagree’ or ‘opinion’ IELTS task 2 essays that could score a Band 7, 8 or 9.

Agree or disagree question types are among the most common on the IELTS writing paper, so you must learn how to write them properly.

In this post, we will look at:

Deciding Opinion

Idea generation.

• Writing an Effective Introduction
• Writing Supporting Paragraphs
• Writing a Conclusion

We will use a question from an IELTS past paper to help us understand the task.

Many students fail to do well in this type of question because they do not have a clear opinion and they do not use an appropriate structure .

The best structure you can use for this type of essay is:

Paragraph 1- Introduction

Sentence 1- Paraphrase Question

Sentence 2- Thesis Statement

Sentence 3- Outline Statement

Paragraph 2- Supporting Paragraph 1

Sentence 1- Topic Sentence

Sentence 2/3- Explain Topic Sentence

Sentence 3/4- Example

Paragraph 3- Supporting Paragraph 2

Paragraph 4- Conclusion

Sentence 1- Summary and reiteration of your opinion.

That’s it! Four paragraphs.

Note : You don’t have to use this structure; other structures can get you a high score. However, this structure has been approved by IELTS examiners to allow you to write a clear and cohesive essay. This structure will allow you to focus on generating your ideas and then writing an effective essay.

In this essay, IELTS examiners want you to give a clear opinion, so you must decide when you read the question. You will also need to do this to write an effective thesis statement.

Let’s look at an example:

In some countries, many people suffer from health problems due to eating too much fast food. It is, therefore, necessary for governments to impose a higher tax on this kind of food.

Do you agree or disagree?

  With this type of essay, we have two choices:

• We agree with the statement or;
• We disagree with the statement

Some teachers advise you to partly agree and disagree. However, I would NOT recommend this because it often leads to an essay with NO clear focus and a CONFUSING structure.

Therefore, for this agree or disagree essay, you can say either:

• This essay agrees that governments should tax fast food or;
• This essay disagrees that governments should tax fast food

I think I will have more ideas for A, so I’m choosing that one. Always choose the one you feel comfortable writing about – even if you don’t feel that way. You don’t get extra marks for writing about how you feel; you want to give the examiner what they need to score your essay a Band 7+.

Now we have to think of ideas for why governments should tax fast food.

Here are some:

• Cigarettes and alcohol are taxed in the same way
• The money raised could be used to treat people with health problems
• Fast food companies should be punished for selling unhealthy food to people
• Making the food more expensive would stop people from eating it
• The money raised could be used to educate people about healthy eating

We don’t need to use all of these, just two for our supporting paragraphs. I will pick the first and the fourth ones because I know a little about these two and feel confident I can expand on them with explanations and examples. Remember, the examiner wants you to fully support your arguments, not just list many ideas.

Now we have two supporting ideas; we can move on to our introduction.

Introduction

As previously stated, we will use the following structure:

For a more detailed explanation, please see our post on writing an effective introduction.

To paraphrase  the question, we restate it with a different meaning using synonyms. I will also reorder the question. Here is the question again:

In some countries, an increasing number of people are suffering from health problems due to eating too much fast food. It is, therefore, necessary for governments to impose a higher tax on this kind of food.

Paraphrased: It is argued that governments should levy a tariff on junk food because the health risks associated with consuming this kind of food are rising. 

This is our first sentence.

We now need to write our thesis statement. This is our opinion in one sentence. This essay will agree with the above statement and will, therefore, look like this:

This essay agrees that a higher rate of tax should be paid by fast-food companies.

This is our second sentence.

We now need to write our third and final sentence, which is the outline sentence . This sentence outlines what you will write about in the main body paragraphs.

Firstly, alcohol and tobacco companies already pay higher taxes; secondly, higher taxes could raise prices and lower consumption. 

So our full introduction will look like this:

It is argued that governments should levy a tariff on junk food because the number of health risks associated with consuming this kind of food is on the rise. This essay agrees that a higher rate of tax should be paid by fast-food companies. Firstly, alcohol and tobacco companies already pay higher taxes; secondly, higher taxes could raise prices and lower consumption.

We now need to write our supporting paragraphs for our agree or disagree essay:

Supporting Paragraph 1

This paragraph should include:

• Topic Sentence
• Explanation

A topic sentence tells the examiner about the rest of the paragraph. In other words, it is a summary of your first idea. It should look something like this:

Higher excise on liqueur and cigarettes has proven to curb the harm caused by these substances.

We now need to expand on this point a little. A good way of doing this is to assume that the examiner does not know this subject, and you must explain clearly what you mean. Here is what this could look like:

This revenue has been used to treat health problems associated with these products and has proven useful in advertising campaigns warning people about the dangers of alcohol and tobacco abuse. Tax from fast food could be used in the same way.

We should now think of an example to support our point. Think about any recent news stories, studies or adverts. If you can’t think of one, make one up. The examiner won’t check if it is real or not.

The United Kingdom is a prime example, where money from smokers is used to treat lung cancer and heart disease while at the same time, pumped into health campaigns in schools to warn children about the dangers of smoking.     

That’s it. Four sentences. The full paragraph should look like this:

Higher excise on liqueur and cigarettes has proven to curb the harm caused by these substances. This revenue has been used to treat health problems associated with these products and has proven useful in advertising campaigns warning people about the dangers of alcohol and tobacco abuse. Tax from fast food could be used in the same way. The United Kingdom is a prime example, where money from smokers is used to treat lung cancer and heart disease.

Supporting Paragraph 2

We now repeat the same formula with our second supporting point- higher taxes will increase prices and reduce consumption.

Our topic sentence:

Increasing taxes would raise prices and lower consumption.

Explaining this further:

Fast food companies would pass on these taxes to consumers in the form of higher prices, leading to people not being able to afford junk food because it is too expensive. Junk food would soon become a luxury item, and it would only be consumed occasionally, which would be less harmful to the general public’s health.

We now support our point with an example:

For instance, the cost of organic food has proven prohibitively expensive for most people, and that is why only a small percentage of the population buys it regularly.

The full paragraph would look like this:

Increasing taxes would raise prices and lower consumption. Fast food companies would pass on these taxes to consumers in the form of higher prices, leading to people not being able to afford junk food because it is too expensive. Junk food would soon become a luxury item, and it would only be consumed occasionally, which would be less harmful to the general public’s health. For instance, the cost of organic food has proven prohibitively expensive for most people, and that is why only a small percentage of the population buys it regularly.

Four sentences.

Conclusion  

As stated before, a good conclusion for agree or disagree essays should include:

Sentence 1- Summary of main points

Sentence 2- Your opinion

Don’t write any new ideas in this paragraph.

A good conclusion should restate your thesis statement and your main supporting points.

In conclusion, junk food should be taxed at a higher rate because of the good precedent set by alcohol and tobacco and the fact that the increased cost should reduce the number of fast-food people buy.

Agree or Disagree IELTS Sample Essay 

 In conclusion, junk food should be taxed at a higher rate because of the good precedent set by alcohol and tobacco and the fact that the increased cost should reduce the amount of fast-food people buy.

I hope you found this ‘agree or disagree’ essay IELTS lesson useful.

About Christopher Pell

My name is Christopher Pell and I'm the Managing Director of IELTS Advantage.

I started IELTS Advantage as a simple blog to help 16 students in my class. Several years later, I am very humbled that my VIP Course has been able to help thousands of people around the world to score a Band 7+ in their IELTS tests.

If you need my help with your IELTS preparation, you can send me an email using the contact us page.

• Skip to main content

IELTS Podcast

Pass IELTS with expert help.

Agree or disagree essay for IELTS writing task 2

Home  »  IELTS academic task 2 » Agree or disagree essay for IELTS writing task 2

What is an “agree or disagree” essay?

• An “agree or disagree” essay offers a statement and invites you either to agree or disagree with it.
• For this type of task 2 essay, you are expected (1) to state your opinion clearly (2) to address all parts of the statement with which you are agreeing or disagreeing (3) fully to support your opinion with reference to further knowledge or experience

Sample “agree or disagree” questions

Here are some examples of agree or disagree essay questions.

1. “Modern life is increasingly chaotic.” Do you agree or disagree?

2. “The death penalty is barbaric and should not be legal anywhere.” Do you agree or disagree?

3. “Libraries are irrelevant in the age of the internet and should not be publicly funded.” Do you agree or disagree?

As an illustration, I’m going to discuss the third of these examples.

I’m going to argue that libraries are not irrelevant in the age of the internet, partly because (as a scholar and teacher of English) that’s what I believe.

It is possible to argue a case opposite to your own real opinion, but you are more likely to argue convincingly if you argue for a case in which you yourself believe.

Always read the question carefully!

• Remember our cardinal rule: always read the question carefully. This is a vital point and expanded on in the online IELTS course .

“Libraries are irrelevant in the age of the internet and should not be publicly funded.” Do you agree or disagree?

Here, it’s essential to note that the view with which you’re being asked to agree or disagree actually consists of two views:

“Libraries are irrelevant in the age of the internet”;

“Libraries should not be publicly funded.”

The two questions are linked, but not identical.

Stating your opinion clearly and decisively

Let’s consider an unclear statement of opinion.

“I suppose libraries are in some ways irrelevant, you can find most things you need on the internet, but after all it is good to have a place to go and study, and many libraries also offer other facilities like cafes etc.”

What is the problem with this way of stating an opinion?

First, the statement of opinion is indecisive, because it is prefaced with “I suppose”.

It is usually a bad idea to preface your statement of opinion with “I suppose”, or “it is my opinion that”, or even “I think that”.

The reader already knows that it is your opinion, because you are stating it!

Every time you are tempted to write “I think that” or “It’s my opinion that”, try simply deleting those words.

The sentence will usually be greatly improved without them.

The other problem with this way of opening your argument is that it is unclear which side you are on.

After the reader has finished reading the opening sentence, it is not fully clear whether the writer agrees or disagrees with the statement offered.

This is not to say that there is no room for subtlety or qualifications to an argument in your essay.

But the main line of your argument needs to be clear because you don’t have much space. Let’s try to find a better opening for the essay.

“Libraries are very far from irrelevant. The experience of reading a printed book is very different from that of reading a text on a screen, and much more is lost than is sometimes supposed when reading electronically.”

This is clear and decisive statement of opinion. A single line of argument is given, followed by a single main supporting reason for it.

Addressing all parts of the question

Let’s move on to the second main criterion, addressing all parts of the question.

Remember that you’re being asked not only whether libraries are irrelevant, but also whether they should receive public funding (vocabulary like this is great for your essay) .

Obviously, these two questions are linked: if libraries were irrelevant, there really would be no point in funding them.

Yet it does not follow that, if relevant, they must be funded. It’s good to demonstrate your awareness that the question has more than one aspect to it.

Here is an example of how you might do this.

“We have seen that libraries are very far from irrelevant. Clearly, this fact does not, by itself, show that they deserve public funding. Nevertheless, a good case can, in fact, be made for public financial support for libraries.”

With this transition between the first and second aspects of the question, you have done a number of things.

You have shown that you have read the question attentively, and have understood that it consists of two distinct parts.

You have also shown that you understand the need to provide support for your opinion on each part of the statement asked about.

Supporting your argument

Finally, let’s move on to the third criterion, the need fully to support your opinion.

Evidently, you are not expected to be an expert on any topic about which you might be asked to give your opinion.

You are not expected, for example, to have precise facts and figures about library use at your fingertips!

But you are being asked to show that you understand the general principle of the need to support opinions with reasons , with evidence of some kind.

Let’s consider what might count as supporting the argument that libraries are not irrelevant in the internet age. You would need to be able to show what it is that libraries provide that a computer screen can’t.

Here, “supporting” your argument might simply mean describing some of the valuable features of reading a book which can’t be reproduced by a computer.

Let’s consider an example of how this might be done.

“Not all the merits of books are replicable on a computer screen. Not only are books one of the simplest technologies ever invented, and therefore extremely easy to use, but they are also physical sites of memory. Many readers remember what they have read in a book by remembering the look, feel and even smell of a book as they have read it.”    

Watch this tutorial on how to give examples, then click here to subscribe to the Youtube Channel.  

This series of supporting arguments has a number of virtues. It points to a number of different specific ways in which books do things which can’t be done by computers; each of these features of books constitutes an implicit reason for valuing libraries.

It draws on the experiences of readers to support a more abstract general point about libraries.

In this tutorial, we have considered some of the main criteria for success in an “agree or disagree” essay.

We have understood the importance of:

• addressing all aspects of the question;
• stating one’s opinion clearly and decisively
• offering full support for all aspects of one’s opinion.

More resources

Take a look at some more IELTS task 2 essay questions to help you practice for your IELTS exam .

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How to write agree disagree essay in ielts.

Rephrase the question in the introduction, say whether you agree or disagree and will explain why in the following paragraphs. Then you need 2 body paragraphs with a main reason for your view and supporting arguments in each, and a conclusion which summarizes these main reasons.

Is an opinion essay the same as an Agree Disagree essay?

Yes, generally it is although the question might be phrased differently. You need to say clearly whether you agree or disagree with the statement and give at least two reasons why (that’s the opinion part).

Audio tutorial

You can download or listen to the audio version here:

MP3 Direct Download | Stitcher | iTunes | Spotify | Soundcloud |Subscribe: Android | RSS

Tutorials and Tips to Prepare for Task 2

• How to Get Ideas for Task 2
• Extremely Useful Sentences for Task 2
• Five Powerful Sentence Structures to use in your IELTS Writing test
• How to use comparisons in Task 2
• Concession Paragraphs for “do I agree/disagree essays”
• How to write an IELTS Essay Conclusion
• IELTS Cohesion and Coherence
• 3 ways to paraphrase for your Task 2 introduction
• Marking Criteria for IELTS Writing
• Topics Sentences for Your Essays
• 7 Ways to Improve your Sentences in Your IELTS Essays
• Grammar for IELTS Writing
• Academic Collocations for Task 2

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

• Ebooks & Courses
• Practice Tests

How to Plan & Write IELTS Opinion Essays

IELTS opinion essays, also known as ‘agree or disagree’ essays, come up frequently in the writing exam. In this lesson, I’m going to show you how to plan and write them step-by-step.

Here’s what we’ll be covering:

• 3 Common mistakes
• Essay structure
• How to plan
• How to write an introduction
• How to write main body paragraphs
• How to write a conclusion

Click the links to see lessons on each of these Task 2 essay writing topics. 

Once you understand the process, practice on past questions. Take your time at first and gradually speed up until you can plan and write an essay of at least 250 words in the 40 minutes allowed in the exam.

The Question

The first part of the question for an IELTS opinion essay will be a statement. You will then be asked to give your own opinion about the statement. Here is some typical wording that might be used:

• What is your opinion?
• Do you agree or disagree?
• To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Want  to watch and listen to this lesson?

Click on this video.

Here's a question from a past test paper.

A big salary is much more important than job satisfaction.  

Do you agree or disagree?  

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Write at least 250 words.

I’ll be using this question to guide you through the process of planning and writing an IELTS opinion essay.

3 Common Mistakes

These three errors are common in IELTS opinion essays.

• Not stating an opinion.
• Giving arguments for both views.
• Not supporting your opinion with clear reasons.

The most common mistake that students make is not giving an opinion. The question will clearly state that you must choose one side of the argument. If you fail to do this, you will get a low score for task achievement.

It doesn’t matter which side of the argument you take or even, that you agree with it. Choose the one you can develop the best argument for.

Make sure that you don’t change your opinion part way through the essay, and don’t give reasons for the opposing view.

Essay Structure

Now let’s look at a simple structure you can use to write opinion essays. It’s not the only possible structure but it’s the one I recommend because it’s easy to learn and will enable you to quickly plan and write a high-level essay.

1)  Introduction

• Paraphrase the question
• Give your opinion
• State two supporting reasons

2)  Main body paragraph 1

• Topic sentence – outline 1st reason for supporting this view
• Explanation – explain this idea
• Example – give an example  or expand the idea

3)  Main body paragraph 2

• Topic sentence – outline 2nd reason for supporting this view
• Example – give an example or expand the idea

4)  Conclusion

• Summarise opinion and key reasons

This structure will give us a well-balanced essay with 4 paragraphs.

We now need some ideas to add into the structure and we’ll have everything we need for our essay.

How To Plan IELTS Opinion Essays

# 1  decide on your opinion.

The question I've chosen to work on is quite straightforward and easy to understand so we don’t need to spend time analysing it. The first task, then, is to decide on our opinion.

Here’s the question again:

A big salary is much more important than job satisfaction.

Do you agree or disagree?  

For this essay, I’m going to disagree with the statement and argue that job satisfaction is more important than a big salary.

# 2  Generate ideas

The second task is to generate some ideas to write about.

Since I‘m going to argue that job satisfaction is more important than a large salary, I need ideas to support this view.

There are several different ways to think up ideas. I cover them fully on the  IELTS Essay Planning  page.

With this particular question, I immediately thought of a couple of examples of situations where job satisfaction did prove to be more important than a high salary, so I’m going to use the ‘example method’ of generating ideas.

Once you’ve thought of an example or two, ideas to include in your essay should come to you easily.

You might want to try this yourself before reading on for my ideas.

Here are my examples and some ideas they generated.

Both the examples are partly true but I've adapted them to better fit the essay. It's fine to do this as the examiner won't check your facts.

• Uncle Barry – boasted about high salary but hated his job. Nervous breakdown – lost job & can’t work.
• Me – gave up teaching. Now enjoy my work and am much more relaxed and happy even though I earn much less money.
• High-salary jobs are generally more stressful
• Stress leads to ill health, both mental and physical
• 40 hours a week at work – a third of the day
• Money doesn’t bring happiness
• Better quality of life
• Sense of fulfilment
• Less stressed – healthier and happier

I’ve got more ideas here than I need so I’m going to pick two to develop in the essay – one for each of the main body paragraphs.

Idea 1 – High-salary jobs are generally more stressful and can lead to ill health.

Idea 2 – Job satisfaction gives a sense of fulfilment.

We’re almost ready to start writing our IELTS opinion essay but first, we have one other small task to do.

# 3  Vocabulary

In an IELTS essay, it’s important to be able to say the same things in different ways, either by paraphrasing and/or using synonyms. During the planning stage, quickly jot down a few synonyms of key words you could use to save you having to stop and think of the right language while you’re writing.

For example:

satisfaction – fulfilment, achievement, sense of accomplishment, content, sense of well-being

salary – income, wages, pay, earnings

important – significant, valued, has more meaning

job – work, employment, position

With that done, we can focus on the first paragraph of the essay – the introduction.

How To Write an Introduction

A good introduction has a simple 3 part structure:

1)  Paraphrased question

2)  Thesis statement

3)  outline statement.

An introduction should:

• Have 2-3 sentences
• Be 40-60 words long
• Take 5 minutes to write

1)  Paraphrase the question

Start your introduction by paraphrasing the question.

     Question:  A big salary is much more important than job satisfaction.

                       Do you agree or disagree?  

Paraphrased question:  

It is argued that earning lots of money has more significance to people than being content in their work.

Note that I’ve used some of the synonyms I listed, although it’s fine to repeat one or two words if you need to. Above all, your language must sound natural.

In IELTS opinion essays, the thesis statement is where you state your opinion. For example,

    Thesis statement:  

    This essay totally disagrees with that statement.

That’s all you need to say.

If you decided to agree with the statement, you would write:

'This essay completely agrees with that statement.'

Finally in the introduction, you must outline the two main points (ideas 1 and 2 above) that you’ll cover in the rest of the essay. Do it in one sentence, or you can add them onto the end of the thesis statement if appropriate.

Outl ine statement:  

I believe that people are increasingly concerned about the risk of stress-related ill-health frequently experienced by people in highly paid positions and they care more about feeling fulfilled at work.

So, let’s bring the three elements of our introduction together.

     Introduction

This introduction achieves three important functions:

• It shows the examiner that you understand the question.
• It acts as a guide to the examiner as to what your essay is about.
• It also helps to keep you focused and on track as you write.

The two ideas in your introduction will become your two main body paragraphs.

Main body paragraph 1  – concerns about the risk of stress-related ill-health

Main body paragraph 2  – a sense of fulfilment at work

How To Write Main Body Paragraphs

The structure of a good main body paragraph has 3 parts:

• Topic sentence
• Explanation

If you can’t think of an example, you can add further supporting ideas but we already have our two examples so that’s not an issue here.

A common problem when writing main body paragraphs for IELTS opinion essays is having too many ideas. Again, we have already chosen the two ideas we are going to develop, so we are all set to start writing.

You can see how important the planning stage is and how it makes the actual writing of the essay far quicker and easier.

Main Body Paragraph 1

The  topic sentence  summarises the main idea of the paragraph. That’s all it needs to do so it doesn’t have to be complicated.

It plays an important role in ensuring that your ideas flow logically from one to another. It does this by acting as a signpost for what is to come next, that is, what the paragraph will be about.

If you maintain a clear development of ideas throughout your essay, you will get high marks for task achievement and cohesion and coherence.

We’ll now take the idea for our first main body paragraph and create our topic sentence.

Main idea 1  – concerns about the risk of stress-related ill-health

Topic sentence:  

Employees earning a large income are generally under significant mental and emotional pressure to perform well and achieve targets.

Next, we must write an  explanation sentence . This explains to the examiner what we mean. It expands on our first idea.

Explanation sentence: 

This causes many individuals to suffer high levels of stress which can result in both mental and physical health problems.

Finally, we add an  example  to support our main point. I thought of this in the planning stage so I have it ready to use.

If you can’t think of a real example, it’s fine to make one up, as long as it’s believable. The examiner isn’t going to check your facts.

Example sentence:

This happened to my uncle. He used to boast about his huge salary but the boss kept increasing his sales targets and in the end, the stress became too great and he had a nervous breakdown. Now he regrets being driven by the money.

That’s the 3 parts of our first main body paragraph complete. Here’s the finished paragraph.

We now follow the same process for our second main body paragraph.

Main Body Paragraph 2

Main idea 2  – Job satisfaction gives a sense of fulfilment.

First, we write the  topic sentence  to summarise the main idea.

Topic sentence:

Having a job that they enjoy doing, and in which they feel valued, is a major concern for most of the modern workforce.

Now for the  explanation sentence  to explain this idea.

Explanation sentence:

A significant number of people are giving up well-paid positions to do jobs which pay less but that they find more enjoyable and less stressful.

Finally, an  example  to support our main point. As before, I thought of this in the planning stage so just need to form it into a couple of sentences.

I am an example of this myself. A year ago I left the teaching profession because the workload had become too great and I am now a gardener. I feel really fulfilled in this work and I am much more relaxed and happy even though I earn far less money.

That’s the 3 parts of our second main body paragraph complete. Here’s the finished paragraph.

Now we need a conclusion and our IELTS opinion essay is done.

How To Write a Conclusion

Conclusions to IELTS opinion essays should do two things:

• Summarise the main points
• State your opinion

This can generally be done in a single sentence.

If you are below the minimum 250 words after you’ve written your conclusion, you can add an additional prediction or recommendation statement.

Our essay currently has 233 words so we’re on target and don’t need this extra sentence but you can learn more about how to write a prediction or recommendation statement for IELTS opinion essays on the Task 2 Conclusions page.

The conclusion is the easiest sentence in the essay to write but one of the most important.

A good conclusion will:

• Neatly end the essay
• Link all your ideas together
• Sum up your argument or opinion
• Answer the question

If you achieve this, you’ll improve your score for both task achievement and cohesion and coherence which together make up 50% of the overall marks. Without a conclusion, you’ll score below band 6 for task achievement.

You can start almost any final paragraph of an IELTS opinion essay with the words:

• In conclusion

        or

• To conclude

Now all you need to do is briefly summarise the main ideas into one sentence.

Here’s a top tip . Go back and read the introduction to the essay because this is also a summary of the essay. It outlines what you are going to write about.

To create a great conclusion, you simply have to paraphrase the introduction. Let’s give it a go.

Introduction:

Here is the same information formed into a conclusion:

That’s it. We’ve completed our essay. Here it is with the 4 paragraphs put together.

    Question:

   A big salary is much more important than job satisfaction.

   Do you agree or disagree?

Finished IELTS opinion essay.

Go through this lesson as many times as you need to in order to fully understand it and put in lots of practice writing IELTS opinion essays from past exam questions. Practice is the only way to improve your skills.

5 More Model IELTS Opinion Essays

This pack contains another step-by-step lesson and  model essay. P lus 4 additional opinion essay questions with model answers.

Carefully created to help you achieve 7+ in your Writing test.

Would you prefer to share this page with others by linking to it?

• Click on the HTML link code below.
• Copy and paste it, adding a note of your own, into your blog, a Web page, forums, a blog comment, your Facebook account, or anywhere that someone would find this page valuable.

Like this page?

More help with ielts opinion essays & other task 2 essays.

IELTS Writing Task 2  – T he format, the 5 question types, the 5 step essay writing strategy & sample questions. All the key information you need to know.

The 5 Types of Task 2 Essay   – How to recognise the 5 different types of Task 2 essays. 15 sample questions to study and a simple planning structure for each essay type.

Understanding Task 2 Questions  – How to quickly and easily analyse and understand IELTS Writing Task 2 questions.

How To Plan a Task 2 Essay  – Discover why essay planning is essential & learn a simple 4 step strategy, the 4 part essay structure & 4 methods of generating ideas.

How To Write a Task 2 Introduction  – Find out why a good introduction is essential. Learn how to write one using a simple 3 part strategy & discover 4 common mistakes to avoid.

How To Write Task 2 Main Body Paragraphs  – Learn the simple 3 part structure for writing great main body paragraphs and also, 3 common mistakes to avoid. 

How To Write Task 2 Conclusions  – Learn the easy way to write the perfect conclusion for a Task 2 essay. Also discover 4 common mistakes to avoid.

Task 2 Marking Criteria  – Find out how to meet the marking criteria in Task 2. See examples of good and poor answers & learn some common mistakes to avoid.

The 5 Task 2 Essay Types:

Step-by-step instructions on how to plan & write high-level essays. Model answers & common mistakes to avoid.

   Opinion Essays

   Discussion Essays

  Problem Solution Essays

  Advantages & Disadvantages Essays

  Double Question Essays

Other Related Pages

IELTS Writing Test  – Understand the format & marking criteria, know what skills are assessed & learn the difference between the Academic & General writing tests.

• IELTS Writing
• Opinion Essays
• Back To Top

 * New * Grammar For IELTS Ebooks

$9.99 each       Full Set   Just   $ 23.97

Find Out More >>

IELTS Courses

Full details...

IELTS Writing Ebook

Discount Offer

$7 each       Full Set Just   $ 21

Find out more >>

Testimonials

“I am very excited to have found such fabulous and detailed content. I commend your good work.”  Jose M.

“Thanks for the amazing videos. These are ‘to the point’, short videos, beautifully explained with practical examples."  Adari J.

"Hi Jacky, I bought a listening book from you this morning. You know what? I’m 100% satisfied. It’s super helpful. If I’d had the chance to read this book 7 years ago, my job would be very different now."  Loi H.

"Hi Jacky, I recently got my IELTS results and I was pleased to discover that I got an 8.5 score. I'm firmly convinced your website and your videos played a strategic role in my preparation. I was able to improve my writing skills thanks to the effective method you provide. I also only relied on your tips regarding the reading section and I was able to get a 9! Thank you very much." Giano

“After listening to your videos, I knew I had to ditch every other IELTS tutor I'd been listening to. Your explanations are clear and easy to understand. Anyways, I took the test a few weeks ago and my result came back: Speaking 7, listening 9, Reading 8.5 and Writing 7 with an average band score of 8. Thanks, IELTS Jacky." Laide Z.

      Contact

      About Me

      Site Map

      Privacy Policy

      Disclaimer

IELTS changes lives.

Let's work together so it changes yours too.

Copyright  © 2024     IELT Jacky     

All Right Reserved

IELTS is a registered trademark of the University of Cambridge, the British Council, and IDP Education Australia. This site and its owners are not affiliated, approved or endorsed by the University of Cambridge ESOL, the British Council, and IDP Education Australia.

Welcome Guest!

• IELTS Listening
• IELTS Reading
• IELTS Writing
• IELTS Writing Task 1
• IELTS Writing Task 2
• IELTS Speaking
• IELTS Speaking Part 1
• IELTS Speaking Part 2
• IELTS Speaking Part 3
• IELTS Practice Tests
• IELTS Listening Practice Tests
• IELTS Reading Practice Tests
• IELTS Writing Practice Tests
• IELTS Speaking Practice Tests
• All Courses
• IELTS Online Classes
• OET Online Classes
• PTE Online Classes
• CELPIP Online Classes
• Free Live Classes
• Australia PR
• Germany Job Seeker Visa
• Austria Job Seeker Visa
• Sweden Job Seeker Visa
• Study Abroad
• Student Testimonials
• Our Trainers
• IELTS Webinar
• Immigration Webinar

Agree Disagree Essays in IELTS

Updated On Oct 13, 2023

Share on Whatsapp

Share on Email

Share on Linkedin

Limited-Time Offer : Access a FREE 10-Day IELTS Study Plan!

IELTS Writing Task 2 Agree or Disagree Essay

The agree or disagree essay questions are the most commonly asked in the IELTS examination . They are also called as argumentative essays.  In this type of essays, you are asked to give your opinion, whether you agree or disagree on the particular sentence that is given. You are given 40 minutes to complete the 250-word essay. Most of the students find it easy because you only have to agree and disagree with the sentence given. You have to support only one opinion.

Tips to write Agree Disagree Essays

There are few tips which will  help you to write about IELTS agree disagree essay questions, which are as follows:

• When you get these type of questions, it is advisable to completely agree or completely disagree with it. You have to support only one point of view and not both.
• By doing this, the essay will be more clear and structured and can be easily understood by the examiner.
• You can support the other side of the statement if you want to, but make sure that you do it in a positive way and also say it, only in one or two sentences.
• While writing the essay, make sure that the explanation given doesn’t hurt the feelings of the other person.
• The choice of agreement or disagreement has to be made carefully. You need to choose the side which has more supporting points and which you can illustrate with examples so that the answer that you write is voluminous. Please note that you have to either agree or disagree and cannot do both.
• Also, ensure that the introduction of the topic is not too long. The question should be paraphrased to form the introduction.
• The explanation that you give regarding the topic should match with the introduction and the conclusion given.
• There will be two or three body paragraphs, make sure that each paragraph has a central topic.
• The body paragraphs should include the main features that have to be explained and also your overview and an in-depth explanation of your opinion.
• You have to compulsorily write the conclusion. If you do not have time to complete the essay, make sure you at least write 2 or 3 sentences of conclusion, but the conclusion should be included.

IELTS Agree Disagree Essay Structure

In all the sections of the IELTS examination, structure plays a very important role because it will be easy for the test taker to write the answer. Also, the examiner will find it easy to evaluate the answer. So here is the structure that you can follow while writing an agree/disagree essay:

Paragraph 1: Introduction

How to start an agree disagree essay?

First of all, like any other section, the first sentence must be a paraphrase of the question that is given. In the second sentence, you can state your opinion regarding the topic. In the third sentence, you can write on what you are going to explain in the forthcoming paragraphs.

Paragraph 2: Body paragraph

In the second paragraph, the first sentence should be explaining the central idea. In the second sentence, explain in detail, assuming that the examiner doesn’t know anything about the topic. In the third sentence, you can give examples which support the sentence. In the last sentence, you can give the opposing point of view, but in a positive manner.

Paragraph 3: Body paragraph

The third paragraph is very similar to the second paragraph. The first sentence should explain the central idea. The second sentence, should include  supporting details and the third sentence, examples which support the idea.

Paragraph 4: Conclusion

In the last paragraph, you have to write a summary of the essay. In the first sentence, you can sum up the body paragraphs and rephrase your opinion.

Sample Checklist for Agree/Disagree essays:

Agree disagree essay topics:.

• Some people who have been in prison become good citizens later. Some people think that inviting these people to talk to school students is the best way to tell them about dangers of committing a crime. Do you agree or disagree?
• The only way to improve road safety is to give much stricter punishments on driving offenses. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
• It is generally accepted that exercise is good for children and teenagers. Therefore, physical education and sport should be compulsory for all students in all schools. What do you think?

Take a look at some IELTS Agree/Disagree Essay sample answer

Also check :

• IELTS Writing tips
• IELTS Writing recent actual test
• IELTS Writing Answer sheet
• IELTS map vocabulary

Frequently Asked Questions

Can agree/disagree essays be called as opinion essays?

Can I partially agree?

Can I skip the conclusion part if I’m running out of time. What weightage does that one liner consist of?

Can I use the word “I” such as ” I agree” or “I disagree”?

What is the structure of Agree/Disagree essays?

Practice IELTS Writing Task 2 based on Essay types

Start Preparing for IELTS: Get Your 10-Day Study Plan Today!

Janet had been an IELTS Trainer before she dived into the field of Content Writing. During her days of being a Trainer, Janet had written essays and sample answers which got her students an 8+ band in the IELTS Test. Her contributions to our articles have been engaging and simple to help the students understand and grasp the information with ease. Janet, born and brought up in California, had no idea about the IELTS until she moved to study in Canada. Her peers leaned to her for help as her first language was English.

Explore other Writing Articles

Kasturika Samanta

Raajdeep Saha

Post your Comments

Recent articles.

Nehasri Ravishenbagam

Our Offices

Gurgaon city scape, gurgaon bptp.

Step 1 of 3

Great going .

Get a free session from trainer

Have you taken test before?

Please select any option

Get free eBook to excel in test

Please enter Email ID

Get support from an Band 9 trainer

Please enter phone number

Already Registered?

Select a date

Please select a date

Select a time (IST Time Zone)

Please select a time

Mark Your Calendar: Free Session with Expert on

Which exam are you preparing?

Great Going!

25,000+ students realised their study abroad dream with us. Take the first step today

Meet top uk universities from the comfort of your home, here’s your new year gift, one app for all your, study abroad needs, start your journey, track your progress, grow with the community and so much more.

Verification Code

An OTP has been sent to your registered mobile no. Please verify

Thanks for your comment !

Our team will review it before it's shown to our readers.

• Study Abroad Test Prep /

IELTS Agree/Disagree Essay: How to Write, Structure, Tips, Sample Answers 

• Updated on  
• Jan 2, 2024

IELTS General Writing Task 2 presents a challenge for test takers to craft comprehensive essays. One of the most recurring topics in this segment is the agree/disagree essays. Such essays prompt you to articulate your stance on a given topic, demanding concise, clear, and precise expression. Essentially, you aim to present your reasoned opinions with clarity and avoid redundancy or errors in grammar and spelling. For those seeking to delve deeper into the art of crafting impactful agree/disagree essays for IELTS writing task 2, this comprehensive article offers invaluable insights and guidance. Read the article to know more. 

This Blog Includes:

Ielts agree/disagree essay structure , how to write an agree/disagree essay for ielts writing task 2 , ielts agree/disagree essay: do’s and don’ts, ielts agree/disagree essay: sample questions with answers .

Mastery of structure is paramount for acing the IELTS agree/disagree essays. A thorough understanding of this format facilitates clear organisation and articulation of your opinions and arguments, leading to a more comprehensive and coherent response. That being said, have a look below to go through the IELTS agree/disagree essay structure. 

IELTS writing task 2 frequently features agree/disagree essays. Mastering this format is crucial for success, as these essays offer significant scoring potential. A strong understanding of structure and effective argumentation can pave the way for high band scores. In IELTS Writing Task 2, some essay prompts present a statement and require you to express your level of agreement or disagreement. With that in mind, let’s explore the key elements of crafting a successful agree/disagree essay for this task.

Introduction

This is the most crucial segment of any essay. You must ensure that your introduction is short, crisp and conveys your message. Two sentences are enough here. Whilst writing an agree/disagree essay, always start your introduction by paraphrasing the task question. Once you have paraphrased the task question, you must state your opinion on the topic, i.e., whether you agree or disagree with the given statement. This will let your reader know what you think immediately. 

Body Paragraphs 

Strong paragraphs play a critical role in structuring, articulating, and ensuring the coherence and comprehension of your agree/disagree essays in IELTS Writing Task 2. Fundamentally, three approaches exist:

• Full Agreement: In the first paragraph, present your compelling arguments supporting the statement. The second paragraph can further reinforce your position with additional justifications.
• Full Disagreement: Dedicate the first paragraph to clearly outline your counter-arguments against the statement. The second paragraph can strengthen your stance by introducing further dissenting points.
• Partial Agreement : The first paragraph should encompass reasons for aligning with certain aspects of the statement. The second paragraph then transitions to explore reasons for disagreeing with other aspects, ultimately presenting a nuanced perspective.

Your conclusion should be crisp and to the point. Brevity can be your ally in this case. One golden rule for writing impactful conclusions is to keep them one to two sentences long. Your conclusion should summarise the entirety of your essay in just a few sentences. Apart from that, you should avoid introducing new information in conclusions. Therefore, it is ideal to not introduce other reasons or topics at the end of your text.

Here is a list of do’s and don’ts that you must keep in mind while writing an IELTS agree/disagree essay. 

Here are the best practices for writing an impactful agree/disagree essay in IELTS writing task 2. 

• In your introduction, leave no ambiguity concerning your level of agreement or disagreement with the prompt.
• Structure your arguments logically. Organise your supporting points into distinct paragraphs, ensuring a coherent flow of ideas.
• Back up your arguments with relevant examples, statistics, or research findings to bolster your credibility.
• Engage in nuanced analysis. Beyond simply stating your stance, explore potential counter-arguments or exceptions to strengthen your overall position.
• Employ a range of sentence structures to maintain reader engagement and showcase your language skills .
• Maintain strong grammar and vocabulary. Demonstrate proficiency in English language mechanics to avoid detracting from your content.
• Limit yourself to writing only four paragraphs.
• Write a short conclusion.

  Here are the things you must avoid whilst writing an agree/disagree essay in IELTS writing. 

• Avoid ambiguity in your introduction. Ensure to make them as concise as possible.  
• Avoid jumping between points or omitting transitions. Doing so can confuse the reader and weaken your argument.
• Assertions without supporting evidence appear unsupported and undermine your credibility.
• Monotonous writing can bore the reader and limit your ability to showcase language proficiency.
• Grammatical errors or vocabulary mistakes can significantly lower your band score, regardless of the strength of your arguments.
• Avoid including too many different ideas. 

Sample IELTS Agree/Disagree Essays: Here are some sample IELTS agree/disagree essays that you can refer to whilst attempting the IELTS Writing Task 2. 

Question : When new towns are planned, it is important to build more public parks or sports facilities than shopping centres for people to spend their free time. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Ans: The discussion that governments must spend more money on railways rather than roads is a complex one. While railways do have certain advantages, I feel that roads should be given more priority because of several reasons. 

Roads serve as the backbone of any nation’s transportation system by helping them interconnect cities, towns, and remote areas to ensure accessibility. On the other hand, railways have limited reach and mostly cater to urban and semi-urban regions. Take India as an example where a significant amount of the population resides in rural areas where roads are vital, for commuting, transporting goods, and accessing essential services like healthcare and education. In addition to this, roads accommodate a range of vehicles ranging from bicycles and cars to buses and trucks. This versatility is not replicated by railways that primarily focus on long-distance travel and bulk transportation of goods. Therefore, roads play a crucial role in both city and inter-city transportation. 

Finally, the construction and upkeep of roads typically demand lower costs and shorter timeframes in comparison to the development of railways. This inherent efficiency in road infrastructure allows governments to establish and maintain a more expansive network with the same financial resources. The flexibility and adaptability of road systems contribute to their cost-effectiveness, enabling quicker implementation of projects and more immediate responses to changing transportation needs. This advantage becomes particularly crucial in regions where swift infrastructure development is essential for economic growth and accessibility.

In conclusion, while railways hold importance in a country’s infrastructure and overall development, the advantages and adaptability of roads make them more deserving recipients of government funding. Hence, I respectfully disagree with the notion that governments should prioritise spending on railways over roads.

Question: Governments should spend money on railways rather than roads.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

Ans : The discussion that governments must spend more money on railways rather than roads is a complex one. While railways do have certain advantages, I feel that roads should be given more priority because of several reasons. 

So that was all about IELTS Agree/Disagree Essays. Hope the blog has answered your queries regarding the topic. 

Ans. You can write a formal letter by including an introduction (Dear Sir/Madam), body paragraphs (1, 2,3 and more), and a signoff (I hope to hear from you, Yours faithfully). 

Ans. Test takers can use a range of linkers, adverbial phrases, references, and punctuations to bolster their overall scores in IELTS writing. 

Ans. The IELTS General Writing Task 1 (Letter Writing) requires individuals to complete the task within 20 minutes. 

Related Reads:

Visit the Leverage Live page of Leverage edu or contact our study abroad experts at 1800-57-2000 to strengthen your scores and application to secure your spot in your dream college. 

Shubham Das

Shubham Das has been working as an educational content writer for the past two years and has a background in filmmaking & screenplay/ teleplay writing. He is fascinated by the human psyche, literature and cinema.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Contact no. *

Connect With Us

25,000+ students realised their study abroad dream with us. take the first step today..

Resend OTP in

Need help with?

Study abroad.

UK, Canada, US & More

IELTS, GRE, GMAT & More

Scholarship, Loans & Forex

Country Preference

New Zealand

Which English test are you planning to take?

Which academic test are you planning to take.

Not Sure yet

When are you planning to take the exam?

Already booked my exam slot

Within 2 Months

Want to learn about the test

Which Degree do you wish to pursue?

When do you want to start studying abroad.

January 2024

September 2024

What is your budget to study abroad?

How would you describe this article ?

Please rate this article

We would like to hear more.

Have something on your mind?

Make your study abroad dream a reality in January 2022 with

India's Biggest Virtual University Fair

Essex Direct Admission Day

Why attend .

Don't Miss Out

• What can IELTS do for you
• Ways to take IELTS
• Who accepts IELTS?
• Sample test questions
• IELTS Trial Test
• Understanding your score
• Trust IELTS
• On test day
• Test centres
• IELTS One Skill Retake
• Cancellations, refunds...
• Access arrangements
• Getting and sharing...
• Improving your results
• Academic Institutions
• Why accept IELTS?
• IELTS Scoring
• Compare IELTS
• IELTS for your sector
• Get started with IELTS
• Verifying IELTS results
• Research reports
• Test statistics​
• Research funding
• Awards and scholarships
• Previously funded...
• News and Insights

Need help finding something? Enter a search term below

How to write an agree/disagree essay for IELTS Writing Task 2

Date Published

01 February 2023

This article was first published on WeLoveIELTS.org (this website is now closed)

Knowing how to write an agree or disagree essay is very important because if you get this type of task question in the test and you don't know how to approach it, you might not get a very high score. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

An agree/disagree question is very similar to the one above. Let’s look at two typical agree/disagree essay questions:

• Some people believe that nowadays we have too many choices. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?
• Living in a country where you have to speak a foreign language can cause serious social problems as well as practical problems. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

Can you see how these are similar to my question at the beginning? Both include a statement (= a sentence expressing an opinion) and ask you to what extent (= how much) you agree or disagree with it.

OK, so what are you going to do first? Start writing? Absolutely not .

After you’ve carefully read the task question and understood the topic, the first thing to do is to ask yourself to what extent you agree or disagree with the statement. There are three possible cases:

• You agree completely
• You disagree completely
• You partially agree (which means you also partially disagree)

Next, ask yourself: ‘ Why do I think that?’ This is a very useful question because by answering it you will start generating ideas that you will then include in your essay.

How many ideas should you come up with? In all three cases the secret is that less is more, so I recommend having no more than four in total.

Let’s have a look at an example from Cambridge IELTS 11:

• Governments should spend money on railways rather than roads. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

I’ve read the question and now I’m going to make some notes before I start writing. Here are my notes:

Partially agree - Both needs funding Why?

• Safety reasons
• Taxpayers expect government investment in both

Two main ideas. Now we have some direction and know where we are going with our essay. Should you now start writing? Not yet. You’ll need to develop these ideas, and the best way to do this is to give explanations, details, reasons and examples. Let’s add these to the notes.

• Safety reasons - Both roads and trains are widely used / all ages / need to be kept in good condition / if not, risk of crashes / example: Ponte Morandi collapse 2018 – Italy / lots of casualties / could have been avoided with more funding - maintenance / Trains are crowded at rush hour -> a railroad accident might be a terrible tragedy
• Taxpayers expect government investment in both - governments need to provide good services / citizens pay tax for this / example: train commuters pay to have efficient trains / if not – disruptions - late for work / same is true for road users / example: opening a new highway -> less traffic

Notice that I didn’t write full sentences but notes. Keep your full sentences for the essay! If you don’t do this brainstorming exercise before you start writing, the risk is that you’ll write whatever comes to your mind, and your essay will probably be confusing to read.

Top Tip: Think of how you’re going to structure your text. Keep life simple and always aim at four paragraphs: introduction, two body paragraphs and conclusion.

Introduction

Two sentences are enough here. In the first sentence you should paraphrase the task question. In the second sentence say if you (partially) agree/disagree so you immediately let the reader know what you think.

Two main paragraphs

Why these paragraphs? A paragraph contains ideas about a single subject and using them will make your essay organised, structured and easy to read. When writing an agree/disagree essay there are, again, three possible options:

• You completely agree - First paragraph: reasons why you agree. 2nd paragraph: other reasons why you agree.
• You completely disagree - First paragraph: reasons why you disagree. 2nd paragraph: other reasons why you disagree.
• You partially agree - First paragraph: reasons why you agree. 2nd paragraph: reasons why you disagree.

Remember: it’s much better to have few well-developed ideas than a lot of poorly developed ones , so when you write the paragraphs make sure to give reasons, examples and details. All these must be relevant to the reason you agree/disagree.

Again, keep life simple and write one or two sentences only. You should briefly repeat and summarise your answer to the question. Don’t introduce information that you didn’t mention in your paragraphs before. We need a conclusion to conclude right? So, don’t introduce other reasons or topics at the end of your text.

• Read the topic of the question and make sure you understand it
• Ask yourself if you agree or not with the statement in the question
• Brainstorm ideas before you start righting
• State your opinion in the introduction
• Use four paragraphs
• Logically organise the main paragraphs (for example, one for reasons why you agree and the other for reasons why you disagree)
• Extend and develop your ideas with reasons, examples and explanations
• Write a short conclusion.
• Start writing immediately
• Include too many different ideas. Less is more!
• Introduce more information in the conclusion.

Hope this helps you with your writing. Good luck!

• Accessibility
• Legal & policies

2024. IELTS is jointly owned by the British Council; IDP IELTS; and Cambridge University Press & Assessment

• A Beginner’s Guide to IELTS
• Common Grammar Mistakes [for IELTS Writing Candidates]

Writing Correction Service

• Free IELTS Resources
• Practice Speaking Test

Select Page

How to Start an Agreement Essay

Posted by David S. Wills | Aug 7, 2023 | IELTS Tips , Writing | 0

In IELTS writing task 2, you could be asked to write an agree or disagree essay, also known as an “agreement essay.” Today, however, I want to show you how to start an agreement essay . This will focus on the first few lines.

You can read my full guide to agree/disagree essays here if you want to learn about the overall structure.

What are the requirements of an agreement essay?

First of all, let’s look at what an agreement essay actually is and what you need to do. Here’s an example:

All cars that burn fossil fuels should be banned and electric cars should replace them. Do you agree or disagree?

An IELTS agreement essay will typically give you a statement and then a line that says something like:

Do you agree or disagree?

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?

• To what extent do you agree or disagree with the statement?

Your objective is to state whether (or to what extent) you agree or disagree with the idea expressed in the first line of the question. For the above example, you would either:

• Completely agree
• Partly agree
• Neither agree nor disagree
• Partly disagree
• Completely disagree

Your essay should explain your position and your view should be clear throughout the entire piece of writing.

Now let’s look at the first lines.

How to start an agreement essay

Considering the above, what should you write in the opening lines of your essay?

Generally, an IELTS task 2 introduction should feature 2-4 sentences that clearly tell the reader what the essay is about and what your opinion is. You should write 1-3 sentences that explain the overall idea (basically introducing the topic) and then you should write an outline sentence .

Important: Your opinion must be stated in the introduction . Regardless of whether you agree, disagree, or have no strong opinion either way, you must make this clear to the reader. If you fail to do this, you will not score band 7 or above.

Thus, here is how you should start an agreement essay:

You often hear people say that you should paraphrase the question. This is certainly a possible approach, but it presents many problems and often results in terrible first sentences. In fact, it can ruin your whole introduction. You can learn about paraphrasing here .

Examples of agreement essay introductions

To further explain how you can start an agreement essay, let’s look at some examples.

All cars that burn fossil fuels should be banned and electric cars should replace them.

Intro to sample band 9 answer:

During the twentieth century, people around the world began using vehicles powered by fossil fuels, and in this new millennium that trend has continued, with a vast uptick in the number of privately owned cars. However, it has become apparent that this phenomenon is causing major environmental damage and needs to be stopped. This essay will argue that humans ought to switch to electric cars.

Instead of paraphrasing the question, I have taken the approach of explaining the wider situation. This is much better! I have used the next sentence to give a more focused introduction, raising the idea of banning traditional cars. Then, I gave my opinion. It is nice and clear and the reader would understand the topic fully before reading the body paragraphs.

A person’s worth nowadays seems to be judged according to social status and material possessions. Old-fashioned values, such as honour, kindness and trust, no longer seem important.

There are numerous ways in which a person can be valued, and these vary widely from culture to culture. They also vary over time, and some people suggest that in the modern era it is more common for people to be judged according to their wealth, rather than personality attributes. This essay will argue that it is probably not true.

Again, you can see that I have avoided blindly paraphrasing the question. Instead, I started with a nice, broad overview of the main idea, then focused it specifically in the next sentence. My opinion is made very clear in the final sentence.

Note: This is a notoriously difficult question and many people struggle with it. I’ve made this video to explain why it is so hard and how people can answer it intelligently.

Using a computer every day can have more negative than positive effects on young children.

Nowadays, it is quite common for children to have access to some kind of computer, and some people argue that this is damaging for their health. This essay will look at both sides of the argument, but ultimately conclude that it is not entirely negative.

This introduction is a little more “standard” in that I have sort of paraphrased the question. Still, it is hard to see that it is paraphrased because it is totally my words and ideas. I have then given my opinion clearly. Note that this may seem like an introduction to a “ discuss both views ” question but really I just wanted to talk about both sides because I feel that there is no clear-cut answer here. In other words, I’m providing balance because I neither wholly agree nor disagree.  

Question #4

Some people think that women should not be allowed to work in the police force.

Traditionally, there were some jobs that could only be done by men. These days, however, it is common to see women doing jobs that they were once forbidden from doing. Some people still hold onto the traditional view in regards the police force, but this essay will argue that women shouldn’t be unfairly restricted.

This goes back to my favoured approach, which is starting with a general statement, then refining it to a more specific point. As always, I have made my opinion very clear in the essay outline sentence. Note that I have avoided personal pronouns by saying “this essay will…” This is a good way to increase the level of formality without making it convoluted.

When you start your agreement essay, you should introduce the main topic and then provide your opinion. That is the key to writing a great introduction. Keep it relatively simple and make sure that your primary aim is to let the reader know exactly what your position is. Don’t try to show off with any fancy language or complicated ideas. Just make it straightforward and your essay will be off to a great start!

About The Author

David S. Wills

David S. Wills is the author of Scientologist! William S. Burroughs and the 'Weird Cult' and the founder/editor of Beatdom literary journal. He lives and works in rural Cambodia and loves to travel. He has worked as an IELTS tutor since 2010, has completed both TEFL and CELTA courses, and has a certificate from Cambridge for Teaching Writing. David has worked in many different countries, and for several years designed a writing course for the University of Worcester. In 2018, he wrote the popular IELTS handbook, Grammar for IELTS Writing and he has since written two other books about IELTS. His other IELTS website is called IELTS Teaching.

Related Posts

IELTS Speaking: Best Friend

January 10, 2022

The Perfect Book for Studying IELTS Writing [Academic]

December 20, 2018

150 Idioms for IELTS [Free Download]

October 2, 2020

Describe a Skill [IELTS Speaking Part 2]

April 23, 2019

Leave a reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed .

Download my IELTS Books

Recent Posts

• How to Improve your IELTS Writing Score
• Past Simple vs Past Perfect
• Complex Sentences
• How to Score Band 9 [Video Lesson]
• Taxing Fast Food: Model IELTS Essay

Recent Comments

• David S. Wills on How to Describe Tables for IELTS Writing Task 1
• anonymous on How to Describe Tables for IELTS Writing Task 1
• David S. Wills on Writing Correction Service
• James Oluwasegun on Writing Correction Service
• Daisey Lachut on IELTS Discussion Essays [Discuss Both Views/Sides]
• Lesson Plans
• Model Essays
• TED Video Lessons
• Weekly Roundup

IELTS Agree or Disagree Essay

• Opinion Essays
• Discussion Essays
• Problem Solution Essays
• Advantages & Disadvantages Essays
• Double Question Essays

Example of IETS Opinion essay

• You should spend about 40 minutes on this task.
• Write at least 250 words.
• Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your knowledge or experience.

Structure of IELTS Opinion Essay

• Paragraph 1: Introduction
• Paraphrase the Essay Topic
• Thesis Statement
• Paragraph 2: Supporting Paragraph #1
• Topic Sentence
• Support (Example or Experience)
• Explanation
• Paragraph 3: Supporting Paragraph #2
• Paragraph 4: Conclusion
• Restate Thesis/Summarize your ideas

To what extent..

Example vocabulary and phrases: stating your opinion.

• In my opinion I believe that education should be free because it helps move society forward.
• As far as paying for education is concerned, I believe that you should have to pay because it creates competition which helps to develop stronger institutions.
• My impression is that education should require a cost whether it be through tax payer money or private institutions.
• Most institutions require tuition to attend. However. I believe that education should be free because it helps move society forward.

Example Vocabulary and Phrases: Arguing Your Point

• This proves that free education can provide many opportunities for those who cannot afford it.
• According to this, it can be argued that financial aid is a way to support students who cannot afford to pay for education.

Example Vocabulary and Phrases: Adding Adverb

Beginning of the sentence, middle of the sentence.

• Clearly, this is an example of numerous afford a proper education.
• This is definitely true because there are many students who are unable to attend school because they cannot afford it.
• Deciding whether education should be free is absolutely a major challenge to consider.
• The right to receive an education is substantially more important than earning money.

Example Vocabulary and Phrases: Verbs

• I disagree that education should cost students.
• I believe that education should be free.
• I have no doubt that society will benefit with free education.
• I think that education should be free.
• It cannot be denied that education costs money because teachers, faculty, and staff all need to be paid.
• As I see it, education has costs, so someone needs to pay for it.

Before You Start

• Think about how you will plan to write your essay.
• Brainstorm and generate ideas.

Outline structure for IELTS Essay

• ________________________________

Outline structure for IELTS Opinion Essay

• Paragraph I: Introduction
• Paraphrase the Essay Topic - I believe that everyone should have access to free education without limitations.
• Thesis Statement - Education is a valuable resource and it advances society.
• Education is tool that helps us succeed
• Germany - Free education
• Same philosophy - society advances
• Paying for education helps drive competition between institutions, but I believe this restricts social mobility.
• Student cannot afford education
• If every person of society is allowed to move forward, then all of society will benefit.
• In conclusion education is essential to any society
• By restricting access to it because of tuition limits societal advancements, it is important that we eliminate sort of barriers to education, Including costs.

Example Essay

• Thesis Statement - Education is a valuable resource and it advances society. If there are certain barriers to receiving education like costs, many students would lose the opportunity to pursue an education because of this.
• Education is a tool and it advances society and with free universal access to education, there are no limits to what a country and what a society can obtain.
• A perfect example of this Is Germany, where universities are now tuition-free.
• If all countries developed the same philosophy towards education as German. I have no doubt that society will benefit.
• Some may argue that paying for education helps drive competition between institutions and helps to develop stronger schools. However. 1 completely disagree because I believe this restricts social mobility.
• In other words, if a student who would like to pursue a degree In higher education, but cannot afford the high tuition rates then he or she will be unable to further their education.
• On the other hand, If every person of society is allowed to move forward, then all of society will benefit.
• In conclusion education is essential to any society.

Example Essay in color

Share this article

If you liked this article share it with your friends. They will thank you later.

Write For Us

I am always looking for new guest authors and I welcome teachers and individual bloggers to contribute high-quality guest posts to writing9.com. Read more »

How To Write An Agree Or Disagree Essay?

In writing task 2 you will be asked to write a discursive essay ( 250 words minimum ). You will be given a question asking you to give your opinion and discuss a problem or issue. You could also be asked to provide solutions, evaluate a problem, compare and contrast different ideas or challenge an idea. In this post, we will be focussing on how to write an agree/disagree/opinion essay .

One of the first things you should do is read the marking criteria  to see what the examiners expect. This is really important, as you need to know what they are looking for in the band 7+ boxes. 

You should be able to give the examiners exactly what they want, in order to get a 7+ band score. 

If you would like to purchase a 31  page PDF download that is easy to read and print out please take a look at the bookshop >

Writing Task 2 Agree/Disagree Essay Structure

The structure that I advise my students to use, will be sure to get you a band score of 7+. You need to practice using this structure, with as many questions as you can, before sitting your IELTS test. This writing task 2 structure has been proven to be successful for my students and when perfected, can easily help you to achieve a high band score. 

TIP >> Before you start writing, plan your ideas so that you can organise the information clearly. You must decide how much you agree or disagree and why. Take 5 minutes and plan out your ideas, opinions and examples. 

TIP >> It is very important that spend a full 40 minutes on this task as the score you get for writing task 2 is two-thirds of your total writing score. You also need to write a minimum of 250 words and use your own ideas.  

TIP >> Remember to write in a formal tone, this is an academic essay, and therefore your writing should be formal. 

IT IS A 4-PARAGRAPH STRUCTURE

Paragraph 1 – The Introduction

This is the introduction to the essay and where you should start off by paraphrasing the question. 

Do you understand what I mean, when I say ‘paraphrase’ the question?

This means that you rewrite the question in your own words using synonyms. You can’t just copy the question again or use the same words in the question. Paraphrase and show off your vocabulary knowledge by using synonyms. When practising your essay writing, use an online thesaurus  to help you. This is a great tool and can help you to learn many new words.

Then your next sentence should give your view/opinion on the issue. A good way to say this is to start with…I agree…. or I disagree…… or In my opinion, I believe that…….. 

The third sentence in the introduction should outline for the examiner exactly what you will discuss in the main body paragraphs. For example, Firstly this essay will discuss……… Secondly, this essay will discuss…….

There are three sentences you need in the introduction >>

• Paraphrase the question
• Give your view/opinion
• Outline the specific topics that will be discussed in the main body paragraphs.

Paragraph 2 – Main Body Paragraph 1

In this paragraph, you should write about your first main idea (opinion A) that supports your opinion on the issue from the question. You should give specific information and only write about one main idea in each main body paragraph. 

Start the paragraph by introducing the topic. This is where you need to have a topic sentence. The next sentence(s) should explain the topic, going into detail. The third sentence should give an example that supports the view.

The example you give could be something from your own experience or made up – it is ok to make up something as the examiners will not fact check your information. They want to see your ability to use English at a certain level. You could make up an example from a report, journal, newspaper or University study to support your view. 

This is how the paragraph should look >>

• Introduce the topic (topic sentence – opinion A)
• Explain/give detail

Paragraph 3 –  Main Body Paragraph 2

In this paragraph, you should write about your second main idea (opinion B) that supports your opinion on the issue from the question. You should give specific information and only write about one main idea in each main body paragraph. 

• Introduce the topic (topic sentence- opinion B)

Paragraph 4 – The Conclusion

In the fourth paragraph, you write the conclusion giving a summary of your main points and restate your opinion/views and justify them. You should not enter any new information or ideas in this paragraph. 

• Summary of the main points
• Restate own views/opinion/justify

Expressing your opinion

To get a high score in IELTS academic writing task 2, you should use as many different structures, collocations and idioms as you can.  

Sequencing ideas

You can use phrases like these to make statements, for example; On the one hand sunbathing can give your body vitamin D, on the other hand, it can also be very dangerous for your health. 

Sample Agree/Disagree essay

**All questions have been reported by students who have taken the IELTS exam.**

Obesity has become a huge concern as an increasing percentage of the population have become overweight and this has put a tremendous strain on the healthcare authorities, leading to increased costs. One solution that is being implemented is the introduction of more sports lessons in the school curriculum. In my opinion, I strongly agree that the integration of active lessons will greatly assist in kerbing obesity. Firstly, this essay will discuss how sports lessons will increase awareness of the benefits of having a healthy lifestyle. Secondly, this essay will discuss, the importance of combining exercise with a healthy diet.

On the one hand, I believe that the best way to fight health care problems is by utilising health education. By integrating physical education classes into the curriculum, impressionable young children and adults will be exposed to healthy lifestyle practices of sport and exercise, whereas they will also learn about teamwork and see their self-confidence grow. For example, at Westminster primary school in the UK, 10-minute exercise intervals were introduced between classes. The children must run laps around the playground before going to their next lesson. This formed part of a study by Cambridge University, where it reported that 85% of the children performed better on tests and obesity records were at an all-time low.  

On the other hand, in my view having more physical education classes in the curriculum is not the only way to teach young people how to have a healthy lifestyle. The children should be educated how to balance exercise with a healthy diet, so that this could extend, not only to the students in the schools but also to the parents. For instance, the NHS in the UK regularly hold talks in schools for both parents and students to educate communities on how to have a balanced diet. They also promote proper exercise, involvement in sports, and having an active lifestyle. As a result of this program, in some areas, they saw a decrease in the number of overweight health issues.

In conclusion, I strongly agree that having more sports lessons in schools will help to fight the growing number of overweight people. By combining this with a healthy diet, the students will be encouraged to be healthy, from a young age, right through into adulthood.

(Word Count = 385 / Band Score 9)

• Task Achievement  – The answer provides a paraphrased question, to begin with, followed by a clear opinion. The opinion is fully supported in the main body paragraphs in the essay, with fully extended and well-supported ideas
• Coherence and Cohesion  – The answer has been divided into clear logical paragraphs and each main body paragraph only has one main idea. There are cohesive links between the main body paragraphs and between most sentences.    
• Lexical Resource  – There is evidence of a wide range of vocabulary, with no errors in the text.
• Grammatical Range and Accuracy  – The answer has no grammatical errors. The sentences have a wide range of structures. 

TIP >>  Remember to give your opinion, state your opinion in the introduction clearly and develop your main body paragraphs around it. Use each of the main body paragraphs to support your opinion, giving examples that are relevant. In the conclusion, summarise your main points and restate your opinion. 

Writing Task 2 Band Score 9 Criteria

If you would like to view more high band score agree or disagree essay examples please click the button below >

We hope you found this post useful in helping you to study for the IELTS Test . If you have any questions please let us know in the comments below or on the Facebook page.

The best way to keep up to date with posts like this is to like us on Facebook , then follow us on Instagram and Pinterest . If you need help preparing for the IELTS Test, join the IELTS Achieve Academy and see how we can assist you to achieve your desired band score. We offer an essay correction service, mock exams and online courses.

Related Posts

IELTS Agree/Disagree Essay Sample 11 – Government

IELTS Writing Task 2 agree/disagree essay example that is a band score 8. The question is…

IELTS Discussion Essay Sample 7 – Government

IELTS Writing Task 2 discussion essay example that is a band score 8. The question…

Create profile

Like courses

Apply direct

Create your IDP profile

To continue your research, create your profile with IDP. Your profile allows you to:

• Apply direct to courses and receive a response within the same day
• Shortlist and save courses
• Get the AI course recomendations
• Access our cost of living calculator

Match with universities

Now create a profile

Create a profile and start liking courses. We’ll show you recommendations that match what you’re looking for.

Your password must include

• One upper case letter
• One lower case letter
• One special character
• At least 8 characters

Business Hours

Monday-Friday 1PM-9PM EST

Saturday-Sunday 11AM-6PM EST 

A Simple Formula for Organizing Agree/Disagree Essays

When you get to the essay writing component of the IELTS exam, the clock is ticking and the pressure is on. You have about 40 minutes to determine the key question to address, think of your response, come up with relevant examples and then write the essay.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you knew how you were going to organize your ideas before you went into the exam? In this blog, I’m going to show you a formula that can be modified to fit most IELTS tasks and will save you valuable time. Most importantly it will ensure that the message in your essay is easy to follow (one of the key criteria for higher level scores).

Today it is a popular belief that students attending high school should volunteer in the community as part of their schooling. I strongly agree with this notion. Volunteer work can provide young people with the experiences they need for paying jobs and it can also help them see themselves as valuable contributors to society.

When completing compulsory work activities with charitable organizations or community organizations, students gain skills that they can add to their resumes and use in future jobs. Working out in the real world quickly teaches young people the importance of time management, clear communication and teamwork. Employers like McDonald’s restaurants, who provide many young people with their first paying jobs, look for volunteer work on resumes as evidence of having developed some relevant work skills. So, although students are not paid for their time, they are building valuable abilities for future employment.

Perhaps even more importantly, when students volunteer, they are more likely to realize that their actions have a positive impact on the world around them. Often the problems of our world can seem overwhelming but if students are given the opportunity to help others, even in a small way, they will see that they can make a difference. In schools that have been running these programs, there has been an incredible boost in student morale and the community has benefitted from the talent and time that young people have contributed to the many programs that need support. It’s true that studying for academics is time-consuming and students already have a lot to do in a day but if we teach them how to step up and help others, we create a better future for us all.

In conclusion, it is a great idea to have unpaid community service as part of a high school program because it will help the next generation prepare for employment and it will build a caring community that is willing and able to make our world a better place. It’s my hope to see this in every school.

Now, let’s look at the underlying structure sentence by sentence.

AGREE/DISAGREE ESSAY - 4 PARAGRAPH FORMULA Paragraph One - Introduction

  Paragraph Two - Body

Paragraph Three - Body  – Repeat the above

Paragraph Four – Conclusion

What I hope you see from this example is that when you pay attention to how you organize your essay, it’s easier to read. I also want you to realize that it isn’t difficult to accomplish this clarity when you have a reliable structure in mind.

Check back for future blogs that will show you how to modify this formula for other kinds of IELTS essay tasks.

In the meantime, here is a blank template for you to use when you write your next agree/disagree essay.

AGREE/DISAGREE 4 PARAGRAPH FORMULA

Paragraph One -Introduction

Sentence 1:

___________________________________________________________________________

State the premise that the essay will address (you can simply rephrase the words in the task).

Sentence 2:

State your opinion in the matter.

Sentence 3:

Briefly outline what you are going to write in the next two paragraphs to support your opinion.

Paragraph Two and Three – the Body of Support

Sentence 1 (topic sentence):

Tell the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing your first point .

Assume that the reader doesn’t know anything about this topic and explain your point clearly.

Give a real life or made up example that illustrates and supports this point.

Sentence 4:

Concede to a relevant opposing position but redirect to yours.

Paragraph Three – Repeat the above

Sentence 1 (topic sentence)

Tell the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing second point .

Give a real life or made up example that illustrates and supports this point .

Rephrase your opinion and sum up your two supporting points.

Make a prediction or a recommendation based on what you have said.

By Angela Rutherford

Recent posts

• March 2024 1
• December 2023 4
• October 2023 4
• September 2023 11
• August 2023 5
• June 2023 1
• March 2023 3
• February 2023 2
• January 2023 1
• View All 181

Recommended articles

Find Your Course

With so many reputable schools and courses in Canada, deciding where and what to study can be an overwhelming decision. Chat today with an IDP expert who can guide you through your study options and assist with your application.

Our History

We are here to help connect people like you to schools across Canada. Our experience in Canadian education translates into the best outcome for you.

• Search for courses
• Find a university
• Find a scholarship

Please select a level of study

Enter subject, choose from the list or hit search

Start typing, choose from the list or hit search

Enter subject, choose from the list or or hit search

Please type and select an institution

Type 1 character of a university name and select from the list

Enter a university or school name and select from the list

Got any ideal countries in mind?

No Event Found.

Let’s get started

Sign up or login in with one click, sign up or login to save your courses, let's get started with "shortlist".

Your profile page will have the liked courses.

has been saved to your shortlist

View your shortlist or close this box to continue researching.

• Courses for you

IELTS Agree or Disagree Essay format: Works 100%. Guaranteed

In Writing Task 2 of IELTS , an agree or disagree essay is the most common type of essay. Essentially, a debatable opinion will be presented to you, and you have to propound a discourse either supporting or opposing it .

There are multiple ways of going about with agree or disagree essay questions. You can agree with the statements whole-heartedly or totally disagree with the claims. Likewise, you may decide to agree or disagree to a certain degree. All this depends on your perspective as well as the arguments you can think of during the test.

Examples of IELTS Agree or Disagree essay questions

WRITING TASK 2

You should spend around 40 minutes on this task.

Write about the following topic:

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge and experience.

Write at least 250 words.

Structure of IELTS Agree or Disagree Essay

Even though we can lean on one side of the argument partially or fully, I recommend to either completely agree or completely disagree with the opinion in agree or disagree essays in the IELTS test.

This is because regardless of what your personal beliefs are on the matter, scoring high in the IELTS Writing Test involves writing in a tightly-structured format with a clear position on the subject matter.

So, during the test, brainstorm for ideas regarding the topic, and choose to agree or disagree depending on how many arguments you can think of on either side. You need to write about two to four separate ideas in support of your position based on the following format:

If you have only two arguments, then develop them into two separate paragraphs with explanations and examples.

When you come up with three arguments, include two of them in one body paragraph and the other in the next.

Similarly, with four arguments, the two body paragraphs should consist of two ideas each.

You do not need more than four arguments for an agree or disagree essay in IELTS Writing Task 2. More is not always better. Too many ideas may make your essay disorganized and lacking focus.

Questions which ask “Do you think this is positive or negative?” can also be answered in the same format as the agree or disagree essay.

Introduction

As we have seen before, an Introduction paragraph in essays has three components.

• Paraphrase the statements from the question
• Pick a side: choose between agree or disagree
• Mention your arguments

The above paragraph is a good Introduction for IELTS agree or disagree essay question. The first sentence paraphrases the statement given in the prompt. The second sentence asserts that the essay agrees with the opinion as well as provides an argument. The third sentence adds more ideas which will be developed in the body paragraphs.

Body paragraphs

The ideas mentioned in the Introduction paragraph of agree or disagree questions should be extended in the paragraphs that follow. For this, clarification, logical reasoning, and evidences are needed . In Writing Task 2 of IELTS, two body paragraphs work best for an agree or disagree essay.

Just like the Introduction paragraph, the body paragraph also has a three-part structure:

• State your point
• Explain what you mean by providing reasons
• Give examples

Conclusion for Agree or Disagree essay

Like all other essay questions, the IELTS agree or disagree essay also ends with a Conclusion paragraph . It is here in this last paragraph that we summarize the points made in the body .

• Reiterate your thesis

Next lesson:

Advantages and Disadvantages essay in IELTS Writing Task 2

Related Posts

The government should control the amount of violence on television in order to decrease the violent crimes in society. to what extent do you agree or disagree, nowadays technology is increasingly being used to monitor what people are saying and doing (for example through cellphone tracing and security cameras). in many cases the people being monitored are unaware that this is happening. do you think the advantages of this development outweigh the disadvantages, ielts essay format: solving writing task 2 easily, a 3-step process for powerful ielts essay introduction paragraph.

sir is there difference between – to what extend do you agree or disagree vs do you agree or disagree questions?

The two questions are identical. “To what extent” means you can partially or completely agree or disagree with the prompt. Even when the “to what extent” phrase is missing from the question, you can still partially or fully take a side to argue for in the essay.

For practical purposes, there is no difference.

The official IELTS by IDP app is here! Download it today.

• IELTS tests IELTS Academic IELTS General Training IELTS UKVI IELTS One Skill Retake LEARN ABOUT THIS TEST What is IELTS Academic? Reschedule or cancel an IELTS test Find a test centre WAYS TO TAKE IELTS ACADEMIC IELTS on paper IELTS on computer IELTS Online LEARN ABOUT THIS TEST What is IELTS General Training? Reschedule or cancel an IELTS test Find a test centre WAYS TO TAKE IELTS GENERAL TRAINING IELTS on paper IELTS on computer LEARN ABOUT THIS TEST What is IELTS UKVI? Reschedule or cancel an IELTS test Find a test centre WAYS TO TAKE IELTS UKVI IELTS on paper IELTS on computer LEARN ABOUT THIS TEST What is IELTS One Skill Retake? Reschedule or cancel an IELTS test READ MORE ABOUT IELTS ONE SKILL RETAKE Where is IELTS One Skill Retake available? FIND THE RIGHT TEST IELTS for study IELTS for work IELTS for migration

Get your results

Check your provisional IELTS results online and do more.

How to organize agree/disagree essays on your IELTS exam

We're going to show you a simple structure for an IELTS agree/disagree essay that will enable examiners to make their way through your writing with ease.

Content Tags

When you get to the essay writing component of the IELTS exam, the clock is ticking, and the pressure is on. You have about 40 minutes to determine the key question to address, think of your response, come up with relevant examples and then write the essay.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you knew how you were going to organize your ideas before you went into the exam? In this blog, I’m going to show you a formula that can be modified to fit most IELTS tasks and will save you valuable time. Most importantly, it will ensure that the message in your essay is easy to follow (one of the key criteria for higher-level scores).

There really isn’t any mystery about it. Here, I’m going to show you a simple structure for an IELTS agree/disagree essay that will enable examiners to make their way through your writing with ease – as if they have a roadmap to follow.

Some people believe that unpaid community service should be a compulsory part of high school programs (for example, working for a charity, improving the neighbourhood or teaching sports to younger children). To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Today it is a popular belief that students attending high school should volunteer in the community as part of their schooling. I strongly agree with this notion. Volunteer work can provide young people with the experiences they need for paying jobs, and it can also help them see themselves as valuable contributors to society.

When completing compulsory work activities with charitable organizations or community organizations, students gain skills that they can add to their resumes and use in future jobs. Working out in the real world quickly teaches young people the importance of time management, clear communication and teamwork. Employers like McDonald’s restaurants, which provide many young people with their first paying jobs, look for volunteer work on resumes as evidence of having developed some relevant work skills. So, although students are not paid for their time, they are building valuable abilities for future employment.

Perhaps even more importantly, when students volunteer, they are more likely to realize that their actions have a positive impact on the world around them. Often the problems of our world can seem overwhelming, but if students are given the opportunity to help others, even in a small way, they will see that they can make a difference. In schools that have been running these programs, there has been an incredible boost in student morale, and the community has benefitted from the talent and time that young people have contributed to the many programs that need support. It’s true that studying for academics is time-consuming, and students already have a lot to do in a day, but if we teach them how to step up and help others, we create a better future for us all.

In conclusion, it is a great idea to have unpaid community service as part of a high school program because it will help the next generation prepare for employment, and it will build a caring community that is willing and able to make our world a better place. It’s my hope to see this in every school.

Paragraph One - Introduction

Now, let’s look at the underlying structure sentence by sentence.

AGREE/DISAGREE ESSAY - 4-PARAGRAPH FORMULA Paragraph One - Introduction

Sentence 1 :  States the premise that the essay will address (you can simply rephrase the words in the task).

Today it is a popular belief that students attending high school should volunteer in the community as part of their schooling.

Sentence 2 :  States your opinion on the matter.

I strongly agree with this notion.

Sentence 3 :  Briefly outlines what you are going to write in the next two paragraphs to support your opinion.

Volunteer work can provide young people with the experiences they need for paying jobs, and it can also help them see themselves as valuable contributors to society.

Paragraph Two - Body

Sentence 1  (topic sentence):  Tells the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing your first point .

When completing compulsory work activities with charitable organizations or community organizations, students gain skills that they can add to their resumes and use in future jobs.

Sentence 2 :  Assumes that the reader doesn’t know anything about this topic, and explains your point clearly.

Working out in the real world quickly teaches young people the importance of time management, clear communication and teamwork.

Sentence 3 :  Gives a real-life or made-up example that illustrates and supports this point.

Employers like McDonald’s restaurants, which provide many young people with their first paying jobs, look for volunteer work on resumes as evidence of having developed some relevant work skills.

Sentence 4 :  Concedes to a relevant opposing position but redirects to yours.

So, although students are not paid for their time, they are building valuable abilities for future employment.

Paragraph Three - Body – Repeat the above

Sentence 1  (topic sentence):  Tells the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing the second point .

Perhaps even more importantly, when students volunteer, they are more likely to realize that their actions have a positive impact on the world around them.

Often the problems of our world can seem overwhelming, but if students are given the opportunity to help others, even in a small way, they will see that they can make a difference.

Sentence 3 :  Gives a real-life or made-up example that illustrates and supports this point .

In schools that have been running these programs, there has been an incredible boost in student morale, and the community has benefitted from the talent and time that young people have contributed to the many programs that need support.

It’s true that studying for academics is time-consuming, and students already have a lot to do in a day, but if we teach them how to step up and help others, we create a better future for us all.

Paragraph Four – Conclusion

Sentence 1 :  Rephrase your opinion and sum up your two supporting points.

In conclusion, it is a great idea to have unpaid community service as part of a high school program because it will help the next generation prepare for employment, and it will build a caring community that is willing and able to make our world a better place.

Sentence 2 :  Make a prediction or a recommendation based on what you have said.

It’s my hope to see this in every school.

What I hope you see from this example is that when you pay attention to how you organize your essay, it’s easier to read. I also want you to realize that it isn’t difficult to accomplish this clarity when you have a reliable structure in mind.

Check back for future blogs that will show you how to modify this formula for other kinds of IELTS essay tasks.

Blank template for you

In the meantime, here is a blank template for you to use when you write your next agree/disagree essay.

AGREE/DISAGREE 4-PARAGRAPH FORMULA

Paragraph One -Introduction

Sentence 1:

___________________________________________________________________________

State the premise that the essay will address (you can simply rephrase the words in the task).

Sentence 2:

State your opinion on the matter.

Sentence 3:

Briefly outline what you are going to write in the next two paragraphs to support your opinion.

Paragraphs Two and Three – the Body of Support

Sentence 1 (topic sentence):

Tell the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing your first point .

Assume that the reader doesn’t know anything about this topic and explain your point clearly.

Give a real-life or made-up example that illustrates and supports this point.

Sentence 4:

Concede to a relevant opposing position but redirect to yours.

Paragraph Three – Repeat the above

Sentence 1 (topic sentence)

Tell the reader what this paragraph is about by introducing second point .

Give a real-life or made-up example that illustrates and supports this point .

Rephrase your opinion and sum up your two supporting points.

Make a prediction or a recommendation based on what you have said.

Share this article

You may also like.

The A to Z of IELTS: E is for Essays

Grammar 101: Understanding verb tenses

The A to Z of IELTS: C is for 'collocations'

Grammar 101: How to use who and whom correctly?

Words and phrases commonly misused

There vs Their vs They’re – Learn the difference

The difference between metaphors and similes

The difference between IELTS Academic and IELTS General Training

The A to Z of IELTS: B is for 'blue' and 'black' idioms

Reach a band 5 and higher in IELTS General Training Writing

• Useful links
• Who accepts IELTS?
• News and articles
• IELTS Masterclass
• Your IELTS results
• IELTS General Training
• IELTS Academic
• IELTS Online
• IELTS by IDP app
• Find a test centre
• Middle East
• Netherlands
• New Caledonia
• New Zealand
• Papua New Guinea
• Philippines
• Saudi Arabia
• Solomon Islands
• South Korea
• Switzerland
• Legal notices
• Privacy policy
• Cookie policy
• Copyright 2024 IDP IELTS

IELTS Compositions

Approaches to achieve higher band score in IELTS Writing

Essay Structure for “Agree or Disagree”

Not only will this page provide a structure but also templates that you can use when writing your own essay.

NOTE: An IELTS Task 2 essay will always have four paragraphs : Introduction, Body Paragraph 1, Body Paragraph 2, and Conclusion.

Typical Question Words :

• Is this a positive or a negative development?
• What is your view?
• What is your opinion?
• Do you think it is a good or a bad thing?
• How far do you agree or disagree?

Sample Question: Wild animals have no place in the 21 st century. Some people think that preventing these wild animals from dying out is a waste of resource. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Introduction

Sentence 1 – paraphrase the statement.

It is best if you try to choose which words are easy to be paraphrased.

Wild animals have no place in the 21 st century . Some people think that preventing these wild animals from dying out is a waste of resource.

• wild – untamed, undomesticated, feral
• animals – creatures
• have no place – serve no purpose
• in the 21st century – nowadays, in this modern world
• some – several
• people – individuals
• think – assert, believe, argue, contend, assume, insist
• dying out – extinction
• waste – squander

So if we attempt to paraphrase, it would be like this:

“Nowadays, it is argued that undomesticated creatures serve no purpose. Several individuals believe that preventing them from extinction is a squander of resources.”

The phrase “it is argued that” is quite important here because in IELTS, the technique hedging is necessary to indicate that you, as a writer, should not sound know-it-all and that the statement is not entirely a fact.

Sentence 2 – Write a thesis statement

The next sentence will now be your answer to the question “Do you agree or disagree?” So how will you answer you answer this question?

In the last sentence, the questions is “ To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion “. To answer this, you need to specify:

• “This essay totally agrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay completely agrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay strongly agrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay is strongly in favor to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay firmly agrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay totally disagrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay completely disagrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay strongly disagrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay is strongly against the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay firmly disagrees to the given statement due to (reason 1) + (reason 2).”
• “This essay partially agrees to the given statement since (reason 1) + (reason 2).”

NOTE: As for (reason 1) and (reason 2), these should only be brief.

Sentence 3 – Write an Outline Sentence

This is basically what you plan to do for your essay. You may use this template:

“In this essay, I shall elaborate the reasons provided.”

Quite simple right? Again, what are you planning to do? To elaborate the Reason 1 and Reason 2.

However, some students cannot provide a brief explanation for their reason. Hence, it will be easier to write both the thesis statement and the outline sentence.

“This essay [totally/partially] [agrees/disagrees] to the given statement and I shall provide the reasons in the following paragraphs.”

As you can see, the sentence above can still answer the question “Do you agree or disagree?” and “What are you planning to do with your essay?”

NOTE: Before writing anything on your answer sheet, it is best to plan everything. But for this to be easily understood, the planning process will only show templates.

Body Paragraph 1

Sentence 1 – state your reason.

Writing your reason first will serve as the main topic which needs to be elaborated. Begin by writing:

• “The [major/primary] reason as to why I [agree/disagree] is that (reason 1).”
• “One of the significant reasons why I [agree/disagree] is (reason 1).

NOTE: This is only a simple template. There will be more complex phrases on model answers.

Sentence 2 – Explain your reason

Your main reason might need to be elaborated further to be understood by your readers. You may write:

• “This is because of…”
• “This is due to…”

Sentence 3 – Provide an example

You have to provide a specific example that could further support the aforementioned statements. It may be in a form of a survey, statistics, research, or a specific happening in the past. You may start by writing:

• “For instance, …”
• “To exemplify, …”
• “To illustrate, …”
• “For example, …”

Sentence 4 – Add a minor point

In most cases, when writing for task 2, test-takers might not reach the minimum word count. By adding a minor point, if necessary, you might reach more than 250 words. In other words, this is just an optional part of the body paragraph.

You start your minor point with cohesive devices such as:

• “Furthermore, …”
• “In addition, …”
• “Moreover, …”
• “On top of that, …”

Body Paragraph 2

Sentence 1 – provide another reason.

The structure for Body Paragraph 1 and 2 is quite similar. The only difference will only be how you will begin your 2nd body paragraph.

If you strongly agree or strongly disagree, you are supposed to provide another reason under the same opinion.

These are some of the ways to begin your 2nd body paragraph:

• “Another reason is… (reason 2).”
• Furthermore, … (reason 2).”

But if you want to provide another valid point opposed to your first opinion, begin with:

• “Nevertheless, … (reason 1 of the opposed opinion).”
• “It cannot be denied… (reason 1 of the opposed opinion).”
• “On the other hand, … (reason 1 of the opposed opinion).”

This part is the last paragraph where you need to give summary of the main point in the body paragraphs. So what are these main points? The main reasons which are written in the first part of your body paragraphs. However, there are times that writers also summarize some parts of their explanation.

Here are some ways to start your conclusion:

• “In conclusion, …”
• “To sum up, …”
• “To recapitulate, …”
• ‘To encapsulate, …”

Now that we are done discussing the structure of the agree/disagree essay, let’s go back to the sample question above with its model answer.

Wild animals have no place in the 21 st century. Some people think that preventing these wild animals from dying out is a waste of resource. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Undomesticated creatures serve no purpose in this contemporary era. Several individuals believe that saving them from extinction is a squander of resources. This essay is completely against the given statement due to its impact on the ecological balance. In this essay, I shall elaborate on the reason provided.

One of the main factors for disagreeing is due to the importance of wildlife’s existence in maintaining the balance of nature. This is because the disappearance or the decline of the population of one creature may either result in the complete extermination or an alarming increase of another. To illustrate, if the amphibian population are to decrease in a certain area, insects would probably increase in number, thus increasing the chances of insect-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue fever.

Another factor to consider is that the natural environment significantly relies on the animal kingdom. Animal defecation is essential for the earth to act as a natural fertilizer which in turn can help grow fruit-bearing trees for herbivores and humans as well. Moreover, birds and insects play a significant role in pollination. Hence, diverse flora could grow along with an adequate number of pollen-carrying animals. To exemplify, nearly half of Bhutan is protected by the law, stating that it is should remain under forest cover. Citizens of the said country rely on agroforestry, all the while, having one of the most diverse wildlife throughout Asia.

To recapitulate, wild animals provide a significant purpose in maintaining the balance of nature as well as allowing the environment to naturally flourish.

Word Count – 256 words

This time, try to go back to the structure and match the parts in the essay to the templates.

Share this:

Published by ielts compositions.

A guide to IELTS Writing View more posts

Leave a comment Cancel reply

• Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
• Subscribe Subscribed
• Copy shortlink
• Report this content
• View post in Reader
• Manage subscriptions
• Collapse this bar

An opinion essay

Learn how to write an opinion essay.

Do the preparation task first. Then read the text and tips and do the exercises.

Preparation

Matching_MjMxMDM=

Some people think that some types of criminals should not go to prison. Instead they should do unpaid work in the community. To what extent do you agree?

Owing to the great variety of crimes that can be punishable by prison, some people argue that not all criminals are the same and it would therefore be more appropriate to give certain criminals community service instead. I agree that in some cases, prison may not be the best solution and community service would probably have more benefits.

One justification given for prisons is to keep society safe by removing criminals from the outside world. So the first thing to consider is if someone who has broken the law is a danger to other people. In the case of violent crime, there is an argument to keep the perpetrator away from society. However, burglary or possession of drugs, for example, does not involve violence against other people so the criminal does not present a direct danger to anyone in the community. Keeping these types of criminals in prison is expensive for the taxpayer and does not appear to be an effective punishment as they often commit the same crime again when they come out of prison.

Personally, I also believe punishments should reform people so they do not reoffend. A further reason not to put these people in prison is that they may mix with more dangerous and violent criminals, potentially committing a worse crime when they are released. By keeping them in the community, helping others, they not only learn new skills, but they could also develop more empathy and care towards others. If this occurs, society can only benefit.

Critics of this more rehabilitative approach to crime believe that justice should be harsh in order to deter people from committing similar crimes and that community service could be less likely to have that effect. However, there is very little evidence to suggest that long prison sentences deter criminals.

In conclusion, putting criminals who are not a danger to society in prison is expensive and, in my opinion, ineffective, both as a deterrent and as a form of rehabilitation. Community service for non-violent crimes benefits both society and the offender. That said, it would be useful to have more data to work out whether community service or prison is more likely to stop someone reoffending. I strongly believe that decisions on how best to deal with criminals should be based on evidence of what actually works.

• Introduce your essay by restating the question in your own words.
• If the essay asks you to what extent do you agree?,  make your opinion clear throughout. You can either agree, partially agree or disagree with the statement, explaining and justifying your opinion.
• Introduction
• The first reason why you agree/disagree
• The second reason why you agree/disagree
• The third reason why you agree/disagree (if you have one)
• Use phrases to organise and link your ideas, e.g. Owing to … , One justification for … , The first thing to consider is … , A further reason … , In conclusion ... .
• If you do not have solid evidence for your ideas, use modal verbs such as might , may or could  (e.g. they could  develop more empathy and care ) or other tentative phrases (e.g. it does not appear to be an effective punishment ).
• Conclude by restating your opinion and summarising your two or three main arguments.

Do you agree that community service is better than prison for some crimes?

Language level

Good day Sir/Madam,

I would like to ask about the expression ‘So the first thing is to…’. In academic and formal writing, should I avoid using ‘thing’ or ‘so’ or is it still fine? Thanks a lot for taking your time to read this. Hope to hear from you.

Your sincerely, Kimmie

• Log in or register to post comments

Hi kimmie,

Thanks for your question. In academic and formal writing, there is a general preference for precision over vagueness, so generally speaking it's better to avoid this usage of  so  and  thing  and use more precise and academic terms when they are available (e.g. Therefore, the first factor/issue to consider is ... ).

However, if you search academic writing, you will find writers do use  thing  sometimes, especially in fixed phrases (e.g.  the first thing /   the same thing ) or technical terms ( e.g. the Internet of Things ). Some writers might also use more general terms first before moving onto more precise terms.

(Note: The essay on the page above is in a somewhat formal style but not very formal.)

I hope that helps.

LearnEnglish team

Hi Jonathan

This is immensely valuable for me. Thank you so much for your swift response. Hope you have a nice day.

In my country it is often debated whether community services are better than prison for certain crimes. I think it's pretty obvious that it should be an option for less important faults. However, sometimes it happens that a judge decides to grant this benefit to some type of powerful criminals who cause more significant damage to society than others who do not have the same possibility, such as financial criminals or corrupt government agents. In my opinion, these types of sentences can have a bad impact on people, since they see that these behaviors are not severely punished and are somehow protected by the law. In conclusion, I agree that certain types of crimes should avoid prison, but I believe that before implementing it, the society must agree on which crimes will be able to enjoy this possibility to ensure that justice is fair for all.

please approve for testing

Hello aaron,

We check all comments before publishing them, which is why it's taken some time for your comment to be published.

Normally we delete a comment like this -- and we deleted the other one you made -- but have let this one through so you can see that it works. 

We are a small team, so it can sometimes be several hours before comments are published -- just wanted to tell you for the future.

We look forward to hearing more from you!

All the best, Kirk LearnEnglish team

The subject of how criminals should be punished is complicated, there are a lot of different opinions defending their points of view. There are two main ideas the first is arresting all the offenders, and the second idea is separating those not dangerous to society, and sending them to work in the community. In my opinion, I agree with the second idea, because there are many expenses with the prisons and the prisoners, so if lessen the population in this environment the conditions and the quality could be better than if there were overpopulation, avoiding justice being done right. Furthermore, these people aren't violent and dangerous to others, so with bad company in the prison, they might become bad people too. In this case, it's an awful idea to mix a different kind of person. Therefore, it's an excellent suggestion to oblige these people to do work in society, but with supervision in the right way and strictly.

On account of the differences between several types of crimes, not all criminals should be sent to prison. It is suggested that giving certain offenders community service would be more appropriate than just jailing them.

Honestly, I completely agree that the right way to protect people from harm is to imprison criminals who conduct violent crimes that endanger human physical health. Nevertheless, this penalty may be ineffective with offenders who have administrative guilts or non-violent offenses. Since they often commit the same crime after getting out of prison, this is just a temporary punishment to ensure the security of citizens for a certain period. The nature of the problem is these crimes originate from greed and bad habits which lead to their deviant behaviors but have not yet resulted in such severe consequences that affect human life.

From my perspective, the government would rather reform these types of offenders than deter them as a kind of punishment. It is better to have an alternative that perceptively impacts these people’s awareness which is to make them do community service. Jailing these criminals just increases their hatred and develops antisocial personality. By keeping and controlling them in a community, besides learning new skills, they amend their bad manner as well as develop more empathy and care towards others.

Given these points, the application of punishment should be based on the nature of each specific crime. Prisons should only be used for perpetrators committing directly dangerous crimes to people's lives. Making non-violent criminals do community service is more of a practical way to optimize tax wasted for prisons as well as give them a chance to fix their wrong behaviors.

There are several types of crimes and for each of them, a different sentence is dictated. A paramount question to be considered is whether community servers are more accurate than prisons for some crimes.

To begin with, community servers would help and support criminals through specialized psychologists. Not only would community servers help and support them, but also it would give them jobs to help them give the society back a contribution in return.

In addition, prisons only contribute to worsening the situation owing to the fact that criminals will commit crimes again. The key to excellent behavior is learning. If they learn suitable habits, they will adapt to society and help it.

Furthermore, it is necessary to have empathy with criminals and not judge them because their hate increases when they are condemned in prison. A further reason for this is that hate feeds hate. Nevertheless, some criminals must be in jail due to their danger on the streets. It is difficult to know that a person who kills someone else, is going to change even if he/she receives help from psychologists.

In contrast, most of society believes that all criminals should be in prison. However, prisons must be all comfortable like a hotel in order to bring for the prisoners a place to recover themselves. The reason why they must live in appropriate conditions is due to his mental health. For instance, in Norway, prisons are like hotels because the government considers that criminals need a second chance to live in a community

To conclude, it would be suitable for all criminals to live in accurate prisons in order to recover themselves. Despite the cost that kind of prisons are supposed to take, they are worth paying for them. In my opinion, safety is priceless and is more important than the cost.

Online courses

Group and one-to-one classes with expert teachers.

Learn English in your own time, at your own pace.

One-to-one sessions focused on a personal plan.

Get the score you need with private and group classes.  

agree disagree essay

Learn how to structure and respond to IELTS writing questions that ask whether you 𝗮𝗴𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗼𝗿 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗮𝗴𝗿𝗲𝗲 with a topic. This will increase your score for Task Response and Cohesion & Coherence. The following are included in this post:

• video explaining how to write this type of essay
• identifying an agree/disagree question type question
• essay structure
• model answer
• homework activity

Identifying this Type of Question Typical question words include: What is your opinion? Do you agree or disagree? To what extent do you agree or disagree? Do you think it is a positive or negative development?

Sample task instructions Many people believe working from home is better than going to an office. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Responding to the Question I suggest that you totally agree or totally disagree. If you wish to understand the logic behind this watch the video above. A plan for the task instructions above is as follows: totally agree reason one saves time reason two leads to higher productivity Structure Paragraph 1: Introduction Paragraph 2: Reason 1 to agree/disagree Paragraph 3: Reason 2 to agree/disagree Paragraph 4: Conclusion

Model Answer Many people prefer working from their house or apartment instead of an office. I totally agree that it is better to work from home because it saves time and increases productivity. The main reason I support working from home is that it leads to saving time. In particular, it eliminates the need for a daily commute to an office, which saves most people many hours per week. For example, due to covid lockdowns, I am now working from home and I save at least ten hours each week that would otherwise be spent travelling. I also save time on dressing and grooming myself for work as I can dress more casually when I work from home unlike when I go to an office and need to put on a suit and tie. Furthermore, working from one’s residence can also lead to higher productivity. This is because it eliminates the distractions that come with working in an office environment like noise, and colleagues interrupting. For instance, since I started working from home, I no longer get distracted by my co-workers chatting or stopping by my desk to ask me unnecessary questions and this enables me to not only get more done but also have higher quality outcomes on my projects. In conclusion, I completely believe that working from home is better. This is because it saves time traveling to and from an office and leads to higher levels of efficiency. Therefore, employers should try to offer their workers this option whenever possible. [the last sentence is for band 8 writers and can be left out] Homework Activity Many people say that cooking and eating at home is better for the individual and the family than eating out in restaurants. Do you agree or disagree?

Get your homework corrected to find out the band score and how to increase it.

6 thoughts on “agree disagree essay”

Hi Mike, which score should I receive from this essay?

Some people feel that individuals who eat and cook at home have more benefits than the ones who prefer to eat at restaurants. I tend to agree because by doing that they can not only improve their quality time with their family, but also acquire healthier eating habits. The main reason I support cooking at home is that it is possible to have a quality time with the loved ones. Nowadays, in a society where everyone is on rush it is hard to find a moment to be with the family. However, if people chose cooking instead of buying ready-made food, they would experience unforgettable moments with their families. For instance, when cooking you can demonstrate your love through food because cook require love, time and desire. Furthermore, home-made food is lead to a healthier diet. A plethora of studies have shown that individuals who cook their own food have a better diet comparing to the ones who don’t do it. This is because restaurants meals have an excessive amount of sodium, satured fat when comparing to home-made food. Moreover, a home cook chose carefully his ingredients before cooking. In conclusion, I completely believe that eating and cooking at home are lead to a better life. This is because it allows quality time with the family and leads to a healthier life. Therefore, individuals should adhere to culinary habits to have a healthy life.

Around a band 6.5 to 7 overall. A few errors of note 1. everyone is on rush = everyone is in a rush 2. because cook require love = because cooking requires love 3. home-made food is lead to a healthier diet = home-made food leads to a healthier diet

An increasing concern for many people around the world cooking and eating at home have more benifits than the other person prefer to eat restaurants.In this eassy i will examine both side of the argument and provide my overall opinion.

Generally speaking, there is a number of reason why people believe that cooking and eating at home. Perhaps the main reason why people are in favour of cook and eat is because by doing that they can not only improve their quality time with their family, but also acquire healthier eating habits.For example, home-made food leads to a healthier diet.

Despite these arguments, there is also a case of the idea that cooking and eating at home better restaurants.A further point in favour against restaurants are that home-made food. In addition, restaurants meals have an expensive amount of sodium, satured fat when comparing to home-made food.

In conclusion, Cooking and eating at home better than restaurants is a topic which raisen strong passion on both sides of the argument. Having considered both sides of the issue, i would argue that cooking and eating at home is better who ones eating out in restaurants.

Thank you for this insights.

You’re welcome!

Leave a Comment Cancel reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

About Mike I’m Mike Wattie from Australia. I have been teaching IELTS for over 20 years in Asia and Australia.

I have written IELTS books and this enables me to be an effective tutor. This is because I understand the main problems that students have taking the test and also the ways to overcome them.

Maybe you would like me to teach you the necessary skills and strategies to pass your test.

IELTS is a registered trademark of University of Cambridge ESOL, the British Council, and IDP Education Australia and they jointly manage the IELTS test. This website is for test preparation only and has nothing to do with the administration of IELTS tests This website is not affiliated, approved or endorsed by the University of Cambridge ESOL, the British Council, and IDP Education Australia.

IELTS Preparation with Liz: Free IELTS Tips and Lessons, 2024

• Test Information FAQ
• Band Scores
• IELTS Candidate Success Tips
• Computer IELTS: Pros & Cons
• How to Prepare
• Useful Links & Resources
• Recommended Books
• Writing Task 1
• Writing Task 2
• Speaking Part 1 Topics
• Speaking Part 2 Topics
• Speaking Part 3 Topics
• 100 Essay Questions
• On The Day Tips
• Top Results
• Advanced IELTS

IELTS Agree Disagree Essay Sample Answer

For an IELTS agree disagree essay you can either agree with the statement, disagree with the statement or give your opinion which contains a balanced approach to the issues in the statement. However, this does not mean you can discuss both sides impartially – you must give a clear opinion to get a good score in the criterion of Task Response which is 25% of your marks. Another name for an agree disagree essay is an opinion essay or argumentative essay. 

IELTS Opinion Essay Question

The growing number of overweight  people is putting a strain on the health care system in an effort to deal with the health issues involved. Some people think that the best way to deal with this problem is to introduce more physical education lessons in the school curriculum. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

IELTS Agree Disagree Model Essay

Below is a model answer for the above Opinion Essay: Agree/Disagree Essay. 

Owing to the problems which a growing population of overweight people cause for the health care system, some people think that the key to solving these issues is to have more sport and exercise in schools. I completely agree that this is the best way to tackle the issue of deteriorating public health in relation to weight.

Firstly, dealing with the issues surrounding obesity and weight problems is best solved by taking a long term approach and introducing more sport and exercise in schools. This method will ensure that the next generation will be healthier and will not have such health problems. At the moment, the average child in the West does sport possibly twice a week, which is not enough to counteract their otherwise sedentary lifestyle. However, by incorporating more sports classes into the curriculum as well as encouraging extracurricular sports activities, they will undoubtedly become fitter and more active.

Another point to consider is that having more sports lessons for children in schools will probably result in children developing an interest in exercise which might filter through to other members of their family and have a longer lasting effect . In other words, parents with sporty children are more likely to get involved in sport as a way of encouraging their ch ildren . By both parents and children being involved, it will ensure that children grow up to incorporate sport into their daily lives. This is certainly a natural and lasting way to improve public health.

In conclusion, to deal with an increasing population of unfit, overweight people, changing the lifestyle of the coming generation by introducing sport in schools is the easiest and most effective method to use.

Download a PDF copy of the model essay below:  IELTS Agree Disagree Model Essay

• Make sure your introduction is not too long. Just paraphrase the essay question and present your opinion.
• Make sure your opinion is consistent from introduction to conclusion.
• Each body paragraph presents a reason for your view.
• Your body paragraphs should explain your views with relevant detail.
• Never miss the conclusion. Keep it short, but make sure you write it!
• It is possible to have a partial agreement for this essay where you think sports lessons are a good solution, but there is another more effective solution.

Advanced IELTS Writing Task 2 Lessons

Are you struggling to hit band 7 or above? My Advanced Lessons are the answer to high band score techniques. You can also find a useful “Ideas for IELTS Essay Topics” e-book to help you with ideas and vocabulary.

• Click here: Liz’s Online Store

IELTS Model Essays

• IELTS Opinion Essay Model Answe r
• IELTS Discussion Essay Model
• IELTS Solution Essay Model
• IELTS Positive Negative Development Essay Model
• How to write an introduction: Video Tutorial
• Opinion Essay Practice Questions

………………..

Subscribe to get my Free Lessons by Email

Email Address

Can I write examples from my own life? like ” For example, my friend was fit because……….”

All IELTS writing task 2 essays, for both the GT test and Academic test, are formal essays. That means you are not writing about friends, family or yourself. But rather your understanding and knowledge of people and the world in general. See all my model essays to learn the tone and types of essays: https://ieltsliz.com/ielts-writing-task-2/ . For detailed training, get my advanced lessons in my store: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

It is true that nowadays, the rise in the ratio of obese patients, are putting a significant amount of pressure on health systems to cater for their deteriorating health needs. A good number of people believe that the best way to deal with this endemic is to incorporate health education in school programs. This essay will completely agree to this statement and give relevant examples.

First and foremost, there are various reasons to this statement. However, the most powerful to this, is the ability to increase the life span of the young adults. This means that when adolecents are being educated enough on the risk of overweight, they are likely to change their habits. Most especially, when they are practiced at school level, this is because children learn better when they are with their colleagues. For example, a result to a research conducted in a montessori school revealed that children aged 4-17 consumed a ton of sugary snacks which was filled with unhealthy calories and they never liked fruits and vegetables as well. All of them had unequal body mass index which was detrimental to their health and if had continued they were continously going to be filled with infirmity and weren’t going to live long. The school changed and incorporated health science in their curriculum. In less than a year after evaluation, the children were all living well, loved healthy snacks. which resulted zero hospital visit.

Furthermore, the second benefit to eradicating obesity is incorporating sporty activities in the routine of their students. By so doing, pupils will always burn off excess calories while engaging in their favourite sports. This will also encourage people around them like their parents to get fit when they see the benefits in their kids. It is proven that parents with sporty children ends up finding interest in sports to encourage their children in doing better. In doing this, they are unconsciously living a healthy lifestyle thereby reducing the risk of obesity in the society.

To sum up, the preferred method to eradicate unhealthy weight is by educating children in schools and instilling exercise in their routine.

Just a quick comment. For an opinion essay, you can’t write “this essay will”. This essay question is asking for your opinion – your personal opinion. If you fail to give it, you will lose marks. Also make sure body paragraphs are equally developed and equally supported. See my advanced lessons to learn how to tackle this essay type: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

I was able to score 7.5 for my Academic Writing with the help of your valuable guidance. Thanks a lot for your genuine effort

That’s a great score! Very well done 🙂

Hii mam, please check the essay below and tell me band score of it and also tell where I did mistakes.

I argued that the people who are heavyweight visiting health care systems to reduce the weight,but few people thought that correct way to solve this issue at school about physical education lessons.I completely agree about the problem think that each and every school should introduce about physical education. first of all, nowadays most of the people are visiting to healthcare to reduce the weight because their is no proper exercises.so,to solve this problem at school education has to introduce about physical education lessons although they have to take care about exercise thrice in a week even though keep more activities about exercise. moreover encourage the children to participate in the physical activities while it should introduce from schooling about the physical exercise so their people donot face any issues about their weight.By using medication people can face health issues.Fir example in an army education they thought about physical activities like running, long jumps, overweight lifts so,in this education they maintain a proper weight however people don’t have any health issues. To conclude every educational institution should have about physical exercise and educate them by keeping the lessons on physical activities so we can avoid overweight problems.

Can you please share your feedback on my essay:

Overweight has always been a great challenge in the past few decades. These days patient list is increasing, not because of serious illness or emergency cases, but because of weight gain problems. Lately, people have started believing that to combat this issue; schools must include physical education as extra course. Although, the idea behind the belief is partially correct, but providing students with only these classes will not address the problem completely.

In a World health survey report of 2019, it was recorded that in Finland, there are least number of cases when it comes to health and fitness related sickness. Finland spends heavily on the health awareness programs at schools, and which, in turn, prepares students right from the very beginning, to be conscious about their body. However, this research doesn’t show the full picture, because Finland’s residents are eating only organic food since last 3 decades. Moreover, the deep cultural and traditional norm of Finland is to have only one meal a day, which automatically keeps people fit and fine.

Adding to the above point, school teachings are not the only way to create health awareness. In a research published by Doctor Prakashmurthy, at IIT Roorkee, it was discovered that hormones and stress levels play a crucial role in fat storage. Hence rather than some exercises, people of India opt for Yoga and meditation as tools to combat body problems related to weight gain.

To conclude, I agree that children should be trained about health and fitiness in schools, but it is also vital to teach them discipline about eating food and involve them in other activities, which are related to calmness of body, as these eventually leads to a healthy and fit body and mind.

It is often argued that the increasing number of obese people is putting a strain on the healthcare system. Some masses believe that the best way to tackle this problem is to introduce more physical education in the school curriculum. I completely agree with this opinion and think that it’s the most important thing that every school should do.

First of all, doing physical exercises daily enhances not only your physical health but also your mental health. Introducing physical education in the school curriculum provides daily basis physical training which helps to remove unnecessary fats and also helps to become free from anxiety, tension, and pressure which ultimately benefits both physical and mental health. For instance, students involved in daily basis physical education can be qualified for jobs related to body physics such as Army. Thus it is better to introduce more physical education.

Secondly, physical activity in schools is one of the best ways to eradicate obesity problems. It helps to form the habit in students on involving in physical activity. Even if the student completes their education in school, they have good knowledge of physical education which they can apply for the rest of their life. That’s why it is important to include physical education in every school, curriculum.

To conclude, I strongly believe that involving physical education in the school curriculum is beneficial because it helps to eradicate the obesity problem in a more holistic way.

there is no doubt that, I contemporary era, the majority of individuals are becoming victims of obesity, hence, it is suggested by few masses that involving the vast information regards physical education in school study, can be proved beneficial to tackle with this issue. I completely agree with this statement. Now I will discuss about this statement in my next sections along with explanation. To commence with, there are numerous reasons for increasing weight related issues. the first and the foremost is unawareness of folks towards balance diet. To clarify it, in modern era, human give high priority to fast food instead of home made, however, junk food has plenty of calories, which is responsible to make people fatty, therefore, it is excellent concept to give possible knowledge about physical education in school to children, because in this age they easily can understand and definitely follow in their future life. furthermore, advancement of technology is second cause fir this problem, To elaborate it, it can be seen that in earliest time, human being needed to move out for work, however, in modern time, it yas become straightforward for them to finish their at home, it means the roberts have been taken replace of human labour, for this reason, people have become lazy and do not anything to keep their body fit and health, and if the knowledge about demerits of enhancing weight will be given in younger age, can be fruitful for adolescence in further life. to conclude, after discussing this statement it is clear that everyone has various thinking, but, in my opinion, this notion is better for every person.

Nowadays, increasing number of obese people is putting a strain on the health care system. Some masses believe that the best way to tackle this problem is to introduce more physical activities lessons in the school curriculum. I completely agree that this is the best way to solve this issue.

to begin with, obesity is become a major problem in the society and adding more physical education lesson in school is the best way to solved this problem. for instance, if more physical lessons are introduced in the schools then children get more time to do physical activities like playing football, cricket and many more physical games, this thing not only make them physically fit but also make them more socialize and mentally happy. hence, adding more physical fitness lessons can change the lifestyle of the students and make them fit physically as well as mentally.

Another point to be consider is that introducing more sports lessons for pupils in school may result in creating more interest of children towards sports and also encourage them to take part in different sports event. Moreover, if a child take part in many sports events then he/she can also encourage their parents to do more physical activities. In other words, parents with more sporty child are more likely to involve in sports as a way of increasing interest of their child towards the sports. Thus, by both parents and children involvement in sports can create a good and healthy society.

In conclusion, to deal with unfit population changing the lifestyle of the coming generation by adding more physical activities in school is the easiest and most effective method.

Very good man

Hello Liz, thank you for making your website a great resource for many of us who are studying for the IELTS!

Essay on obesity topic, any inputs or comments would be greatly appreciated:

Reducing weight can be a challenge for many, and figuring out a solution to this health issue is an important task. Being overweight comes with its own related co-morbidies, such as heart disease, hypercholesterolemia, and osteoarthritis, just to name a few. Consequently, these health issues invariably put a strain on the healthcare system, through the involvement of multidisciplinary teams needed to manage these conditions as well as the cost of medications needed to treat the symptoms. Having said that, physical education lessons implemented at school is a possible solution. However, I disagree with the view that it is necessarily the ‘best way’ to deal with this problem.

Being overweight is defined as having a body mass index greater than 25 kilograms per meter square. Overweight and obesity are becoming an increasingly prevalent condition across the globe, more specifically in first world countries. This is partly because of the surplus in food available (especially fast food) as well as the sedentary lifestyles afforded by the children.

Physical activity in schools is just one way to combat obesity. Evidence-based research has shown that being overweight is not just caused by a sedentary lifestyle, it is a multimodal condition with several etiologies: genetics, diet and lifestyle. Hence, just focussing on one cause will insufficiently address and tackle the issue at hand. There needs to be enough done on all fronts in order to not only tackle the present issue, but also to take preventative measures for future generations.

Besides physical educations classes, governments can direct funds towards preventative campaigns through educational sessions in both school and through advertisements. Moreover, policy changes need to be implemented, which include -but not necessarily limited to – the following: banning sugary drinks and candies from school canteens, reducing junk food availability and providing healthier options such as salads. Parents should also be educated on the need and importance of reducing screen time – a known risk factor for obesity.

In conclusion, there cannot be one “best way” to deal with a complex issue such as overweight. This has to be tackled in a more holistic way in order to attain more statistically signifiant results and outcomes to have an impact on the healthcare system.

I am so grateful for your tutorials. I followed all your lessons, bought some of your e-books for my personal studies and finally wrote my exams this year. I am happy to say that I had Reading 8.0, Listening 7.5, speaking 7.5 and writing 7.0. Now I have informed all my friends about your wonderful website. God richly bless you Liz.

That’s wonderful. Well done to you 🙂 And thanks for sharing my website with others 🙂

It is considered that the best option to mitigate the stress of the health care system in tackling with the increasing overweight population is to make students take more physical education lessons at school. Although I agree that students having more exercise will help to deal with the issue to some extent, more attention should be put on enhancing the health awareness of people from all walks of life to solve the problem thoroughly.

On the one hand, exercise is definitely the best choice to keep fit compared to other improper methods like medicine therapy, especially for younger groups like students who are more energetic and able to refresh themselves at a relatively high speed after a running race. The obesity rates of students who have engaged in a sports club at school are averagely lower than those who have not. Therefore, increasing the number of lessons related to sports at school will have positive impact on tackling with the issue.

On the other hand, the physical education lessons cannot stop the rising trend of the obesity population outside the school, it is necessary to let people of all ages receive the health education. Children at school contributed a part of the population who are overweight, the rest part consist of people with unbalanced lifestyle and people suffered from diseases which are the primary cause of obesity like diabetes. It is inevitable to improve their awareness of staying healthy to deal with the growing number of overweight people. This can be achieved in many ways, health experts can give lectures on prevention of obesity and nutritionists can provide advice on daily diet, which are available for everyone on smartphones or TVs. A great number of people who are out of shape will benefit from the health education, which is the cornerstone of winning the battle with obesity.

To conclude, thought I agree that more sports lessons at school may contribute a part in solving the obesity issue, it is more important to improve the health awareness of people of all ages and only in this way, can we solve the problem thoroughly.

Could someone please give feedback on my essay.

The health care system is struggling to resolve the health problems caused by a number of more and more overweight people. It is addressed that introducing more physical education lessons in the school curriculum is the most efficient method. I totally agree that applying the new classes is the key for public health improvement. One plausible effect of the method is that people will spend more time outside and less time in bed. In fact, overweight and obesity people who are likely to eat quite much are not very active. Additionally, modern technologies contribute a huge impact on the sedentary lifestyle. Therefore, getting them engaged in such outdoor activities will help to improve their body health in a positive way. In other words, they can do frequent exercise and burn more unnecessary fat. Creating a stronger society bond is another feasible consequence of the teaching application. Attending physical lessons at school, people can find new friends, especially when they work in teams, and enhance the mental health. Achieving which, a chain effect on their existing relationships such as parents, siblings and classmates will blast. Gradually, people will get to know each other more and more. Nationwide competitions can be held on a regular basis, producing TV shows which entertain viewers and reducing stress among workers. Therefore, the health care system is no longer restrained. In conclusion, to tackle overweight problems, I consent that people should be active on both their mind and behaviors by emerging themselves in the school curriculum. This is among the easiest and most effective way that is either good for body development and social connection.

You’ve got some grammatical errors and I suggest contracting contractable words…. so instead of saying obesity people, say “obese.”

Overall, good job!

It is thought that some of the problems that the health care system faces due to the growing populations of overweight people can be solved by introducing sport and exercise lessons in the schools’ curriculum. I completely agree that this is the best solution to overcome such some of the health issues, in addition to increasing the awareness of people about healthy diet.

Firstly, I believe that making sport as a mandatory subject in schools will decrease the problems that face the health care system. When children do some exercises at different times in the day, they will get healthier and more fit in the future. Also, this will be reflected to their parents as they watch them. For instance, when parents take their children to a garden and the children start to practice what did they learn in their school, their parents will notice the elasticity of their children and they will start do like their children. This encourages most of people and increases their awareness about the importance of sport to their health.

Secondly, besides sport, an awareness about a healthy diet should be taken into account. Eating a lot of fats and sugar can cause some health problems regardless that someone does some exercises. For example, the government should put some taxes on fast food and reduce the taxes on the healthy food.This will encourage people to buy healthy food and as it becomes a habit to them and their children and they notice the difference in their weight and in turn their health. Thus, I strongly recommend to increase the awareness of people about their healthy food bedsides doing sport.

To conclude, I believe that sport and healthy diet will make a big difference in the health care system when they are introduced to children at schools. This results in increasing the awareness of the next generation about avoiding health problems and following a healthy lifestyle.

I dont think the second point was relevant. If it is being marked for Response point, adding and explaining how diet is helpful seems off-point. I think answering like that will be good for questions that ask you for more ways and solutions to the problem, rather than this type

Hello Respected Madam Liz 💗 Please help me to sort out the problem with the question type * To what extent do you agree or disagree) please i am having so much trouble in this ..

If you need training, please go to my store where you can find an advanced lessons about this essay: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Obesity has become more common in our society due to the busy lifestyle practiced by individuals. This has caused enormous strain on the health care system, which can be avoided by practicing a healthy lifestyle.

It is important to promote awareness among the general public of the health problems that can occur due to obesity.

Increasing the frequency of physical education alone will not effectively solve the issue. That is one of the several other steps to inculcate a healthy lifestyle among people. Exercises have the potential to eliminate the excess calories present in our bodies. Exposing children to a variety of sports can help to identify their interests and sometimes, it can help to create a habit among them. In such cases, it can be taken as a very effective option to prevent the flooding of the health care system due to obesity. According to available statistics, the probability of such an occurrence is negligible.

More than that, a well-balanced, nutritious and healthy diet should be practiced. Governments should step up measures to reduce the accessibility of fast foods rich in Sodium and Sugar. They also can educate their citizens about the healthy diet options, which can be easily substituted for the fast food.

In conclusion, a healthy lifestyle, involving nutritious food, adequate sleep, rest and exercise, when combined in the right proportion, is the only solution to deal with any of the lifestyle abnormalities which overwhelm the health care system.

Hi Liz, Is it correct to write the thesis statement as: “I completely agree with this statement for two reasons which I will elucidate below.” Here, I am not using words related to the prompt because they will be used again in the topic sentences of both the body paragraphs.

That is a learned phrase. Each sentence should be connected to the topic you are given and created uniquely by yourself in the test. Is the topic about family? Is it about education? Each sentence must connect to the specific issues presented in the essay question. However, please note that all my advice is aimed at people aiming for the higher band scores. If you are needing only band 5 or around that score, it would be fine to use such techniques in your essay.

Wow… Liz you are back ..so happy for you ❤

Liz, hi. When they ask to what extent do you agree can I write my thesis statement I completely disagree. What is the difference between to what extent do you agree or disagree question and to what extent do you agree question.

There is no difference at all. IELTS like to paraphrase instructions – it’s still the same essay.

Very magnificaant👍👍👍

Hi Liz, thank you for the tips here, they are really helpful. What is the difference between these two essay types- ‘To what extent do you agree/disagree’ and ‘Do you agree or disagree’

Do i have to answer that ‘I completely agree’ to ‘To what extent do you agree question’ OR should i just answer ‘ I agree’ ( I mean, do i have to state the extent of my agreement or i should just simply say i agree)

They are 100% the same. IELTS like to paraphrase instructions from time to time.

Thank you for the response.

Thank You Liz.

I started my prep using your site, a week before my IELTS exam and I scored an overall 7.5 using your tips. Thanks for uploading such amazing tips and samples. They really helped me a lot in my exam.

Great to hear that you did well. Good for you !! 🙂

Hi. Pleaseeeee answer me if possible. In body paragraphs of agree/disagree essays, the first body paragraph should be assigned to agreement side and the second paragraph should be assigned to disagreement side? Or both paragraphs could be assigned to agreement or disagreement side? Thanks in advance.

Your whole essay is a presentation of your opinion. It is not a discussion essay. If you are unsure, please get my Advanced Lessons: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Hi, Liz. I’ve seen certain solutions to the writing task 1 and 2 with a heading or title. Is that necessary please?

You definitely do not use headings or titles in any IELTS Writing task.

Hi Liz, I had practiced GT Writing Task 2 recently first time. Please check and tell that how much band score I’ll get if the following question will come. I’ll be thankful to you for this. Q- You should spend about 40 minutes on this task. Write about the following topic. Write at least 250 words.

In some countries it is thought advisable that children begin formal education at four years old, while in others they do not have to start school until they are seven or eight.

How far do you agree with either of these views?

Answer- In world, some countries believed that proper education of a child should start at the age of 4. On the other hand, other countries do not want to start the education of child before the age of 7 or 8. In my opinion, children have to start his/her education from the age of 4 so that basic concepts will be clear in coming 3-4 year. Firstly, if we discussed about formal education, it requires a formal schooling with adequate content and materials that create interest and increase knowledge related to the subject in a child. A young child brain is in developing stage up to the age of 5. If any country want to start primary education in formal way, it helps to increase knowledge of the children’s. Additionally, They will catch the new terminologies and content in a different ways e.g., play-way method. Secondly, if a country want to start children’s study from the age of 7-8 in formal school, they have to provide some materials and content before school. In other words, they have to provide them education in play schools and with new techniques e.g., learn and play, visual learning etc. When children join the formal school, an evaluation test needs to be taken to check the knowledge and capability they’ll have. After that, based on the performance, particular actions and classes should be arrange so that they all come at equal level. Lastly, I want to share my view that early education is very important. I would prefer to provide early school from the age of 4 so that kids brainstorming can be done at right time. I am strongly agreed to start education from the age of 3-4 years.

Hello, I just took Ielts indicator test. I really messed up with the writing task 2. What I wrote is off topic. I don’t remember the question clearly. It is about lectures and technology and maybe it means that teaching in the class I wrote about lecture paper and students should find information from internet by their own I didn’t write about teaching in class. Do you think I can get 6. Please, reply my message I really need to know If I can’t get 6 I have to try again on 27. I need all skills at least 6.

For listening, In Sec 4, there are 4 multiple questions so I think questions are not the same. I just wanna share the others.

It is important to understanding the way Writing Task 2 is marked. If your essay is off topic then you might get only band 4 or 5 for Task Response. It will depend on whether some parts of your essay are relevant as to what you get for Task Response. Task Response counts for 25% of your Task 2 marks. The other marking criteria for Task 2 will not be affected. You could get band 4 in TR, but get band 8 in the other three marking criteria. You can do the maths. On top of these considerations, you must also consider that Task 1 counts for about 33% of your final marks for Writing. With all these considerations, your overall score will depend on so many factors. You will need to judge for yourself what score to expect in the three other criteria then calculate your prediction for your score in Task 2. Then you will need to add your prediction for Task 1 on to that as well.

Thank u so much for your reply Tr, Liz. In task 1 they asked for one bar chart and pie chart and I think I did well. And thank you so much for your lessons. These help me a lot I really appreciate all these lessons provided, I really mean it. In speaking part 2, the time you didn’t tell a truth to your friends and in part3 why children lie to parents and why people tell lies and that kinds of questions. (just sharing the other friends ). I can’t use earphones in speaking maybe because I’m under 18 and my father had to sit near me. It is ok to use earphones in listening.

Good luck with your results !! Let me know how you do when they arrive

Yes, teacher, I will. Thank u so much for the lessons. My result will not be good as others but I’m glad to study your lessons.

GOD Bless You Hello Liz very thnx for your help

You’re welcome 🙂

Good afternoon Liz.I should say You are very intelligent and thank you very muuuuuch .Since your tips help improve my writing .Thanks😘

Please Liz I took my ielts today I completely agreed on an opinion in my introduction but ended up discussing on partially agreed in the paragraphs, please how will this affect my score

It will affect your score for Task Achievement which is 25% of your task 2 marks. If you look at this page: https://takeielts.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/ielts_task_2_writing_band_descriptors.pdf , you’ll see that presenting a clear position throughout is a requirement for band 7. This means that for this marking criterion, you would struggle to hit band 7 if you alter your opinion in the middle or end of your essay. But luckily. it won’t affect your score for the other three marking criteria for task 2. Hopefully other people reading this comment thread will see the importance of fully planning your essay before you start writing your introduction.

Thank you very much Liz for such a kind support. Your’s blog is the best one which i follow the most in my preparation. Specially i recently bought your Essay ideas e-book, which is also very helpful.

Kind Regards

I’m so glad you are enjoying my Ideas for Topics E-book 🙂

Hello, ma’am, I took my IELTS exam on 11th nov. 2020. and i got only 5.5 band(overall).i am struggling with grammar and lack of confidence. please assist me for that.

This year I released a Grammar E-book. However, the level of the e-book is quite high. It will help you, but make sure you don’t overreach yourself. It is important to only produce English within your level rather than trying to impress. The more errors you make, the lower your score. So, use the e-book to improve your accuracy and reduce your errors: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Thank you liz.।।। Making content accessable

I took the test on 12th of Sept 2020. Here is the Writing Task 2 question: The most important priority of any governments is to provide housing. To what extent do you agree or disagree. I hope it helps.

Dear Liz, Your lessons are really very helpful and easy to understand.Thanks for the useful instructions:) Could you please help in assessing the below essay?

Looking at the eating habits and sedentary lifestyle of people, obesity problem has grown over the years which in turn is increasing pressure on the healthcare systems. In my view, introducing physical exercise lessons alone in the school cannot solve this problem. In addition to this, proper eating habits should be followed by people.

Firstly, there is no doubt that physical education can help people maintain their weight and thereby reduce the health problems arising due to overweight. Making students aware of the importance of body stretching on a regular basis is the initial step towards solving this problem .Students can learn a lot about the body structure , its functioning and the ways to keep the body fit through exercises. When the students understand the value of physical exercise, they can pass on this information to their families as well. This is the kind of transformation which is possible only by involvement of not only students but also elders .

Secondly, doing exercise alone cannot be a solution to this problem. There are many more factors such as eating habits (junk food) and sleep cycle , which are responsible to this overweight issue.So , along with the physical fitness, people should start working on their eating patterns and the type of food they eat. Taking an average amount of sleep is also required for healthy lifestyle.This can be achieved by introducing healthy-lifestyle specific lessons in the school curriculum and make children implement the healthy eating habits in their life.

In conclusion, adding more physical fitness lessons at the school level will greatly help in improving the health of people. However, eating habits should also be in control to keep oneself fit and active.

Thank you very much for the free lessons. Can I partially agree in agree and disagree essay even when I’m not asked: ”to what extent do you agree”?

Yes, you can.

But, I was told never to have a clear opinion in agree and disagree question. It’s not only in situations of “to what extent” that we can decide our grace.

Do you agree? Do you agree or disagree? To what extent do you agree? To what extent do you agree or disagree? What is your opinion? All the above are the same instructions which are used for an Opinion Essay. They are not different instructions. This means the techniques for an Opinion Essay apply to an Opinion Essay regardless of how the instructions are phrased. They are simply paraphrases of the same instructions. If you are confused, please get my Advanced Lessons so you can learn the right way to tackle an IELTS essay: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

My instructor told me my reasoning behind my opinion was not strong enough. For instance, when the topic was about the advantages of having older people in a country, I discussed my views as “Children need older people at home for supervision as most of them have working parents”, whereas, my instructor thinks, I should’ve discussed it in country’s perspective saying ” older people are experienced in their occupations”.

I described my arguments clearly with supportive lines. But he didn’t like the “argument” itself. Is that a problem? Will I get less marks for this?

Both you and your instructor are thinking about two different points, not the same point. Your instructor is talking about how older people have more experience in their work which is beneficial for a country. Your point is that elderly people provide family support to take care of the grandchildren if their parents are working. Both points are relevant, but they are completely different points. You get a high score to organising your clear points into logical paragraphs and explaining what you mean in detail. As long as your point was well explained, it’s fine.

You are really super and your explanatory techniques and exemplification in addition to how simple you discuss and present the material are awesome. you have a high talent or skill in analyzing all the discussed and handled topics. thank you from the depth of my heart as you are helping me alot Haytham Selim Egyptian in UAE

I’m really pleased you are finding my lessons useful. Good luck in your test!!

hey liz, Thank you so much for your free content. I did my IELTS test today and it was quite fair. My task 2 was “employers should give their employees at least 4 weeks holiday per year. Do you agree or disagree with the statement?”

Thank you so much for the wonderful tips and lessons, I have learned so much in my short time of preparing. I would be taking the test for the first time in Aug. I hope I make it.

I do have a question on paraphrasing. Is it OK to paraphrase only the 1st sentence of the question, as I saw this done on a model essay. The 2nd sentence was used as the thesis statement. Please find Sample question below. I would truly appreciate it if you could give a model answer.

“According to a recent study, the more time people use the Internet, the less time they spend with real human beings. Some people say that instead of seeing the Internet as a way of opening up new communication possibilities world wide, we should be concerned about the effect this is having on social interaction. How far do you agree with this opinion? ”

Thank you for your help ☺️

Learn how to write an introduction and see model essays on this page: https://ieltsliz.com/ielts-writing-task-2/

Hey Liz, It’s Mr. Jasjit singh here and I am working as an IELTS trainer in a company. Here, my concern is to point you out that you have used “sporty children” in the essay’s body para – 2, even though, the word SPORTY is an informal. According to the parameters of marking, the informal language must not be used basically in the essay writing, otherwise there is a penalty. Do you think it is worthy to be used by the candidates?

Kindly share your perspective asap!!

“sporty” is completely fine. However, to use the word “kids” is too informal.

I have a question, please answer me.

In my IELTS writing, while checking things at last minute, I did a foolish mistake and change all the words next to comma “, ” in a capital letter.

i.e “However, This was…..”

So, the question is how many marks did the checker will cut or how many bands of mine are at risk. I am worried sick.

Please reply.

Well, I still don’t understand how I did that mistake. Time was ticking and something pushes me to do it :@ maybe this was because of C.D test. I am.sure if I were writing on a paper it would not happen. But fate :@

Since childhood, we know that after full stop next letter is Capital and not after the comma :@ but…argh

This would just count as one systematic error. It means you make the same mistake over and over again. It will affect your score for Grammar, but it isn’t possible to predict your overall score. Your Grammar score will depend on how many other errors you made and the range of grammar features you used. Good luck with you results! Try not to worry too much.

Hello Liz and thank you for all the info that you give us!! I would like to ask you. In this type of essay can I add examples from my personal experience? or I just say my opinion at the introduction and nowhere else?

The style of all essays should be formal which means you should avoid writing about your family and friends. Instead share your experience of the people in your country or around the world.

Dear Liz, Please, I am confused; agree/disagree is opinion essay? I mean: both are the same? Regards

Yes, they are the same. Do you agree or disagree? To what extent do you agree? What is your opinion? All the above are Opinion Essays.

Should I write the word count at the end of the writing task 2?

No, definitely don’t waste your time with that. The examiner will count the words himself if necessary.

Hi Liz, First of all thanks a lot for your great website and youtube channel. These are treasure troves of information. Millions of thanks to you.

I took the test couple of days ago. Writing part 2 was a bit confusing for me.” some people agree it is the best way to make detailed plan of activities in their free time”. While others disagree. Discuss both the views and give your opinion. I read this question more than 10 times, meanwhile, I was writing the essay. Whether it is asking about ‘ free time activities plan’ or ‘If we are free and utilize that time to make a plan about upcoming activities’. I hope you can solve my confusion.

However, the remaining questions are:

Writing part 1: write a letter to the manager about an accident you met with? Speaking: part1: about me, my residential area, facilities, whether you like living in an apartment or not? did you write with a pen or pencil as a child? what do you think if you get a pen as a gift? How do you think when it is compulsory to write only using a pencil-like this test? speaking part 2: An incident when you were not allowed to take a phone with you. (No more points to explain). speaking part 3: why the phones are restricted in some areas of the hospital? Importance of politeness, Need of rule for using mobile phones.

You haven’t remembered the essay question correctly – there are English language mistakes in it. For this reason, I can only speculate. Most questions like this are about whether you should make plans for free time activities or not. Many people like to plan each and every activity they do in their free time, whereas others prefer to wake up and decide what to do based on how they feel that day or how the weather is etc – they don’t want to schedule or plan.

I am preparing my IELTS exam and I have written the below eassy all myself can I please have your feedback

Since the 18th Century technological advances have replaced people in the workplace. with today’s technology this process is happening at a greater rate. Technology is increasingly responsible for unemployment.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement? Since Industrial age technological breakthroughs have taken the place of individuals in many companies. Now a day’s Digital process plays a great role in many organizations due to which a lot of people are jobless. I completely agree that machines have taken place of human beings. Firstly, mobilized process has fasten the work and brings out better results than of humans. Organizations doesn’t have to double check the work as its scientifically proven that computers and machines are not liable to make errors or mistakes. Many firms are trying to replace the employees with robots where possible to reduce the number of workers in their company, save money which can be used to do investments, buy shares and make profit. For instance, I work in a water company, where distribution of water is 24hours. there are many departments were large number of employees are working. In the production department, earlier men’s where used to drive the forklift and load the trucks now they have been replaced with robots to do the same job.

Secondly, Using Scientific advancement can lead to organizational growth in very less time. As the employer doesn’t have to go through the hiring process which is time consuming and sometime leads to failure as the wrong person is hired for the job. A good illustration of this is, Accounts department is the most important section in any huge firm if the employees are not provided with computers the calculations may go wrong and in worst case the firm could face loss.

In conclusion, I would highly recommend especially large organization to save their time, efforts and utilize their money in digitalizing their work which will lead them to huge profit.

Number of overweight people and children are increasing from last 10 years. Some people think that to solve these issues, facilities of sports and exercises should be provided in school. I completely agree that this is the best solution to tackle the issue for improving public health in relation to weight.

Firstly, to deal with increase in number of obesity and weight of people, some steps should be taken by schools and colleges. Easy access and more facility in sports should be introduced for children and people. This will ensure fitness among students and people interested to take part can join with no age barrier. This will result in reducing sadentry lifestyle and will encourage all to take part in competition.

Secondly, the sports lesson for children in school would result in children developing interest in exercise which might encourage the old age or parents to get motivated. In other word parents with sporty children will try to involve themselves with sports to make their children happy. If both of them get interested, they will practice daily. This would be the best and natural way to improve health of people.

In conclusion, to deal with reducing laziness and overweight people, changing the lifestyle and access to more facility will change the body shape with less problems.

Hi Liz, Is this an opinion essay and we need to cover both sides? Or just the side that I support. I am confused.

It is generally accepted exercise is good for children and teenagers. Therefore physical education and sports should be made compulsory for all students in all schools. What do you think ?

IT is asking for your opinion. It is an opinion essay. It is the same as “do you agree or disagree?” or “To what extent do you agree?”. You present your opinion of the issue or issues stated and use the body paragraphs to give reasons and explanation for your opinion.

Thank you so much Liz! I got a score that is very useful (lrsw=8,9,8.5,7.5). I was just 0.5 away from 8 in writing to get a perfect score! It was an opinion question. I agreed in part in other to have ideas to get my body paragraphs. Number of words 330 essay and 190 letter (computer-based IELTS is the best if you enjoy typing but hurrible hand written like me). I looked through all your model essays, and I discovered that my issues were mainly articles and punctuations).

Well done with your results 🙂 I’ve put loads of information about articles in my new Grammar E-book as well as a chapter on punctuation. I hope to have the e-book ready at the end of April or beginning of May 🙂

May I ask could I take both sides on the question like “Do you agree or disagree”?

Sorry, I think I just found the answer in the comments… 100% same. Which is strange. I thought agree or disagree should give only one position; and for “to what extent do you agree or disagree” require two positions.

Thanks for the great community!

They are the same instructions, just paraphrased.

Hi Liz, is “the key to solving these issues is” correct? Shouldn’t it be “the key to solve” ? Thank you

“the key to solving” is 100% correct. The word “to” is used as a preposition in this phrase, not as part of the verb.

Hi, Liz! I’ll have an IELTS test next week, but am still confused about agree-disagree essay.

Here’s the question: Some people think that employers should not care about the way their employees dress, because what matters is the quality of their work. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Is that alright if I say on my introduction as follows: In my opinion, dress codes are significant in a working environment, while employees’ competence should matter as well.

My first body paragraph explains the reason why dress codes are important, and my second body paragraph is about why competence should matter.

I do hope you answer my question. Thank you, Liz! Get well soon.

You’ve got the right approach for a partial agreement. However, you need to address your English. “In my opinion, both dress codes and employee competence should be important to any employer.” Try to aim for accuracy and clear meaning in your written English. Don’t try to write in any particular style – just be clear and direct.

Wish me all the best liz!!… I ve covered all your lessons!!…

Thank you very much Liz. Your lessons were of immense help. I got the band score that I wanted.

That’s great to hear. Well done 🙂

Thanks for all time! We truly appreciate your efforts in making IELTS easier to tackle. However I would like to ask about recent questions reported by student for writing task 2. My exam is on the 13th of this month.

Thanks! Don’t forget to get well soon 🙂

I will post Recent Questions for January 2020 soon.

Hi Liz, Thank you soo much for your help.

Should we quote example only if they asked for it in the question or should we give it for all essay questions?

You give examples when you know of a good example to use that will help support and explain the main idea of the body paragraph.

Hi dr liz u r great soul i ever seen wish u a happy happy new year

Thanks 🙂 Happy New Year 🙂

Hi dear liz,wish u a very happy new year ,stay blessed always. U r the great soul i ever seen. I have a doubt regarding essay. If the question was asked about leadership innate or achieved opinion essay shall i write my balanced view lik this, i agree that this skill must be innate for political leadership i bliv this should be achieved for managerial leadership.is this stand ok for partly agree. Thanks in advance for reply

If you want a quantified response which you by you say it is X in this situation and Y in this, make sure your grammar and language are 100% clear. If you make any mistakes with that statement it could have serious consequences. So, make sure you write it clearly without any errors at all.

Its quite evident that the physical structure of humans are mainly measured in terms of average weight and height. This aspect of human body varies based on several factors. Also there are many speculations anticipated especially with respect to the optimal weight of any person. This requires a lot of monitoring and maintenance efforts to predict the health related outcomes of any individual who is known to be overweighted. I totally agree with some of the initiatives incorporated at the school levels in order to mitigate the above factor. School Managements in recent days have implemented diet related programs with the strong vision of maintaining advisable health care system, particularly for stalwarts who are considered be above the average weight. Furthermore, the students have to be encouraged rigorously to participate in sports, games and other outdoor activities. Now a days, we also find a typical gymnasium court with trained experts dedicated to help students who are weighing above the acceptance level. The above attempts can also be recommended to help students to address their depression levels if they are facing any sort of misbehaviour from their fellow mates. There are many real-time scenarious wherein a kid is illtreated or accused by his or her classmates due to their physical appearances pertaining to overweight. It should also be treated as key responsibilities of teachers especially physical fitness trainers in schools. Overall, these kind of programs will always stand as unique and responsive while addressing many health related issues due to overweight. Irrespective of any barriers pertaining to this, the schools shall give atmost importance to motivate students who are observed to be above the normal weight.

You definitely need to realise that an IELTS essay is an essay formed and structured in a particular way for this test to adhere to the band score requirements. You must first learn how to structure your essay. Look at all the differences between my model and your own essay. If you can’t see the differences, please get my advanced lessons which teachin how to write an IELTS essay step by step: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Really you are a very good trainer.

How are you ? Will you please explain the difference between writing task 2 of academic and general? in your website nothing is mentioned like for academic and general for writing task 2. i am preparing for general. please let me know writing task 2 is same for academic and general or different ?

Go to the RED MENU BAR and select “Test Info”. You’ll see an option for GT IELTS information. Always use the MENU BAR to access what you need.

Hi Liz !thanku so much for your topic they are all very useful. I think I got a high band score for writing task 2 thankuuuuu sooo much dear.

That’s really good to hear !! Very well done 🙂

Hi liz, this is the first time I am commenting! Hope you are well. Please tell me where I can find the model answers of writting task 2 provided in your WT – 2 section !

You can find all model essays, tips etc in the main writing task 2 section of the website. Just click on the RED MENU BAR at the top of the page to open the section of the test you want to learn.

That’s is really great for my IELT practice and I’m just 13 and I’m gonna take it when I’m 13 and a half thanks for the information

Good luck 🙂

hi !!! Can we use ‘A LOT OF’ and ‘SO’ in task 2 ? as someone told me that we cannot use it in writing , reason being these both are INFORMAL. Is it true ?

No, that isn’t true. It’s completely fine to use those words.

Hey there!! Can we use “And” and “But” For the beginning of the sentence in between the body paragraphs to add and contrast information respectively ???

PLEASE PROVIDE ME WITH AN EXPLAINED INFORMATION ASAP, I WOULD BE GRATEFUL FOR THAT.

— Jasjit Singh

No, you can’t. See the linking words page for details: https://ieltsliz.com/ielts-writing-task-2/

Hi Liz , I sat for my academic test on the 28 of September, 2019. I got an overall score of 7.5. LRWS = 7.5, 8.0,6.0,8.0. For the Speaking questions. Part 1: 1.Tell me your full name please? 2. Do you work or study? 3.How is the weather in your country?. 4.Would you like to live in a place with a different weather from your country? 5. Where do you like to read? 6. Do you like to read in an hot weather or cold weather?. Part 2: Talk about an historical building you visited in your country. Part 3:1. Should the appearance of public buildings be designed ? 2. Do you think people should pay taxes to use public buildings? I can’t remember the other 3 questions she asked. For the reading questions, most of them were Yes, No, and Not given questions. I think I did well because the passages were close to what I studied in school. The listening was easy. I got lost in some places though. Writing Task 1. I was given a table to describe the population of people in Jakarta, Sao Paolo, and Bangkok in 1999 and 2001. There was a column for the projected population in 2001.The numbers were too close. I got confused a bit. Writing task 2: Some people believe that university admissions should only be offered to young people with the highest merits while some believe that admissions should be given to all people without considering their grade. Discuss both views and give your opinion. I didn’t finish my writing to my satisfaction. I think that’s the reason for my low score. Time finished faster than I thought. I just want to say Thank you Liz for everything. I learnt a lot from your lessons. Hopefully,i won’t write this exam again.

Well done with your results and thanks for sharing 🙂

Hi Liz, I love all your content. Thank you so much for helping us through IELTS. I just wan to know is there a difference between “Do you agree or disagree” and “to what extend do you agree or disagree ” also are opinion essays same as agree disagree essays ?

They are 100% the same.

Hi Liz, thanks for all your help to prepare for my IELTS exam. I can’t thank you enough. I have a doubt regarding “To what extent do you agree or disagree” question. Can I just see it as Agree or Disagree question and just take one side or do I need to address both the side? This question type is really confusing. Kindly advise me. Thanks again for all your help and you are indeed my God for IELTS 🙂 🙂

Thanks, Karthik

They are 100% the same essay – no difference at all.

I am also confused about “to what extend do u agree or disagree” and “Do u agree or disagree” Is there any diference in their answer plz explain

No, there is no difference at all.

hello madam I’m Nikhil I have a doubt that crushing my mind since 10days, please madam could you solve it.

my Institute tutor said we must follow this pattern for agree or disagree question Introduction paraphrase question thesis statement ( not mentioning agree or disagree)

para1 (agree|) statement ! example

para2 (agree) sate3ment2 example

para3 statement3 example

conclusion now I must discuss my opinion

Above essay can also write in vise verse with disagree madam, I already comment you, but you didn’t give reply madam please help me out from this problem, I would be ecstatic.

There is no such thing as a fixed content for body paragraphs. Of course you should state your opinion in the introduction – give your answer and then explain it in the body paragraphs. Please see my Advanced Writing Task 2 lessons if you need training: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Hi Liz! Thank you for your lessons. They are all very useful.

I would like to ask your opinion regarding examples in body paragraphs.

To get a high band score for writing task 2, it is necessary to support and develop our main ideas. I found some websites recommend providing examples from surveys, polls, government report, etc to support main ideas. Is example really needed? Are there any other ways to support main ideas without using examples?

If we really want to give an example, does it have to be a real example? Can we fabricate false/unreal example?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you, Liz!

Examples with data from sources are definitely not required. You can explain and illustrate your ideas in any way you want. Giving the source of information is a waste of time in IELTS because a) it is written as a learned phrase which doesn’t help your language score b) the examiner doesn’t mark data in task 2 so it won’t help your score either. You decide how to explain your main ideas. You can see most of my essays don’t have examples with data.

Thanks, Liz! It’s so helpful.

Hi Liz, i want to clear my doubts regarding this essay type. There is an essay question in your website which is about the rapid expansion of supermarkets because of which local shops are closing, and some people believe that this is causing death of local communities.

I disagreed with this argument and wrote that supermarkets provide efficacious results for native communities. In body paragraphs i wrote reasons of my opinion, and i hadn’t mentioned local shops in body paragraphs. I just wrote reasons to support my view that this and this are the advantages which benefit local communities. I want to ask is it okay to not mention local shops because i am supporting my view for supermarkets?

You can’t ignore part of the essay question. The fact presented to you is that supermarkets are expanding and local shows are closing. This is the basis of your essay. The opinion you tackle is “do you think this is the death of local communities?”. So, if you think supermarkets are good for local communities – do you also think it is good that local shops are closing?? You need to address the issue or issues in the question.

But if i also acknowledge that local shops are good for local communities then i might be contradicting my own agreed view point that supermarkets are good for local communities, so it means that i have to say that local shops are not good for local communities?

It would mean you have a partial agreement. You don’t have to agree with one side. Think more carefully about why you think supermarkets are good for local communities and then think about what effect local shops closing will have. Once you’ve brainstormed, analyse your ideas and think of exactly what your view is and how to you will express it. After that, plan supporting points. Hopefully you can now see how important planning is 🙂

Hi Liz… Your website is so helpful for me. Thank you much for that. My confusion is…. In this model esssy, there is no discussion about health system. Should we avoid discussion about it? I used to elaborate about helath system in one paragraph . Am I wrong? Please guide.

An opinion essay is not a discussion essay. This essay does not ask you to discuss the health care system. It is asking your opinion about whether you think the problem that obesity is causing on the health care system can be solved by offering more physical education in schools – do you agree with this solution?? Your whole essay from beginning to end is about your opinion of solutions to the problem.

Hi Liz, thank you for all the tips and essay examples. They really help us to achieve better scores on IELTS. Anyway, I was practicing this essay before reading the example, and I wrote it differently. So I want to know your opinion on how I wrote it.

In the first body paragraph, I wrote that including physical activities such as sports in schools’ curriculums is the best way to introduce children to an active and healthier life, giving the example of how US do this.

However, in the second body paragraph I explained that there are other approaches that should be done to countries witness a really dramatic decrease of healthcare use: lowing the taxes of companies that produce natural and organic food, to make these types of food cheaper to people, and making awareness campaigns about having a healthier diet.

I conclude restating that physical activities in schools are essential to create the habit of being physically active, but it should be combined with an awareness of healthy diet.

So the question is: can I agree and also include other aspects to the subject? Thank you!

Yes, of course. It’s called a partial agreement (or balanced approach). It means that you agree to some extent but not 100%. So, you would explain what you agree with and then add what else needs to be considered. I find this approach to be very useful sometimes because it’s easier to find unique ideas for each body paragraph which results in a more focused essay and also a better range of language. See my Advanced Writing Task 2 lessons if you want more training: https://elizabethferguson.podia.com/

Oh nice! That’s a relief. I don’t agree completely sometimes with the affirmation on the question, so I’ll look the page that you recommended. Thank you very much for the answer!

I love this response.

Speak Your Mind Cancel reply

Notify me of new posts by email.

Advanced IELTS Lessons & E-books

Recent Lessons

Ielts liz personal update 2024, ielts model essay -two questions essay type, ielts bar chart of age groups 2024, ielts topic: urban planning, ielts listening transcripts: when and how to use them, 2024 ielts speaking part 1 topics.

Click Below to Learn:

• IELTS Test Information

Copyright Notice

Copyright © Elizabeth Ferguson, 2014 – 2024

All rights reserved.

Privacy Policy & Disclaimer

• Click here:  Privacy Policy 
• Click here: Disclaimer

Return to top of page

Copyright © 2024 · Prose on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in