How To Plan & Write

IELTS Discussion Essays

Students can find it difficult to identify IELTS discussion essays and often
confuse them with either opinion essays or advantage and disadvantage
essays.

This is one of the issues I’ll be covering in this lesson. I’m also going to show
you how to plan and write discussion essays step-by-step.

Here’s what we’ll be covering:

 Identifying IELTS discussion essays

 3 Common mistakes

 Essay structure

 How to plan

 How to write an introduction

 How to write main body paragraphs

 How to write a conclusion

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 discussion essay will be a
statement containing two opposing views.

You will then be asked to discuss both sides of the argument and give your
own opinion. Here is some typical wording that might be used:
  Discuss both views and give your opinion.

 Discuss both these views and then give your own opinion.

 Discuss both sides of this argument and give your own opinion.

Here's a question from a past test paper.

Some people think that zoos are cruel and should be closed down.
Others, however, believe that zoos can be useful in protecting wild
animals.

Discuss both views and give your opinion.

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

Write at least 250 words.

The key to identifying this type of question is the fact that you are required to
discuss BOTH views. This is different to opinion questions where you must
decide between two opposing views and make an argument to support your
own opinion.

Opinion essays, also known as ‘agree or disagree’ essays, a generally

worded in one of these ways:

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

you agree or disagree?

The other essay type that students mistake for discussion essays
is advantages and disadvantages essays. With these, the statement will
contain just one view and the question will typically be written as shown in this
sample question.

School children are using computers in school more than ever.

Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of this and give your own
opinion.
The consequence of incorrectly identifying the question type is that you will
use the wrong structure for your essay. This is a major reason why people
make the mistakes we’ll now look at.

3 Common Mistakes
These three errors are common in IELTS discussion essays.

 Not stating your opinion.

 Not giving arguments for both views.

 Not developing both sides of the argument equally.

The most common mistake that students make is not giving their opinion. The
question will clearly state that you must choose one side of the argument to
agree with. 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
actually agree with it.

However, you must give equal attention to both sides. A common error is to
provide a stronger argument for the view you favour. This leads to an
unbalanced essay and a low score for task achievement.

Essay Structure
Now let’s look at a simple structure you can use to write IELTS discussion
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

 State two supporting reasons
 Give your opinion

2) Main body paragraph 1

 Topic sentence – outline the view you don’t agree with

 Explanation – explain why this view is held by some people
 Example – give an example

3) Main body paragraph 2

 Topic sentence – outline the view you do agree with

 Explanation – explain why this view is held by some people
 Example – give an example

4) Conclusion

 Summarise the key points and state your opinion

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 Write Main Body Paragraphs

Main body paragraphs in IELTS discussion essays should contain 3 things:

 Topic sentence – outline the view you don’t agree with

 Explanation – explain why this view is held by some people

 Example – give an example

It is easier to begin by discussing the opinion you don’t agree with and
then present the reasons for the opposing view that you support. So,
we’ll start with idea 1.

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 body paragraph 1 – Breeding programmes for endangered species,

some species saved from extinction.

Topic sentence:

On the one hand, there are many projects in existence in zoological

parks around the world where species facing extinction have been
successfully bred in captivity and their numbers increased substantially.

Next, we must write an explanation sentence that expands on the idea. This
explains to the examiner what we mean or why this is the case.

Explanation sentence:

This is important for ensuring the survival of animals under threat from
poaching and the destruction of their natural environments.
Finally, we add an example to support our main point. 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:

A good example of this is the golden lion tamarin from Brazil which
nearly died out because of logging and mining activities which are
destroying its habitat. Today, a third of wild golden lion tamarins were
raised in captivity.
That’s the 3 parts of our first main body paragraph complete. Here’s the finished paragraph.

Main Body Paragraph 2

Main idea 2 – Cramped cages & unnatural environments, animals distressed.

First, we write the topic sentence to summarise the main idea. I started main
body paragraph 1 with the phrase ‘On the one hand...’, so main body
paragraph 2 will naturally begin, ‘On the other hand... .

These are great cohesive devices to use when making a direct contrast
between two opposing views and they link the ideas together well. They can
be used in most IELTS discussion essays and will help to earn you a good
score for cohesion and coherence.

Topic sentence:
On the other hand, a significant percentage of zoos house their animals
in cramped cages with very little space to move around or behave
naturally.
Now for the explanation sentence where we expand on this idea.

Explanation sentence:

This can lead to them becoming distressed and depressed as well as

suffering physically through lack of exercise.
Finally, an example to support this point.

Example sentence:

A friend of mine recently visited a wildlife park while on holiday abroad

and was very upset to see the lions pacing up and down in a narrow,
bare pen and eagles in enclosures so small that they were unable to fly.
That’s the 3 parts of our second main body paragraph complete. Here’s the finished paragraph.

How To Write a Conclusion

Conclusions to IELTS discussion essays should do two things:

 Summarise the main points

 State your opinion

This can generally be done in a single sentence.
If you're below the minimum 250 words after you’ve written your
conclusion, you can add a prediction or recommendation statement.
Our essay currently has 231 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 discussion 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 discussion 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: