Task 2 — answering the actual question

Read the question twice, and name its form

There are five recurring Task 2 forms, and each one goes wrong in its own way.
Agree or disagree — choose a side. Sitting on the fence caps Task response at 6.
Discuss both views and give your own opinion — both views and an opinion. Forgetting the opinion is the commonest failure on this form.
Advantages and disadvantages — if the word outweigh appears, you must decide.
Causes and solutions — every solution must answer a cause you actually gave.
Two-part question — two answers, usually a paragraph each.

Practice

'Do the advantages of studying abroad outweigh the disadvantages?' What must your answer do?

State your position in the introduction, in one sentence, before any argument.
The conclusion must say the same thing. A conclusion that decides "both sides have merit" after an opinion contradicts your own essay.
⚠ Answering a partly different question is the most expensive mistake available. "Should students study abroad?" is not "What are the benefits of studying abroad?"
Underline the exact words of the question and tick them off when you have answered each one.

Practice

On an agree/disagree question, concluding that both sides have merit is a safe choice.

Pollution is bad for health is an assertion. It adds nothing a reader did not already believe.
Particles from traffic aggravate asthma, which is why clinics near main roads report more attendances is support.
Every main idea needs one of: a reason, an example, or a consequence traced one step further.
You do not need statistics, and inventing them helps nothing. Reasoning is what is marked.

Practice

Which sentence is support rather than assertion?

Technology has changed education greatly.
Recorded lectures let a student who missed a class replay the part they did not follow, which a live lecture never allowed.
Everybody knows technology is important nowadays.

Name the strongest objection to your position and answer it.
It is true that a ban would cost jobs in the short term. But the industry has already shrunk by half without one, and a planned closure protects those workers better than an unplanned one does.
This is what separates a position from a preference, and it is visible to an examiner in one paragraph.
⚠ A concession is not a change of mind. Say why it does not move you.

Practice

Complete: a concession names the strongest ___ to your position and answers it.

5 minutes planning. An essay with a plan is a different band from the same ideas written as they arrive.
Introduction — rewrite the question, state your position.
Body 1 — first reason, developed.
Body 2 — second reason, developed, or the concession.
Conclusion — restate the position. No new material.
3 minutes at the end for articles, plurals and tense — the three things a reread can actually fix.

Practice

Put the 40 minutes in order.