Describing Charts

The approachto writing a description of a chart is similar to writing a descrip. tion of a graph. Only the languageused is different.

Practice
You should spendabout 20 minutes on this task. It is often claimed that women have achievedgreaterfreedom and have accessto the sameopportunitiesas men.Thepie charts below patterns in Great Britain. show someemployment Write a report for a university lecturer describing the information in the charts below. Youshouldwrite at least 150 words.

Females

Males

110/ tt/o

Manual ffi Craftor similar labourers I General manual il Other

Non-manual and ! Managerial professional and @ Clerical relateo non-manual Other I

F i g u re 0 1

IELTS Preparation and Practice

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Here are somenotes madeduring the planning stageof the essay.

Time/tense Topic Generaltrend

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Here is a sampleanswerto this Practice for Task 1. {fie twa pie c$arlss$o'w yroportion *ht onl tlrn ,f fr*ola, in emylattrment o (troal catugories, in llrtlrl inte manualonl non*o**l occu?ations, g"n ro{, a greater Vercmtageol *o rn "9n *orft in ,on-^onuo(occuyations wor$ in manualgccuyations, tkan onl iln reuerse true is fnn*"n, 3n t$e non-^o*o(, ocaryations, *lr;h o greateryercentage ol *rr$irg wln4ent$an mengo t$ere {ounl n chr;cnLlyye yasitions, rs o t*ollt, yercentage *o,*tn tl*n ^* of

ria( anl yrofessiona( pasitims.9k yu"*try u{**"n ,*ylortr"l in otfiernon-*onuo(, ocewixtfrutsstiy#ttyk g* tk" t$eyerts centage *r, in tfrese il a,catyations. *onuo(,,rnyloy*"nt,tile $iggest liff"ntt $etueen tuo t$e "9n seres in tk emyloyment ,roft *orlrrrr,*lr"r, *oh, *o$, uy is of n% t$e u;or&forc, ft*"lrt just a,i/s. ?lurt$ermore, onl t$e "f

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in marnge-

The Vriting Test

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smaff, of *o*r, *or$ing o, grn rol h(,orrrrt is uerttr fercentafre {lrrrc it not a great l^( ,f l;ffrrrnrc letweent$e o"h1 o.s%, of yercentage *r, laing ot$er{or*t ol *onuo( **Nt (zg) o"l wamen atker*oruo( *or$ (sz%). in lo ,rrrkrion, tfie haoclrarttc{rorlysfiontlmt wamen notfiaue "9, as tt1yes emyloyment. ol tlte same access mento certain [192 words]

EXERCISE 9 Write notesfor Figure 11. There are samplenotes in the Answer Key. Timetarget-5minutes

Females

Reasonsfor most recentarrest (o/o)

No answer Otherreasons Theft Assault Breach order of Public drinking Drink driving

Figure11 Persons arrestedin past five yearsreasonsfor most recentarrest,1994

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I E L T SP r e p a r a t i oa n d P r a c r i c e n

Language of Comparison
Look at this pie chart.

Figure 12 Car colours of When describingcharts,the language comparisonis used. o Describingjust one part of the chart The
most popular second most common . Comparlng two parts of the pie chart car colour colour

is white. is red.

Red

1S

substantially considerably a lot far much somewhat significantly slightly fractionally

more common than lesspopular

blue.

'Or
'White is
about twice three times as common popular
AS

red.

Thevriting Test

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'The Note: We cannot say, least popular colour is other'. 'Other' is not a colour but means all the other colours not mentioned here. We can also interpret the chart and say, 'People buy more white cars than red cars'. But be careful. It is better not to say, 'People prefer buying white cars to blue cars'. \7e cannot tell from the chart whether buyers have a restricted range of colours to choose from. Buyers may choose a colour based on availability rather than preference.

EXERCISE 10 Time target - 5 minutes for each chart Look at the following charts in Figures 13 and 14 and write a simple descriptionof each.

Crime(casesper 10000people)
100 80 60 40 20 0 Violence Theft Other
19.24%

Employment
24.58%

Fig u r e 3 1

Figur e 14

Look at Figure IZ and study these exampies. White, which is 56.110lo, is considerably more common than blue, which makes rp 12,72o/o. Red, which constitutes 28.O5o/o,is about twice as popular as blue, which is L2,72o/o. The other colours, which constitute 3.12o/o, are considerably less popular than blue (I2.72o/o). There are two ways of incorporating data: by using . brackets ( ) o a relative clause (which + appropriate verb: is, makes up, constitutes, accounts for).

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IELTS Preparation and Practice

EXERCISE 11 to Look at the charts in Figures 13 and 14 and rewrite your sentences include data. Time target - 3 minutes Per chart Writing introductory sentences Look at theseexamples. The graph in Figure 1 showsthe total grain harvest areain millions of between1950and 1996' hectares in The two pie chartsshowthe ptoportion of malesand females employ' categories. ment in 6 broad use To write an introductofy sentence, your own words' If you copy the title of an illustration or the questionword for word, the examinerwill regardthis as plagiarismand ignore the sentence.This could affect your Thsk 1 band score.
Type of chart Appropriate verb shows illustrates presents Description the number of ... the proportion of . information on ... data on ...

The

illustration graph pie chart bar chart table

To avoid plagiarism, change the words. Example The two pie charts show the proportion of males and females in employment in 6 broad categories

The two pie charts give the nrooor,io' of men and women employed in 6 broad areas Or, change the structure. Example The two pie charts show the proportion of males and females in employment in 6 broad categories.
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The two pie charts show, in 6 broad categories, the proportion of males and females in employment.

Writing Test

You could changethe way you express time period. the Example The graph in Figure 1 showsthe total grain harvest areain millions of hectares between1950and 1996.

The graph in Figure 1 shows,fr. ,Jrl grain harvest areain millions of period. hectares over a 36-year EXERCISE 12 Look at Figure 11 and write a simple introductory sentence. Then, using your notes, write a full answerto the task. Write on a separate piece of paper. Time target - 20 minutes

Describing Tables
Describing tables is similar to describing charts. The same structures of comparison and contrast are used. The most challenging aspect is dealing with considerable amounts of data. When describing tables: o do not describe all the data presented o look for significant data; e.g. the highest, the lowest, etc. . try and group the data. This may require you to use some general knowledge of the world, such as recognising developed and developing countries.

Practice
You should spendabout 20 minutes on this task. Thefollowing table gives statistics showing the aspectsof quality of lift infive countries. Write a report for a university lecturer describing the information in the table below. You should write at least 150 words.

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IELTSPreparation Practice and