General Training Writing Task 2

Post your Task 1 or 2 response and/or read the responses of other students and provide feedback.
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Black Eagle
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General Training Writing Task 2

Post by Black Eagle »

Kindly go through the task I practiced at home, and give your analysis and potential band score.

Some people prefer to eat at food stands or restaurants. Other people prefer to prepare and eat food at home. Which do you prefer? Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

In today's busy life, many a times people do not a chance to cook healthy food for themselves and thus, they resort to eating outside at food stands or restaurants. There, still, are people who take time out of their packed schedules to cook for themselves. Personally, I like to prepare and have food at the convenience of my home. This approach has its own merits, which will be explained further.

Firstly, by preparing food at home, I have the liberty to adjust the spices and other ingredients according to my taste. As an instance, I like my dessert to be less sweet, which often is not the case with the desserts served at the restaurant. Moreover, any meal can be prepared at home according to the mood whereas at the restaurant, the menu is limited. This makes it clear that eating at home provides with a greater degree of choice.

Another benefit to reap by cooking at home is the healthy state of the meal. The food that we eat outside might not be cooked under strict conditions of hygiene or might be stale and thus, can prove to be a cause of health problems. While cooking food for myself, I can make sure that the utensils are washed and the ingredients are clean and fresh. This strengthens the view that generally, food prepared at home is healthier and hygienic.

In a retrospect, preparing food at home results in a great scope for enhancing the taste of your food, improving your cooking skills and having a healthier diet. Hence, the trend of cooking food for oneself will continue in the times to come.



Thanks in advance!
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Ryan
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Re: General Training Writing Task 2

Post by Ryan »

Hi Black Eagle,

I think the structure you employ in your submission is good. Your position on the topic is apparent. What concerns me is that the piece is grammatically quite weak. In fact, it looks as though almost every sentence has a grammatical problem. This causes both awkwardness among the lexical resources you pull from and a degree of incoherence.

I feel the first thing you should do is shorten your sentences. Simplify them as much as you can. Ensure your reader will understand 100% of your message. Adding cohesive devices to these simple sentences will provide your writing with the complexity it needs to score well. There are many factors that are important when writing, but paramount is ensuring your examiner understands what it is you are trying to say.

This essay would likely receive band 5.5. With grammatical cleanup, you can expect all other areas of your writing (Task Achievement, Coherence and Cohesion and Lexical Resources) to improve.
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Black Eagle
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Re: General Training Writing Task 2

Post by Black Eagle »

Hi Ryan

Firstly, thank you very much for your critique of the essay. I didn't expected such an analysis. It seems that I was misinformed about my writing abilities. I better improve my grammar so that I can achieve a better score on my test scheduled in within month and a half. Would you be kind enough to point out the grammatical mistakes I made in the essay so that I can work exactly at the places I need to, to improve my grammatical accuracy.

Thanks in advance!
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Ryan
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Re: General Training Writing Task 2

Post by Ryan »

Hi Black Eagle,

I won't be providing full grammatical cleanup on this site, as this would be extremely time consuming and too closely mimic the paid service I offer on my blog (if you're interested: http://ieltsielts.com/online-ielts-writing-course/). I don't mind providing comments here and there when I have free time, though. If you are in need of more in depth coaching, contact a university in your area. Universities often have databases of local tutors and writing clinics.

Or perhaps a generous band 8+ student would kind enough to provide Black Eagle with a grammar rewrite? ;)
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Black Eagle
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Re: General Training Writing Task 2

Post by Black Eagle »

Thank you Ryan :)
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