September the 8th is International Literacy Day and here is my minor contribution towards raising awareness of the problem. I have selected some figures for literacy rates around the world from the UNDP report of 2007/8 and your task is to summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
It’s an IELTS writing task 1 – but with a real purpose. I’d like to raise awareness of the issue, but I’d also like to make you think about how you go about your writing.
Do you like this?
This chart shows the proportion of people who are able to read and write in 10 countries globally. In Bangladesh 47.5% of the population are literate, whereas in Brazil the figure is nearly double this at 88.6%. Brazil and Colombia both have a literacy rate of around 90%, but in France and Greece the rate is significantly higher.In Iran the number of people that have literacy skills is over 82%, while in Pakistan this number is just under 50%. Finally, in Portugal and Saudi Arabia there is a similar literacy rate of approximately 90%, but in the UK almost the entire population are able to read and write.In conclusion, we can see that the figures for literacy vary notably from country to country, with some countries having almost complete literacy, while others suffer from 50% illiteracy.
What do you think?
Not bad – there aren’t any “mistakes” here and all the information is included. More than that, there is a nice range of language:
number language:
proportion/percentage/rate/number/figure
just over/approximately/around/nearly double
comparison language
whereas/but/similar/while/significantly higher
literacy language
literacy rate/able to read and write/figures for literacy/literate
My verdict
It isn’t bad, but it could be a whole lot better. What is missing from this report is any organisation: the countries are just copied off from right to left. Does the paragraphing make any sense? Not to me – and I wrote it. It looks, and reads, really rather incoherently.
How to organise
There is no one answer here: this is where you need to spend time thinking. But to show you one possible strategy, take a look at this chart:
Do you spot the difference? Of course you do. The message here is really quite simple – look for patterns. These patterns can help you organise your writing so that it makes sense – which is just another way of saying “coherence”.
Here is my second version: do you like it more or less?
This chart shows how literacy rates differed in 10 different countries around the world in 2007/8. The highest level of literacy was to be found in the European countries in the survey with France and the United Kingdom with almost complete literacy at 99%. In Portugal and Greece this figure was lower but was still over 90%.Again, a similar amount of the population in Brazil (88.6%) and Colombia (92.8%) were able to read and write. In contrast, in Saudi Arabia (82.9%) and Iran (82.4%) a significantly lower proportion of people had basic literacy skills.Finally, by far the lowest figures for literacy among the countries in the survey were recorded in the Asia. In Pakistan almost exactly a half of the population was illiterate, while the number was even lower in Bangladesh at 47.5%.In conclusion, we can see that literacy rates vary significantly around the world on a geographical basis, ranging from almost full literacy in some European countries to 50% literacy in some Asian countries.
I should add here that my solution is only one possible one. There is no one answer, but you do need to be logical – time spent thinking in the exam is never time wasted.
To find out more about Literacy Day try looking here. Here are some facts and figures:
“Some 774 million adults lack minimum literacy skills; one in five adults is still not literate and two-thirds of them are women; 72.1 million children are out-of-school and many more attend irregularly or drop out.”
Illiteracy is most rampant in the developing world
Hi,Dominic
Found your blog by acciend but it really helpful particuarly in writing part 2 ,Thanks.
Here i do have some questions about task 1 in writing ,i don’t know how to make a compare and what points should be included in the aritcle? It really confuesed me.
For the speaking part, i got 6 last time when i took it ,what’s the main difference between band 6 and 7 ?My aim is 7 ,so what other works i need to do in order to get that band?
I will be posting more on part 1 shortly. There is no short answer to your speaking question – only to say there is quite a distance between 6.0 and 7.0 – sometimes 6 months work or more. Take a look at my posts on speaking to see how it is graded. It may help you to find a tutor who can help you.