It has been seen that reading for pleasure develops imaginations and better language skills than to watch TV. To what extent do you agree or disagree? Wrtie at least 250 words.
Sample Response
Some people believe that reading books for pleasure is far better for enhancing people's creativity, imagination and linguistic abilities than watching TV. I completely agree that the ingenious capability and language skills of a person are better nurtured by reading books than by watching television programmes in their free time.
To commence with, reading for pleasure captures the attention of a person more than watching TV can. Reading opens doors to an imaginative world giving individuals the opportunity to engage their creative and critical thinking. But watching television is mostly a passive activity, and people get easily distracted by entertaining and sensational programmes than educational programmes on TV. A recent report published by Coventry University London reveals that an average TV watcher switches TV channels at least 10 times an hour and often ends up spending as high as thrice more time than initially intended. This emphasizes how watching TV can offer little value to viewers' creative development on the one hand and kills valuable time on the other hand.
Moreover, readers pay apt attention to sentence structures, writing styles and vocabulary when reading a book. They even open a dictionary to learn about a word when confronted with a new one. This gives them an excellent opportunity to enhance their linguistic skills. On the other hand, while watching TV, they do not pay much attention to sentence structures or individual words as entertainment is their main purpose. To give an example, research work indicates that people who are avid readers tend to become better users of the language than those who are not. This demonstrates the effectiveness of reading books in developing language skills.
To conclude, from the discussion and analysis of the effects of reading books and watching TV, we can express that reading as a hobby has a profoundly positive impact on developing individuals' creative and imagination power and language skills while TV offers little value for that.
IELTS Writing Correction
- 1. Use comparative structure Original: far better for enhancing Suggested revision: far more effective at enhancing Why it matters: More effective at correctly introduces the activity used for comparison.
- 2. Use accurate ability phrase Original: the ingenious capability and language skills of a person Suggested revision: a person's creative ability and language skills Why it matters: Creative ability conveys the intended mental capacity, whereas ingenious describes something cleverly inventive.
- 3. Use natural transition Original: commence Suggested revision: begin Why it matters: To begin with is the standard transition for introducing the first reason.
- 4. Use concise collocation Original: captures the attention of a person Suggested revision: holds a person's attention Why it matters: Hold someone's attention is the natural concise collocation.
- 5. Use fixed expression Original: opens doors to an imaginative world Suggested revision: opens the door to an imaginative world Why it matters: The fixed expression uses the singular phrase opens the door to.
- 6. Add required preposition Original: their Suggested revision: in Why it matters: Engage takes in before an activity.
- 7. Correct the collocation Original: apt Suggested revision: close Why it matters: Pay close attention is the established collocation.
- 8. Use natural dictionary phrase Original: open a dictionary to learn about a word Suggested revision: consult a dictionary to learn a new word Why it matters: Consult a dictionary is the natural formal expression for checking vocabulary.
- 9. Clarify the reason Original: as entertainment is their main purpose Suggested revision: because their main purpose is entertainment Why it matters: Because states the causal relationship directly and gives the clause a natural word order.
- 10. Use concise example marker Original: To give an example Suggested revision: For example Why it matters: For example is the standard concise transition.
- 11. Remove redundant noun Original: research work indicates Suggested revision: research indicates Why it matters: Research already denotes investigative work, so work is redundant.
- 12. Use precise proficiency term Original: better users of the language Suggested revision: more proficient language users Why it matters: More proficient describes language ability more precisely.
Suggested Rewrites
- far better for enhancing far more effective at enhancing
- the ingenious capability and language skills of a person a person's creative ability and language skills
- commence begin
- captures the attention of a person holds a person's attention
- opens doors to an imaginative world opens the door to an imaginative world
- their in
Why this response received Band 7.5
The response presents a clear position and develops two relevant reasons, with the discussion neatly divided between imagination and language development. Its main limitation is that several comparisons and examples are asserted too broadly, while some ambitious wording sounds unnatural and weakens precision. The highest priority is to sharpen the causal explanation of how reading develops each skill and express those claims in more natural, exact language.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The position is direct and fully sustained, and both creativity and language development are supported with relevant explanation and examples.
Make the causal links more rigorous by showing exactly how active reading processes produce the claimed advantages over television.
Coherence and Cohesion
The argument follows a clear progression, with each body paragraph focused on a distinct dimension of the comparison.
Use less formulaic transitions and integrate contrasts more smoothly within the reasoning rather than repeatedly signposting them.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a wide topic-specific vocabulary, though several ambitious collocations are awkward or imprecise.
Choose more natural expressions for phrases such as ingenious capability, apt attention, and creative and imagination power.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A varied range of complex sentences is generally well controlled, with some non-impeding errors in comparison and clause construction.
Review comparative patterns and modifier placement, especially structures such as distracted by one type of programme than another.
Write this task while it is fresh
Try the same task now. It helps you remember the feedback and write better next time.
IELTS Writing Task 2
It has been seen that reading for pleasure develops imaginations and better language skills than to watch TV. To what extent do you agree or disagree? Wrtie at least 250 words.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.