Writing About Bar Charts (Task 1 Writing)

Oh, no! It’s the dreaded Task 1 essay! On the IELTS Academic exam, the Task 1 writing assignment will require you to write about a chart or graph. You must write 150 words as quickly as possible.

The Task 1 essay can be scary because we are not always sure where to begin. Usually, we are presented with something like this:

You have 20 minutes to complete this task.

The bar chart below gives information about the average weight of men in kilograms in several different countries. Write a report summarising all the relevant information and give specific examples to illustrate your points.

You should write 150 words for this task.

Actually, this example is a little more simple than most Task 1 Charts, but let’s start with an easy one!

So, where should we start???

Well, the best place to start is looking at the text of the question and noting the most important points.

We know that this chart is telling us

“the average weight of men in kilograms in several different countries”

So we know that our main goal is to COMPARE and CONTRAST the weights of men in different countries.

Remember that you should ALWAYS write an introduction sentence that gives general information about the chart. Luckily for us, we can steal the introduction sentence from the text above the chart. It is absolutely OK to copy the sentence with only slight changes. Therefore, our first sentence should be:

This bar chart gives information about the average weight of men in kilograms in several different countries.

Good, that was easy! Next, we need to make a GENERAL STATEMENT about all the information that we see. Is there anything that we can say about ALL the countries on the chart? It’s tricky when all the countries are different, but we can say something like this:

We can see from the graph that the average weight for men in each of the countries listed ranged between 74 kilograms and 88 kilograms. Within this range, however, there is some notable variation.

So ALL the men in ALL the countries had an average weight between 74 kilograms and 88 kilograms. Fantastic! Now we can pick out the notable features.

Whenever you are presented with a chart of any kind, you should always look for notable features. These are the largest and smallest numbers represented. In this case, which country has the highest weight and which country has the lowest?

It’s easy to see that the U.S. has the highest average weight for men, while Brazil has the lowest average weight for men.  Let’s make a statement about that.

The USA has the highest average weight for males.

That’s good, but we always need to support our notable points with details. So here’s a better sentence:

The USA has the highest average weight for males, with a figure of approximately 88 kilograms per man.

Let’s also mention Brazil!

On the other hand, Brazil shows the lowest figure, with an average weight of about 74 kilograms for men.

Those are two notable points. Another notable point is that most countries on the chart are close to 81 kilograms. The most common weight on the chart is 82 kilograms.

Most countries averages hover around 81 kilograms, with Australia, Canada, and Germany all falling within this range. Australia and Canada show the same average weight of 82 kilograms each.

Great! We’re almost done. Is there anything else that we can notice about the chart? Is there any way to divide these countries into categories? Australia, The USA and Canada are all English-speaking countries. So, it’s possible to say:

Generally speaking, English-speaking countries tend to have higher weight averages than countries that do not speak English.

OK, I think that we covered all the most important information. Maybe I should say…

I think perhaps English-speaking countries have higher weight averages than other countries because of unhealthy diets.

NO!!!

Do not give opinions or make assumptions when writing Task 1! Do not use personal pronouns such as "I" "You" or "We." You should absolutely stick only to the FACTS and write about the information that you can see on the chart. Make a conclusion which expresses your introduction again, but using slightly different words.

In conclusion, although the average weight of men in the countries shown measured from 74 kilograms to 88 kilograms, we can observe some significant fluctuation within that range.

All Task 1 essays should follow this pattern:

• Introduction
• General Statement About the Whole Chart
• Mention a Notable Feature
• Give A Detail to Support Notable Feature
• Mention Another Notable Feature
• Give Another Detail to Support Notable Feature
• Conclusion

Your final essay should look something like this:

This bar chart gives information about the average weight of men in kilograms in several different countries. We can see from the graph that the average weight for men in each of the countries listed ranged between 74 kilograms and 88 kilograms. Within this range, however, there is some notable variation. The USA has the highest average weight for males, with a figure of approximately 88 kilograms per man. This is significantly higher than other countries. On the other hand, Brazil shows the lowest figure, with an average weight of about 74 kilograms for men. Most countries averages hover around 81 kilograms, with Australia, Canada, and Germany all falling within this range. Australia and Canada show the same average weight of 82 kilograms each. Generally speaking, English-speaking countries tend to have higher weight averages than countries that do not speak English. In conclusion, although the average weight of men in the countries shown measured from 74 kilograms to 88 kilograms, we can observe some significant fluctuation within that range.

Words: 168