Task 1 Overview Paragraph

. The purpose of an overview paragraph is to provide a brief summary of the main features of the graph, chart or diagram that you will discuss in the body paragraphs. By doing so, you will demonstrate to the examiner that you have understood the key trends and patterns in the data and can organize your writing effectively.

Without an overview paragraph, your essay will lack coherence and structure, making it difficult for the examiner to follow your arguments. As a result, you will not be able to score higher than band 5 in task response in the IELTS Writing task 1. It is, therefore, essential to dedicate time and effort to crafting a clear and concise overview paragraph.

So, an overview paragraph should consist of 2-3 sentences. It is important to keep in mind that the overview should not contain any detailed analysis or interpretation of the data. Instead, it should provide a broad perspective on the information presented and how it will be discussed in the body paragraphs.

Overview Paragraph Writing Strategy

 One of the most crucial strategies is to thoroughly understand the question and carefully analyze the diagram or chart. This is the foundation of any successful IELTS task 1 report writing.

To begin, carefully read the question and understand what information is being presented. Identify the key trends, patterns, and features in the diagram or chart, such as the highest and lowest values, any significant changes or trends, and any outliers or unusual data points. These features will form the basis of your overview paragraph.

Next, decide which features you will focus on in your overview paragraph. You may want to group similar features together, such as trends over time, or compare and contrast different parts of the chart or diagram. It is important to make sure that your overview paragraph is balanced and covers the main features of the diagram or chart.

It is important to keep it concise and to the point. Avoid providing too much detail or analysis at this stage; instead, focus on summarizing the key features of the chart or diagram.

Overall, understanding the question and carefully analyzing the chart or diagram is critical to writing a strong overview paragraph for IELTS Task 1. By identifying the key features and focusing on the most important information, you can create a clear and effective summary that sets the tone for the rest of your essay.

How to Analyze A Task 1 Question

To write an effective overview paragraph for IELTS Task 1, it is important to identify the three major areas in the question sentence:

·     topic words or keywords,

·     micro keywords, and

·     action words.

These areas provide the necessary framework to ensure that your overview paragraph accurately and concisely summarizes the key features of the graph or chart.

The topic words or keywords are the most significant words in the question sentence that describe the main subject of the graph or chart. They provide a general idea of what the data is about and give direction to your analysis.

Micro keywords are the specific details that are important for understanding the data, such as units of measurement or time periods.

Finally, action words indicate the type of information that needs to be provided in the essay, such as describing a trend or comparing data.

When you identify the keywords and micro keywords in a Task 1 question, it helps you to quickly understand what the diagram is mainly about and what information is important to focus on. This can make it easier for you to find the main features of the diagram, like the highest and lowest sales numbers or how different products compare to each other.

Dynamic or Static Diagram

When approaching a Writing Task 1 question, it is important to recognize whether you are dealing with a dynamic or static diagram.

A dynamic diagram represents data that changes over time, while a static diagram shows data for a specific point in time. By understanding the nature of the diagram, you can employ the following strategies to develop an effective overview paragraph:

If it is a dynamic diagram:

·     See the starting and finishing points of data

·     See the trend line of data how it changes over the time. See whether it is increasing or decreasing, or remaining stable over the period.

·     Find if there are significant changes in the general trend line.

·     Locate the highest and the lowest points that the data reached

If it is a static diagram:

·     See where are the extreme values

·     Locate the significant differences

·     Look if there is any exception

·     Find if there are similarities

Please note, you should not explain any data in detail. Instead, state the major features in general terms and save the details for the body paragraphs. By following this approach, you can ensure that your overview paragraph is clear, concise, and effectively summarizes the main features of the diagram.

Overall, by analyzing the diagram carefully and following the strategies discussed on this page, you can create a strong and effective overview paragraph that sets the tone for the rest of your essay.

How to Identify The Main Features

Identifying the main features is crucial for achieving a high band score in IELTS Task 1 report writing. This is because the main features are the key elements of the diagram that you must accurately and effectively describe in your report. Failure to identify and describe the main features can result in a low band score, as it will demonstrate a lack of understanding of the data and an inability to effectively communicate the information.

To identify the main features in an IELTS Task 1 diagram, follow these steps:

Understand the type of diagram: The first step is to identify the type of diagram you are presented with. Common types of diagrams in IELTS Task 1 include bar graphs, line graphs, pie charts, tables, and diagrams showing processes or cycles.

Read the title and labels: The title and labels of the diagram provide valuable information about what the diagram represents. Read them carefully to understand the topic and scope of the diagram.

Identify the main trend: Look for any significant trends or patterns in the data. This might include an increase or decrease over time, a comparison between different groups or categories, or a relationship between different variables.

Identify the key features: Look for any significant data points, unusual or extreme values, or other features that stand out. This might include maximum or minimum values, spikes or dips in the data, or other important points of interest.

Note any changes or comparisons: If the diagram shows a comparison between different groups or categories, or changes over time, be sure to note these in your report.

Consider the scale and units: Understanding the scale and units used in the diagram is important for accurately interpreting the data. Be sure to note the units used on each axis, and any changes in scale or units throughout the diagram.

Overall, identifying the main features is essential for effectively communicating the information presented in the diagram. By following these steps, you can ensure that you accurately and effectively describe the main features of the diagram, and achieve a high band score in IELTS Task 1 report writing.

After identifying the main features of the diagram, you can simply summarize them in one or two clear sentences. This summary will serve as the overview paragraph of your report.

Action words: This is simply the instruction sentence, which is always same (Summarize the information by selecting and reporting the main features and make comparisons where relevant.) for all the types of task 1 questions. It wants you to summarize the information, describe the main feature and compare between the significant features, if relevant. Therefore, summarizing, describing and comparing are typically the action words for all the task 1 question types.

After completing the question analysis, you need to find the major features in the diagrams. Just 2 features are enough to discuss as you are required to write only around 150 – 200 words within the limited time (about 20 minutes).

Identify the major features

To analyze a pie chart in IELTS Task 1, you can follow these steps:

1.   Understand the Title: Carefully read the title of the chart or graph as it provides crucial information about the topic and what it represents.

2.   Identify Units of Measurement: Units of measurement can vary and can include amounts, time, age, or percentages. In some cases, units may not be specified, but they can be inferred from the title or other information presented.

3.   Calculate the total: Make sure you have the total of the data represented in the pie chart.

4.   Identify the largest and smallest sectors: Determine which sectors are the largest and smallest in terms of their proportion of the total.

5.   Highlight key information: Highlight any particularly important or interesting information shown in the chart, such as a large sector representing a significant portion of the total.

6.   Compare sectors: Compare the size of each sector to describe the distribution of the data.

7.   Determine Time Periods: It is essential to identify if the data represents the past, present, or future, as this information will determine the appropriate tense to use.

8.   Similarities: In addition to observing significant increases and decreases, also look for similarities or constancies over a period of time.

So, coming across the checklist, these are the major features that we have identified in the pie charts:

1.   Oil constituted the largest energy share in both periods

2.   Natural gas and coal experienced the most significant change

We will simply state these main features using one or two sentences which will be our overview paragraph.

Let's form the paragraph:

"Overall, the nation's energy production was dominated by oil in both years, with a noticeable shift in the proportional share of coal and natural gas."

The overview is probably the most important paragraph in the whole essay. In fact, as we will see later in this post, it is very difficult to score 7 or above without a good one.

An overview is simply a summary of the main or most important points in a graph, chart, process or map. It is normally 2-3 sentences long and should be the second paragraph you write in your essay. As we will see below, it also influences what you write in the rest of your essay.

Learn how to write a good one, and you are much more likely to get a high score.

What does the examiner want? 

An overview is one of the first things an examiner looks for because it shows them that you can identify the most important information from the graph or chart and clearly identify overall trends and comparisons.

If we look at the official marking scheme, we can see that the word ‘overview’ is mentioned three times:

This means that to get at least a 5 for task achievement we must give some kind of overview. If we do not give any overview, we will always get below a 5. If we select the appropriate data to include in our overview, we get a score of 6, and if it is ‘clear’ we get a 7 for this part of the exam.

If you know how to select the appropriate data and practice writing a clear overview, you will likely get the score you deserve in this section.

What is an overview?

To understand this, we must look at the question. The question for academic task one is always the same:

summarize the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

We, therefore, need to provide a short summary of the main features. You do this in the overview paragraph by picking out 3-4 of the most significant things you can see and writing them in general terms. By general, I mean you do not support anything you see with data from the graph or chart, write about what you can see visually.

How do I select the correct features? 

To understand this, we have to think about the different types of graphs and charts we might see. There are generally two different kinds of charts and graphs: dynamic and static.

Dynamic charts show data over time, and static charts show data at just one point in time. This will affect the type of data we select.

When we are looking at dynamic graphs, we should be looking out for:

What does the data do from the start to the finish?

Do they generally go up or down, or do they fluctuate?

Any significant difference from the general trend?

Overall increase/decrease?

Peaks/lows?

When we look at static graphs, we should be looking for:

What are the highest/lowest values?

What are the most noticeable differences?

Any similarities?

Any significant exceptions?

Is there any special grammar? 

You should try and make a complex sentence by making a subordinate clause. Complex sentences are sentences with more than one clause, which help increase our marks in the grammatical range part of the marking criteria.

You can easily make a subordinate clause structure in the overview by joining two pieces of information with the words ‘while’. ‘although’, ‘with’, ‘even though’, ‘whereas’ or ‘and’. However, make sure you know the meaning of these words and how they are correctly used in a sentence.

How does an overview fit into the rest of my essay? 

The overview should be the second paragraph of a four-paragraph structure:

 Paragraph 1- Paraphrase Sentence from question/prompt: introduction

Paragraph 2- Overview

Paragraph 3- Details

Paragraph 4- Details

I tell my students to write the overview before the details because it clarifies to the examiner that they have identified the main features and helps them write the details paragraph. In the details paragraphs, you will take the statements you made in the overview and support them with data.

Shouldn’t I write a conclusion? 

No. Conclusions are really a summary of what you think or opinions. This is not an opinion essay, and you do not need to write a conclusion. Save your conclusions for task 2.

Below is one final example following the structure I used above. I have highlighted the overview in yellow.

Notice how I have picked out the most significant/noticeable/important features and talked about them very generally in the overview. I have not used any data in the overview. However, I have taken the features from the overview and supported them with data in paragraphs 3 and 4.

Example 1

The given pie charts compare the expenses in 7 different categories in 1966 and 1996 by American Citizens. Write a report for a university lecturer describing the information below. You should write at least 150 words. You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.

Overall, the figures showed that the Americans spent more amount of money on food and cars than other remaining items in both years. Nevertheless, there were numerous changes in American people’s expenses from 1966 to 1996.

Model Overview 2 for the previous pie chart

Overall, food and cars accounted for the largest proportion in 1966 and 1996 respectively. Additionally, there was a reduction in the amount of money US inhabitants spent on food, petrol, furniture and books whereas car, restaurants and computer experienced an increase over the period shown.

Example 2

The charts below show the percentage of water used for different purposes in six areas of the world. Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

Overall, it is clear that water used for agriculture accounts for the largest proportion, except for North America and Europe, mainly providing for industrial use.

Model Overview 2

Overall, more water is consumed by agriculture than by industry and homes in the two Asia regions, Africa, and South America. By contrast, industry accounts for the vast majority of water used in North America and Europe.

Example 3

The graph below gives information about car ownership in Britain from 1971 to 2007.

Overall, the percentage of households who owned cars in Britain increased between 1971 and 2007. In addition, the number of households with two cars increased while the number of households without a car decreased rapidly.