#writingtask1 # 5- Identifying Main Features This is often | Englishgram Groups Channel

#writingtask1 #

5- Identifying Main Features

This is often the area most students struggle with and it is because of one main reason. Students need to prioritise. Prioritising means you should choose two or three significant features and just write about these. The examiner expects you to do this and the question will often specifically say ‘select main features.’ There should be 2 or 3 main features for you to comment on.

When students don’t do this they write about every single piece of data they see. This results in them not summarising (this is a summarising task), not writing an effective overview and spending too much time on this task. How many students do you know who spent too much time on task 1 and didn’t finish task 2?

Things that you should be looking for include:

High/low values
Erratic values
Biggest increase/decrease
Volatile data
Unchanging data
Biggest majority/ minority (pie charts)
Biggest difference/similarities
Major trends
Notable exceptions

Looking for these things should allow you to pick out the most important features.

Another thing students often do is overthink the question. They think that the answer is too obvious and therefore don’t write about it. A common main feature is a general increase or decrease. Some students see this as too simple and ignore it all together. Don’t do this, reporting obvious or simple features is fine.