Academic Writing 5 — two maps and a two-part question

A fifth Academic Writing paper, with a Task 1 that has no numbers in it at all: two maps of the same village, Ashcombe, in 2000 and in 2025. What each map shows is also listed in words, so every feature and its position is stated in the task itself.

Maps are described with their own vocabulary, and much of the lexical resource mark depends on it. Changes are reported with the present perfect passive — the fields have been replaced by a housing estate, the farmhouse has been converted into a café, the road has been diverted — and positions with relative phrases: to the north-east of, a short distance to the east, just north of the church. Small errors here, "on the east from" or "have replaced by", are exactly what grammatical range and accuracy picks up.

Organisation matters more than on a chart. The weak answer describes the first map and then the second, leaving the reader to find the changes; the strong one groups them by area or theme — housing, land use, transport — and compares the two dates inside each paragraph. It opens with an overview of the direction of change (a village that has become more developed, with better transport) and says briefly what stayed the same: the river, the church, the shop and the woodland. As always in Task 1, nothing is explained. The maps do not say why the solar farm was built.

Task 2 is a two-part direct question: why have so many people started learning practical skills from online videos rather than from a teacher, and is this a positive or a negative development? Two questions means two answers. An essay that gives three good reasons and never says whether the change is good or bad has answered half the task, and the key points look for a clear position on the second question as well as reasons with examples for the first.

Task 1 is at least 150 words in about 20 minutes; Task 2 at least 250 words in about 40, worth twice as much. You print the sheet, write by hand, photograph the pages and upload them. The check goes task by task — length first, then task achievement or response, coherence and cohesion, lexical resource, and grammatical range and accuracy — and names what your answer did not do rather than issuing a band. A flashcard deck of map and evaluation language comes with the paper, each card with an example sentence.

Ashcombe is an invented village. No IELTS® material is reproduced.

• Write a map overview that states the general direction of change and what stayed the same
• Report every main change in the right place on the map
• Use the present perfect passive for changes: has been replaced by, has been converted into, has been diverted
• Give positions precisely with relative phrases: to the north-east of, a short distance to the east
• Organise a map answer by area or theme, comparing the two dates in each paragraph
• Describe changes to a place without inventing reasons for them
• Answer both parts of a two-part direct question, with a clear position on the evaluative part
• Acknowledge a limitation of your own position and deal with it

Practice paper written by Zestly, based on the ielts.org description of the Academic Writing test (Task 1: a diagram; Task 2: presenting and justifying an opinion). The village is invented.