Choosing the right details in an IELTS bar chart http://www.dcielts.

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Choosing the right details in a bar chart

► IELTS Vocabulary
► IELTS Writing
► IELTS Speaking
This lesson is designed to help you think about how part 1 IELTS writing works. The idea is that many of
the problems with task 1 writing are caused by the thinking part – analysing the data. That matters
because the goal in task 1 is not just to describe the information in the chart, but to summarise it by
selecting the key data. To do this, you need to spend time thinking – it is not simply a vocabulary exercise.

I’d add that time spent thinking is rarely wasted. If you spend 3/4 minutes thinking of what details to
include, the report actually becomes easier to write. All the “ideas” are there (good for your Task
Response score) and it becomes much easier to organise the report (good for your Coherence and
Cohesion score).

Test yourself first

This is a simple bar chart similar to one you might find in task 1. Your task is to analyse and decide what
information you would choose to include in your writing.

1. Look at the chart and think for 3/4 minutes

2. Make notes of what details you would include
3. Try the test – how many of the details I suggest did you find?

Have problems? Disagree with me? Read on below.

Close Me

[QUIZZIN 19]

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Click yes for every detail you made a note of.

Start with the obvious

Sometimes it is easy to forget to include a detail because it looks too simple. Don’t do that. Simple matters.
If you don’t include these simple details, your writing will lack clarity. The tip here is to look at the simple
(that word again) things like colours and line lengths – let the visual help you. Do that and you get
something like this:

1. there are 6 countries

2. some bars are longer than others – there are significant differences in the proportion of proficient
second language speakers among the different countries
3. there are two colours of bars – males and females are included in the study
4. the green lines are typically longer – generally more females than males are proficient in a second
language

Look at the key – use it to organise your answer

The key can also help you. Its role is to show what the different lines mean. One thing that you can do is to
use it to organise your answer: in this case, that means making sure you write about:

males
females
a comparison of males and females

I’ve helped you here by re-organising the data. This is what you should see and need to include:

1. India is much the largest (around 55%)

2. China is the smallest (about a third of India) (around 17%)
3. Romania, Vietnam, Russia and Thailand are in that order and approximately similar (between 32 and
42%)

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Likewise with females, it’s a good idea to look at the extremes and this is what you get:

1. India and Romania are the largest (around 65% and 65% respectively)
2. Thailand is the smallest (about 27%)
3. There are fairly significant differences between Vietnam, Russia and China

Comparisons are almost always important. Here you should see:

1. Typically, more females are proficient than males

2. Thailand is the exception because there the pattern is reversed (the lines cross)
3. Romanian females appear to be especially good at languages

Look at the axes

Another detail you need to include is that the percentage of second language learners varies considerably
from country to country. You can see this by simply looking at the length of the lines on the “y” (vertical)
axis. To help you see this, I have re-organised the data in a pie chart:

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Key information to include from this is that overall:

1. China has significantly the lowest proportion of second language speakers

2. India is much the largest
3. there are no major differences between Romania, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam

A sample report
Take a look at this sample report and see how I have included the relevant details.

This bar chart shows how second language proficiency varies between males and females in 6
different countries. It is immediately apparent that while there is significant regional variation in
second language ability, typically a higher percentage of females than males speak a second
language well.

If we look at males we can see that India has much the greatest proportion of proficient second
language speakers at around 55% and China has the least at fewer than 18%. There is only a
10% difference in competency ranging from around 40% to around 30% between Romania,
Vietnam, Russia and Thailand in second to fourth places respectively. There are,however,
notably more female than male second language speakers in every country with the exception
of Thailand. So, India once again leads the way with around 65% , closely followed by Romania
and then Vietnam and Russia at 56 and 42% in turn. The two countries with fewest proficient
second language speakers are China and Thailand at around 30%. The final point to note is that
of the countries in the report, India would appear to have the highest overall proportion of
proficient second language speakers and China the least.

Notes
The “obvious” details form the summary statement/introduction.

The main content paragraph looks first at males and then makes a contrast with females. Doing it this way
means you don’t need to repeat a lot of detail.

For both males and females, the first figure included is the highest figure and, typically, the numbers run
logically from high to low.

Download
Sample bar chart on foreign languages (3978)

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The language to summarise two pie charts

Practice exercises for percentage vocabulary
Summary statement exercise – a simple line graph
An IELTS pie chart exercise
How to compare and contrast numbers in task 1

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10 Responses to Choosing the right details in a bar chart

lizzy January 21, 2012 at 6:36 pm # REPLY

Thanks Dominic I was really looking for something like this.How to explain task 1.so
we can really compare the graph in one paragraph.I always get 6.5 in the writing .That is my
weak part.Thanks once again.

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NeKa March 28, 2012 at 1:54 pm # REPLY

Hi Dominic!

First of all congratulations for this fantastique blog!

Would be possible to describe this bar chart in 4 paragraph?

!)Introduction
2)Describe and compare females english proficiency
3) Idem with males
4)Comparison of males and females

Here is my sample (it took some expressions for your sample)

The bar chart compares the ability to speak a foreign language between males and females in
China, India, Romania, Thailand, Russia and Vietnam.

It is immediately apparent that while there is significant regional variation in second language
proficiency, typically a higher percentage of females than males speak a second language well.
India shows the greatest proportion of foreign language speakers around 68%, closely follow
by Romania and Vietnam at about 65% and 56% respectively. On the other hand, Russian and
Chinese females have only 43% and 32% approximately. The major exception is Thailand
where more men speak better than women.

If we look at males India again leads the way with about 56%. Romania, Vietnam and Russia
all have almost a similar proportion of second language speakers at nearly 40% while China
has only around three time less proficient male speakers than India.

We should also note that the greatest difference is between males are females are found in
Romania and Vietnam and the lowest in Russia. However, India has the highest overall
proportion of proficient second speakers and China the least.

ccisa July 18, 2012 at 12:46 am # REPLY

this bar chart is bit hard..

Karmaa October 7, 2012 at 2:53 am # REPLY

This is awesome!
This chapter has immensely helped me to analyse bar charts from various angle! Thank-you
very much!

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Choosing the right details in an IELTS bar chart http://www.dcielts.com/task-1-2/understanding-part-1-writing/

shobin November 16, 2012 at 2:09 am # REPLY

Thanks Dominic for describing a complicated bar graph in a comprehensive manner. It

has given me the idea to solve a variety of diagrams.

anu November 25, 2013 at 7:20 pm # REPLY

Is it right to use ‘We’ in the report?

safia December 20, 2013 at 10:24 pm # REPLY

Thank u for your help,I started to understand something.

Servere HP February 26, 2014 at 9:31 pm # REPLY

Do you mind if I quote a couple of your articles as long as I provide

credit and sources back to your weblog? My blog is in the exact same
niche as yours and my visitors would definitely benefit from
some of the information you provide here. Please let me know if this alright with you.
Cheers!

Dominic Cole February 28, 2014 at 7:12 am # REPLY

No problem. Thank you for asking

Roman March 4, 2014 at 10:55 pm # REPLY

Just wanted to say thank you, it is a very helpfull website.

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