IELTS Writing- The Same or Different?

IELTS Writing the same or different

Without looking below for now, listen to your teacher saying two expressions and hold up the right card depending on what you think about their meanings.  Label the lines below with S for the same meaning or D for different meanings. Even small differences in meaning should be D, but differences not related to meaning don’t matter.

Looking at both sides

• A great advantage/ The main advantage
• Pros and cons/ Advantages and disadvantages
• Pros/ Advantages
• Cons/ Disadvantages
• One of the advantages/ An advantage
• Disadvantage/ Demerit

Time

• At the moment/ At that moment
• At the moment/ Presently/ Currently
• Nowadays/ These days

Comparing and contrasting

• In contrast/ On the contrary
• In contrast/ On the other hand
• On the other hand/ Nevertheless
• Nonetheless/ Nevertheless/ Even though that is true
• However,…/ …, but…
• Compared with these two locations/ Comparing these two locations

Describing maps

• In the town centre/ Within the town centre
• In the town centre/ At the centre of town
• In Victoria/ At Victoria
• To the northwest/ In the northwest
• Is located/ Is situated
• Locates/ Is located
• Opposite/ In front of
• Near/ In the vicinity of/ Close to

Trends

• It increased/ It was increased
• attain…/ reach…
• be enhanced/ be improved
• be flat/ flatten out
• boom/ explode
• bounce back/ recover/ regain lost ground/ rebound/ be restored/ pick up (again)
• change/ vary
• climb/ take off
• collapse/ crash
• decrease/ minimise
• dive/ plummet
• drop/ fall
• escalate/ improve
• increase at the same rate/ sustain the progress
• peak/ plateau
• raise/ rise
• rocket/ soar
• rose by 20%/ rose to 20%
• accelerate/ increase exponentially/ increase more quickly
• decrease dramatically/ decrease rapidly
• dip a little/ dip briefly
• fall sharply/ fall slightly
• remain steady/ rise steadily
• significant decline/ steady decline
• be turbulent/ be unstable/ be volatile/ fluctuate
• remain constant/ remain stable/ stay flat
• double and double again/ rise fourfold
• rose by a third/ tripled
• it declined/ it had declined
• it declined/ it has declined
• it will shoot up/ it would shoot up
• might fluctuate/ will probably fluctuate
• the rise caused…/ the rise was caused by…

More Academic Writing Part One

• The diagram illustrates…/ The diagram shows…
• A diagram/ A figure
• A chart/ A graph
• A bar chart/ A bar graph
• Absolutely critical/ Incredibly important
• Incredibly important/ The most important

Listing points

• At first/ First of all
• First of all/ First/ Firstly
• Last of all/ Last/ Lastly/ Finally
• At last/ Last of all
• At the end/ In the end/ Last of all

Others

• To summarise/ In conclusion
• A solution could be/ One possible solution is
• Many people feel that…/ A large number of people think that…/ It is thought by many that…/ There is a widespread belief that…/ A great number of people hold the view that…
• The points below/ The following points
• Looking at…/ Moving on to…
• As for… / Moving on to…

Check as a class, then test each other with the same holding up cards game and/ or by saying which has a synonym and seeing if your partner can rephrase it.

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Cards to hold up

The same	Different
The same	Different
The same	Different
The same	Different
The same	Different
The same	Different
The same	Different