Guides / Exam technique
The IELTS Task 2 Body Paragraph: Four Sentences, In This Order
Most candidates can write an IELTS Writing Task 2 introduction and a conclusion. Those two paragraphs are short and they follow a fixed pattern. The two body paragraphs in the middle are where the essay is actually won or lost, and they are the part nobody practises sentence by sentence.
A body paragraph is not a container you fill with everything you know about the topic. It carries one idea, and it carries that idea in a fixed order. This post writes one paragraph out in full, then breaks it in the three ways candidates break it in the exam.
What a body paragraph is for
Task 2 is marked on four criteria: Task Response, Coherence and Cohesion, Lexical Resource and Grammatical Range and Accuracy. The body paragraphs are where three of those four are tested hardest.
Task Response asks whether you answered the question and developed your position. Coherence and Cohesion asks whether a reader can follow your argument without rereading. Lexical Resource and Grammatical Range and Accuracy are measured across the whole answer, but the body is where you have room to use a longer sentence or a precise word.
So a body paragraph has one job: make one point, and make it believable. Two points in one paragraph is worse than one, because the reader cannot tell which one you are arguing.
The four sentences
Here is the order. Write them in this order every time, in both body paragraphs.
- Topic sentence. One sentence that states the point of this paragraph. No data, no example, no hedging.
- Reason. Why that point is true. This is the sentence candidates skip.
- Example. A specific case that shows the reason working.
- Link. One sentence that ties the point back to the question.
Four sentences is a floor, not a ceiling. The reason or the example can run to two sentences each. A body paragraph of five or six sentences is normal. A body paragraph of one long sentence and a list is not.
A worked paragraph
Take this question.
Some people believe that working from home benefits employees more than employers. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
Here is one body paragraph arguing that employees gain more, written in the four part order. The labels are there for you, not for the exam.
Topic sentence. The clearest gain for employees is the time they recover from commuting.
Reason. A daily journey of an hour in each direction removes roughly ten hours from a working week, and that time is unpaid, so removing it raises the value of the same salary without the employer paying anything.
Example. An office worker in a large city who stops travelling to a central office keeps those ten hours for sleep, family or study, while the company saves only the small part of its rent that relates to one desk.
Link. The benefit is therefore unequal: the employee recovers time that was previously lost, and the employer recovers a cost that was already shared.
That is 103 words and one idea. Written twice with a different idea, plus an introduction and a conclusion, it produces an essay slightly over the 250 word minimum, which is where you want to be.
Notice what the example does. It does not name a study, a percentage or a country. Invented statistics are a risk with no reward, because a marker is assessing your English and your argument, not auditing your facts. A specific but ordinary case is enough.
The three ways it collapses
Below are the three failures that show up most often in real answers, each with the same idea written badly and then written again.
1. No topic sentence
Before. Many people nowadays live far from their workplace and traffic in big cities is getting worse every year, and this is a problem which affects millions of workers, especially in developing countries where public transport is limited.
That paragraph has not made a point. It has described a background. A reader reaching the end of it still does not know what you are arguing, so the paragraph cannot progress, and progression is exactly what Coherence and Cohesion measures.
After. The clearest gain for employees is the time they recover from commuting. In large cities a journey of an hour in each direction is normal, so the time returned is substantial.
The background did not disappear. It moved into the reason sentence, where it supports a point instead of replacing it.
2. An example that proves nothing
Before. For example, my cousin works from home and he is very happy with this arrangement.
One person being happy is not evidence that employees gain more than employers, which is the claim. The sentence is also short and simple, so it does nothing for Lexical Resource or Grammatical Range and Accuracy either.
After. An office worker who stops travelling to a central office keeps those ten hours, while the company saves only the part of its rent that relates to one desk.
The second version compares the two sides, which is what the question asks about. An example should illustrate the specific claim in your topic sentence, not the general topic.
3. Two ideas in one paragraph
Before. Working from home saves employees a great deal of commuting time, and it also allows companies to reduce their office costs significantly, which is why many large firms have adopted it permanently since it benefits both sides in different ways.
Read that sentence again and ask which side the paragraph says gains more. It argues both, in one sentence, and then concludes something neither half supports. In an agree or disagree essay this is a Task Response problem, not a style problem, because your position has become unclear.
After. Keep the employee gain in paragraph one. Put the employer gain in paragraph two, and in the topic sentence of that paragraph say plainly that it is the smaller gain.
A second idea is not wasted. It is a second paragraph.
A quick comparison
| Habit | What the reader sees | Which criterion it costs |
|---|---|---|
| Paragraph opens with background | No point to follow | Coherence and Cohesion |
| Reason sentence missing | A claim and an example with nothing joining them | Task Response |
| Invented statistics | Precision that cannot be checked, often with number errors | Grammatical Range and Accuracy |
| Two ideas in one paragraph | An unclear position | Task Response |
| No link sentence | A paragraph that stops rather than ends | Coherence and Cohesion |
The two minute check before you write
Before writing a body paragraph, write two things on your question paper: the point, in six words or fewer, and the example you will use. If you cannot say the point in six words, you have two ideas and you need two paragraphs. If you cannot think of an example, change the point rather than inventing a statistic.
That check takes under two minutes for both paragraphs and it prevents all three failures above.
What to do today
- Take one Task 2 question you have already answered. Rewrite one body paragraph in the four part order and count the words. Aim for 90 to 120.
- Underline the topic sentence in five of your old paragraphs. If you cannot find one, that is the habit to fix first.
- Write three example sentences with no numbers in them at all. Specific, ordinary, checkable by common sense.
A body paragraph problem is hard to see in your own writing, because you know what you meant and your eye fills in the missing sentence. Pasting your answer into Bandly returns an estimated band for each of the four criteria and names the sentences behind the Task Response and Coherence and Cohesion estimates, which is usually where a weak paragraph shows up. The bands are estimates produced by a scoring engine, not marks from an examiner, so use them to find the paragraph, then rewrite it yourself.
Find out what this essay would score
Paste your own answer and Bandly returns an estimated band for each of the four criteria, with the sentences that pulled the score down. Under a cent an essay, about six seconds.
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