Opinion Essays: Planning (British Council Academic IELTS: Writing): Study Material

Planning opinion essays

• In an opinion essay (also known as Agree/Disagree essays), you are usually given a statement or view about a current issue and asked to give your opinion. 

• Typical opinion essay questions look like this:

  • Some people believe that children should start school at a very early age. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

  • The best way to reduce crime is to give longer prison sentences. Do you agree or disagree?

  • In many countries today, people can choose to work from home or in an office. Some believe that working from home has negative effects on productivity and communication. What is your opinion?

Identifying key words in the question & instructions

• Read the question carefully and make sure you identify exactly what you have to give your opinion about

• Identify the main topic and the specific ideas you must evaluate

• If you misunderstand the key words or ignore the instructions, your answer may become irrelevant, and you will score lower in Task Response

• In the statement, be careful with words such as “all,” “always,” “never,” “only,” “best,” and “worst”

• These  words can completely change the meaning of the statement

Brainstorming for ideas

• Do not start writing your essay immediately

• Spend at least five minutes planning what you are going to include in your answer

• Planning is extremely important because it gives you clarity and direction

• If you do not make a plan, you might start writing anything that comes to your mind

• The risk of doing so is that you end up writing an unfocused essay and getting a low score in Task Response

• Brainstorm ideas first and make notes (do not write full sentences at this stage)

• A useful question you can ask yourself is: “What is my opinion about this topic?” 

• There are three possible cases:

1. You agree with the task question

2. You disagree 

3. You partially agree (this means you also partially disagree)

• You will need to include reasons to justify your opinion, so also ask yourself why you agree or disagree

• Asking yourself why will help you generate more ideas that you can then include in your essay

• You will need to include examples to support your ideas, so think about examples too

Ordering ideas

• Use a clear four-paragraph structure:

  • Introduction: paraphrase the question and state your position (or signal that you'll weigh both sides)

  • Body paragraph 1: the main advantage, fully developed with a reason and an example

  • Body paragraph 2: the main disadvantage, fully developed with a reason and an example

  • Conclusion: restate your position and briefly summarise why

• Keep the details and examples for the body paragraphs

• The order of the ideas depends on what opinions you want to express

• Two suggested structures:

  • Talk about why you agree in paragraph 1 and why you disagree in paragraph 2 (or the other way round)

  • If you agree (or disagree) completely with the task question, you can mention one or two reasons  in paragraph 1 and one or two  reasons in paragraph 2 

• Whatever structure you choose, ensure the second paragraph logically follows the first