Task 1: Reading the Chart
Read this chart before you read anything else
Give yourself thirty seconds. What is being measured, and in what units?
The units mistake
This one is expensive because it is invisible to you once you have made it.
In the chart above, the National Gallery bar for 2019 reaches 1,200. The caption says the figures are in thousands. So the correct sentence is 1.2 million visitors, or 1,200 thousand - not 1,200 visitors.
A candidate who misses that word writes an answer in which every single figure is wrong by a factor of a thousand. The English might be excellent; Task Achievement will not be. Examiners see this constantly, and it always comes from reading the bars before reading the labels.
The same trap appears as per 1,000 people, millions of tonnes, index (2010 = 100) and percentages that do not add up to 100 because they are percentages of different totals.
Five checks, ninety seconds
Do these in order, every time, before you write your introduction.
- What is measured? Read the vertical axis label and the chart title together. Visitors? Tonnes? Percentage of households?
- In what units? Thousands, millions, percentages, an index. Say the unit out loud in your head. This is the check candidates skip.
- Over what period, or across what categories? Is the horizontal axis time, or a set of groups? That single answer decides whether you describe trends or comparisons.
- How many things are being compared? Count the lines, bars or segments. Three is normal; more than four means you will have to group aggressively.
- What is the one thing that stands out? Before any detail, find the largest, the smallest, the fastest-changing, or the crossover. That is your overview.
Which tense?
Decided entirely by the dates on the chart, not by preference.
- Dates in the past - past simple throughout. Visitor numbers fell between 2019 and 2023.
- No dates at all (a snapshot, a process, a general comparison) - present simple. The Science Museum attracts the most visitors.
- Dates in the future (a projection or forecast) - will, or is expected to. Numbers are projected to rise to 1.4 million by 2030.
- A mix of past and projected figures - switch tense at the point the data stops being historical, and make the switch visible with a phrase such as by 2030.
Check yourself on the chart above
Answers are in the sentences below the questions - cover them first.
How many people visited the Science Museum in 2023?
1,150 thousand, which is better written as roughly 1.15 million. Writing 1,150 is the trap.
Which tense should this answer use?
Past simple. Both years are in the past, so: rose, fell, overtook.
What is the single most striking feature?
The reversal. The National Gallery was the most visited in 2019 but had been overtaken by the Science Museum by 2023. That is the overview.
Does the City Museum belong in the same group as the others?
No. It is far smaller and changed very little, so it is better handled separately in the second body paragraph - that is grouping, and it earns marks for coherence.
Where to go next
- New to the task? Start with What the Question Asks.
- Next: Selecting the Main Features - deciding what to leave out.
- Shaky on past simple? The free lesson on Past Simple covers the forms you need here.
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