Hi Ma-Frank

A new topic, thanks - where did you find it? It's great when people suggest real topics accurately.

Your essay is 321 words long. Are you sure that you’ve practiced writing against the clock by hand?  I don’t think I could do 320 words in 30 minutes (and that’s not counting 5-10 minutes planning and head-scratching time!)

 Print out this sample IELTS Writing Task 2 Answer sheet from the official IELTS website, and practice writing by hand in 35 - 40 minutes. For most people, 300 words is about a page and a half. There are 20 lines on each side.  

It’s important to practice by hand at least once or twice. Typing on the computer is not the same. You don’t have time to reorganize when you are writing by hand.  You have to get it right the first time.

 Intro: A Missed Opportunity?

Why use these sentences? You wrote:

• I think the rationality behind this phenomenon depends on specific situation. In my personal opinion, there are three main factors with decisive influence on this issue.

These sentences could be used in a million essays. Where is there a reference to the topic? How are they related to the question?

The question asks about museums, galleries, education,  leisure, admission, accessibility, public awareness, funding, tickets, funding, arts, history, culture, masterpieces, heritage, conservation, tradition, awareness, appreciation, enlightenment, inspiration, art, beauty, society, culture, tourism, nationality, pride, interactivity, artifacts, learning, wonder, imagination, elitism, government policy, populism, patriotism, craftsmanship, virtuosity, handicrafts, technology   -  but none of these ideas are here in these two sentences. A missed opportunity!

Why not write a shorter essay that actually answers the topic and where every sentence is there for a reason?

You are missing a huge opportunity to impress the examiner with a short, simple sentence  or two that (1) has ideas related to the topic (2) gives your opinion, as the question asks, instead of sitting on the fence (3) helps the reader to predict what is coming and (4) has vocabulary and synonyms for the question to show the examiner that you really do understand it.  Instead, we have 26 words which are nice but will essentially not be counted in grading your essay.

Examiners will just sigh and ignore sentences like this. They will scan instead for real ideas about the topic, rather than sentences or phrases that look or sound memorized. It’s great if you’ve memorized phrases properly, but they won’t contribute significantly to your score.

You won’t be penalized for using these sentences or phrases correctly (unless you use too many of them) – they will just be quietly passed over in the search for real nuggets

Paragraph Two

Then we come to Paragraph Two, and finally we HAVE struck gold. Great ideas here, fully supported. Your essay is looking MUCH better!

Paragraph Three

There is a problem with the first sentence -  it’s a fragment and needs rewriting

• Secondly, in some non developed countries with valuable museums and collections can not obtain sufficient government’s subsidies

Here’s a possible rewrite:  (I’m going to leave out the bit about developed or developing countries – museums have similar problems worldwide).

• Secondly, in some countries, valuable museums and collections cannot obtain sufficient government subsidies.

There’s another problem here:

• Only existence, can collections be protected.

I don’t know what you mean.

You wrote:

• In these overpopulated countries fee is also used as a means to control the number of visitors every day, which is important to protect museums’ building and structures.

I think this idea needs better support. Most museums are happy to have a large number of visitors. Do they charge to exclude some people/certain groups of society/ people who would come in just because it’s raining/for political or social reasons?  

This is one of the most important ideas in your essay, but it’s not supported enough here.  It sounds only as if the floor will collapse under the sheer weight of visitors.

In addition, why overpopulated? Singapore is overpopulated and so is Bahrain, but both have beautiful museums. What does overpopulated mean?

Paragraph Four

This paragraph is stronger than Paragraph Three, but it would benefit from being clearer. Where is your opinion? You go carefully around it but don’t say it. Say it!

If people cannot afford to visit museums, they are being excluded from their country’s history, art and achievements.  Museums which charge high prices for admission are effectively saying that these things are for a rich elite only, not all the people of a country.

You wrote:

Obviously, fee revenue favors museum’s survival but negatively influence people’s opportunity to enrich knowledge and spare time.

Here’s a simpler rewrite:

Fees help museums to survive, but they also prevent people from enriching their knowledge.

Conclusion

In your conclusion, you wrote:

In conclusion, free or charge depends on specific situation in individual country.

Here my question is in which countries, and if this is a supported idea or a generalization.  I don’t think you can generalize by entire countries.  You haven’t given any examples. In the UK, some museums are free, some are not, and it is the same in New York or in Washington DC or in Rome.  Some are free on certain days, some have exhibitions that are expensive but other areas that are free.  Some have two prices, one for locals and one for foreigners.  Some museums are private, some are government-owned.  

I would simplify this sentence. I understand what you are trying to say, but the sentence is hard work at the moment. The list needs to be parallel.

• A country’s government should take responsibility to balance functions of protection, spread and educational in museums

Museums need to balance being open and affordable with their need for funding and security.

So the essay has a really good Paragraph Two and an OK Paragraph Four. I’m happy with the layout  and most of the sentences, but I feel you missed an opportunity to be specific in the introduction, and perhaps some examples of museums you have visited or would like to visit would help. Watch out for generalizations.

Hi Ma-Frank and David

I was just looking at your discussion about the layout.

As I said, I'm reasonably happy with the layout. Ma Frank has three paragraphs in the body:

1. well-funded or important museums are justified to charge for admission, and are worth it
2. other less well-funded museums charge because they (1) don't have enough government funds and (2) want to keep some people out
3. keeping people out is not good.

It might be better if there were some clearer topic sentences, and if the thesis sentence had previewed what we were going to read.

The important point is not the number of paragraphs, but that each paragraph has a 'clear central topic.' (Band 7, in the official descriptors for IELTS Task 2 Writing (public version) here.)

I prefer simple layouts like

• 3773 (intro, museums should charge, museums should not charge, conclusion) 
• 3773 (intro, museums should not charge, museums should charge, conclusion) 
• 35553 (intro, museums should charge, museums should charge, museums should charge, conclusion)
• 35553 (intro, museums should not charge, museums should not charge, museums should not charge, conclusion)

 ...but any other layout of paragraphs is fine, as long as the topic of each paragraph is clear and it's easy for the reader to find out what you are saying, AND as long as you mark the change from paragraph to paragraph.

Read more about 3773 and 35553 layouts here.