dim/essayforum_raw_writing_10k huggingface dataset:
**Some universities now offer their courses in the Internet so that people can study online. Is this a positive or negative development?**  
  
## study from your home online

  
  
It is true that online courses are becoming a common feature of university education system. Even though there are some disadvantages of Internet-based learning, I believe that benefits of it far outweigh its drawbacks.  
  
Three cons of online education should be mentioned. The main problem is lack of direct interaction between students and teachers which is a crucial learning process. For example, students can ask teachers questions after class, but it seems not possible if online platform replaces classroom. Another concern is that it is difficult to ensure students attendance. Due to omission of rigorous attendance counting and punishment, playing truant is easy to do with no cost. The last negative possibility is the effectiveness of online courses is still questionable as there is insufficient scientific evidence to prove it.  
  
Despite the drawbacks mentioned above, offering online education is still a reasonable decision owing to several factors. Learning online is a more convenient way to study because students can choose the best time to learn and have a flexible timetable which favours students to learn something other than university courses. In addition, geographical location is no more a limitation because online courses are available as long as Internet service is available. For instance, students in Africa do not have to travel thousands of milometres to Finland to attend lessons there. It also helps facilitate the free flow of knowledge because Internet is a convenient "place" to connect people around the world and their possessed wisdom and experiences.  
  
In conclusion, while I recognise the aforementioned disadvantages of online learning, I consider it to be a positive development overall. (267 words)
Peter, once again you have proven that you are not even taking the time to fully understand what the prompt is asking you to discuss and in what manner. I do not know how many times I have to repeat this to you but, you really need to have some sort of idea as to how the essay is to be discussed. I am worried that you do not have ample English knowledge with which to properly understand the given topics and instructions for discussion because you have not shown any improvement in that problem areas over the number of practice tests that you have done. You need to take the understanding of the prompt seriously or risk definite failure in the actual test.  
  
In this instance, you understood the topic, but then decided to discuss the drawbacks of online courses. Why are you discussing drawbacks when the prompt is asking you to consider if this is a positive or negative development? The drawbacks type of discussion is for a different prompt requirement. In this instance, you are supposed to discuss why you believe that online learning is a negative development, not a drawback. You were to choose either the positive or negative side and then discuss only that in the essay. You went into a whole other direction with the discussion which will definitely get you a failing score of 3 had this been an actual test.
Topic: **Some people say that the best way to improve health is by increasing the number of sports facilities. Others, however, say that this would have little effect on public health and that other measures are required**  
  
## new spaces for sports and for health

  
  
Nowadays, public health improvement has recently become a great concern all around the world. While some argue that an increase in the number of sports facilities is the best way, I believe that there are other measures which have more impact on the improvement of public health.  
  
On the one hand, it is undeniable that increasing sports facilities is essential for the public health because playing sports is the best as well as the easiest way to improve our health. However, the majority of people do not have enough free time to travel a long distance to the sports center although they are actually keen on playing sports. A survey of Youth newspaper reveals that near 30% residents in Ho Chi Minh city do not play sport because the sports centers are too far from their houses. As a result, the higher number of sports facilities will probably increase the rate of people doing exercise. This can lead to the improvement of public health.  
  
On the other hand, there are other measures which have a better effect on our health. While increasing sports facilities require an enormous amount of money, there are many cheaper ways. For example, providing more sports equipment in the local parks also encourages people to exercise while reducing the cost. Moreover, besides physical activities, having a healthy diet is also crucial. Educating people about the harmful effect of fast food, smoking and alcohol by using multi-media is actually one of the best ways to improve personal health and the public health in general.  
  
P/S can you guess my ielts band score as well, thank you very much
Nguyen, you cannot be accurately scored on this essay because of the incomplete original prompt instructions that you delivered. I know that thee are some advisers who say that 2 sentences in an opening and concluding statement is enough for the test. I have tutored many other students who follow my method of using at least 3 sentences in the opening and concluding statement in order to help increase their TA, LR, C&C, and GRA scores. They pass their tests with a band score of 7.5 and up. That is because they use the word count, paragraph requirement, and sentence requirement accurately enough to portray their English comprehension and sentence development skills. Your completed essay does not accomplish that. You are also missing a concluding statement in this essay. You only have 3 paragraphs in your essay which is not very good. In order to gain a higher score, you need to write at least 4 paragraphs or 300 words.  
  
Now, since you did not include the instruction regarding the type of discussion that you are to present in your essay, I cannot advise you regarding corrections in that aspect. The method of essay writing as indicated in the prompt requirement would have helped me judge your essay on an overall basis. At this point, I can't even do it on a per criteria basis because I do not know if your approach to the discussion is within the required parameters of the instructions.  
  
The missing concluding statement also prevents me from accurately judging your essay with a probable score. Please make sure to provide the full original prompt with your next essay if you want to be scored accurately on it. Right now, I can tell you that this essay has major development issues and missing elements so it will not get a passing score in an actual setting.
***The pie chart below shows the main reasons why agricultural land becomes less productive. The table shows how these causes affected three regions of the world during the 1990s. Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparison where relevant.***  
  
## global farmland degradation and its consequences

  
  
The chart illustrates the causes of global farmland degradation. The diagram gives information about how North America, Europe and Oceania were influenced by these causes in the 1990s.  
  
The over-exploitation of land is the major reason for degradation of farmland, with over-grazing and over-cultivation accounting for 35% and 28% respectively. A further 30% of degradation was due to tree clearance, while other reasons are only responsible for the remaining 7%.  
  
Among the three regions in question, Europe suffered the most. It had as much as 23% degraded land, in which 9.8% were caused by deforestation, followed by over-cultivation(7.7%) and over-grazing(5.5%). For Oceania, over-grazing constituted 11.3% in its 13% of total land degraded, leaving only 1.7% for deforestation. North America had a lower degree of land degradation at 5%, with 3.3% caused by over-cultivation and 1.5% by over-grazing.  
  
Overall. The different causes of land degradation had a largely varying impact on different regions. The main culprit in Oceania was over-grazing, while North America and Europe suffered the most from over-cultivation and deforestation respectively.  
  
*
Zhiyuan, while you came in over the minimum word requirement, it is important that you learn how to fully develop your thought process in each paragraph. With only 2 sentences introduced per paragraph, you are only representing the obvious information in your essay instead of expanding upon your discussion with observations and additional information. A listing of the problems with your essay are:  
  
1. In the opening summary, you neglected to include the types of land degradation in your overview, which made the discussion outline incomplete.  
2. You should not indicate information in a parenthesis because you are expected to discuss, not mention, the represented information in the pie chart and chart columns.  
  
3. In your analysis of the pie chart, you should have identified it as a pie chart describing the world wide degradation. There are keywords in the essay that you must note and use in order to show an analysis and full understanding of given diagrams.  
  
4. All of your paragraphs are under the required 3 sentence minimum, 5 sentence maximum. You cannot expect to present a detailed analysis of any information with only 2 sentences. You need at least 3 to even partially do that.  
  
Try to develop the points I noted above in your next practice test. You have done good work in this essay, you have the skill to be even better. Just remember that you need to find the small details that will help to show a better analysis of the given diagram.
**Ques: some people believe the aim of university education is to help graduates get better jobs. Others believe there are much wider benefits of university education for both individuals and society. Discuss both views and give your opinion.**  
  
## benefits of studying

  
  
Education is of vital importance to the growth of individuals and society as a whole, which means it merits an enormous amount of consideration. The notion that tertiary education serves the foremost purpose of generating high qualitied workers has been refuted by those who suppose universities have a greater number of roles to play besides assuring career path for school leavers.  
  
Initially, let's look at the first view. Universities were originally vocational training schools whose scope was to provide students with hands-on skills in a given profession. As now people lay the hope of future development over college students who will constitute the main drive of state's prosperity, higher education would turn to be useless with failure to have practical workforce as output. Intensive labour economy replaced by knowledge-based economy, those attending universities must have advantages over others in securing employment. Furthermore, monetary investment in tertiary education is huge, hence, should be worthing and pay off financially afterward. Therefore, higher education needs to fulfill the role as an instrument for combating unemployment and a ticket to a well-paid desirable job, in turn for the state's support and government funding.  
  
Moving forward onto the other perception of education, one can argue that intrinsically, higher education can definitely bring more benefits that should not be overlooked by either individuals or the society. Aside from becoming a successful income earner, college students now tend to persue tertiary educational opportunities for a wider range of goals and aspirations. Areas such as arts, philosophy, psychology and human sciences may help individuals gain a better understanding of humanity and figure out their own purposes of life. To a larger extent, university graduates who have undergone the environment of discipline and self-independence will stablize the well-being of society by their moral codes of behaviour such as giving priority to the elderly or pregnant women in public services.  
  
Both views elaborated above, I believe the two opinions can be reconciled. Universities can be a facilitator of favourable jobs, as well as a platform for other educational pursuits, which benefits students themselves and society one way or another.
Anh, your essay has a number of problems. The first, is that you did not properly outline the essay in the opening statement. While you did do a very good job at representing the two sides for discussion, you stopped short of doing 2 important things in the opening statement:  
  
1. Indicate that you will be discussing both points of view in the essay;  
2. Inform the reader that your opinion (without actually mentioning what it is) will be discussed towards the end of the essay.  
  
Your presentation of reasons in the first paragraph is highly confusing. It seems to be discussing too many reasons all at once. What you should be doing is discussing only one point in a well presented and understandable manner to the reader. You do not need to present too many reasons in the essay. You just need to present one in every paragraph that the reader can easily understand. I can tell that you were trying to create complex sentences in your essay. Instead, you created unfocused sentences that often became run-on sentences instead. This is specially evident in the second and third paragraphs in the essay.  
  
As for your personal opinion. You need to develop the discussion further because you only have 2 sentences of explanation which does not represent the mandatory 3 sentence minimum requirement per paragraph, including the concluding paragraph. The reason you are being asked to write up to 5 sentences is because that is the only way you can prove that you understand the instructions and that you are capable of making yourself understood to the reader when you write in English.  
  
There is a lack of concluding statement in this essay. Most students often make the mistake of trying to have a very short personal opinion represent the concluding statement. Since you are expected to write by a certain academic standard, this type of writing is unacceptable. If you cannot present a paragraph at the end that represents a restated prompt discussion, summary of the discussion, and a reiteration of your personal opinion, then the essay will get a lower task accuracy score in the final consideration.
**Every year several languages die out. Some people think that this is not important because life will be easier if there are fewer languages in the world.  
  
To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?**  
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## disappearance of languages

  
  
Language is the most important factor in communication. However, it is true that every year, several languages die out. Some hold the belief that they do not have to concern about it due to the fact that life will be more comfortable when fewer languages are spoken in the world. I would say that I strongly disagree with this opinion because of its possible negative effects on our lives.  
  
Language contributes to our lives in several ways. Apparently, language is the identity of a race. Every race in the world has its own language. It should be learnt by each individual so that they can pass on their particular language to their offspring. A research shows that not all Vietnamese children born abroad can talk with their relatives and friends in Vietnamese. Therefore, if people do not take any effective measures to reduce the disappearance of languages, they will soon end up with more and more languages.  
  
Undoubtedly, fewer languages lead to the fact that cultures and traditions will eventually lost in the near future. Language of a region represents its cultures and traditions. They can only be learnt through language. Harshly, without learning language, they will be forgotten by themselves. Thus, if languages die out, as a consequence, these moral value will disappear.  
  
In conclusion, I would agrue that the disappearance of languages should be considered correctly because of its unexpected detrimental impacts on our lives. There should be more solutions to tackle this problem which is certain to arise.
Trang, when you are asked the extent of your disagreement, the last line of your outline paragraph should be "I disagree with this opinion due to several reasons to be discussed below." Your opinion is not warranted in the outline paragraph because that is only meant to be used to present the order of discussion of the paragraph topics. It does not leave room for an actual opinion discussion. That is always fully presented and discussed in the later paragraphs.  
  
You cannot conclude an essay with an argument. An argument requires the additional presentation of facts which cannot be done in the concluding summary paragraph. So your essay only has a personal opinion statement at the end. It is also, an under developed personal opinion because it does not have any supporting information to assist in the claim that you are making through your argument. This does not qualify as a concluding statement. A concluding paragraph / statement just summarizes the preceding discussion in the same manner as the opening statement. Your essay doesn't do that so expect to be marked down for that missing paragraph.
Trang, as pointed out by Mary, the last line of the outline paragraph should act as a transition statement that highlights the points you will discuss in the subsequent paragraphs to backup the extent of your disagreement with facts. This simple step will inform your ability to make an interesting and organised argument. I must commend your grammar skills and the use of transition words. However, as addressed already, your concluding paragraph did not add up at all. If you modify the introductory paragraph and concluding statement, I think your essay will really read better. Your thought is cool already.
A large amount of people are likely to support the idea that teachers have the authority to dismiss disobedient children from the class. From a personal vantage point, it is not a counter-effective measure and there exist other solutions relied on.  
  
On the one hand, the possibility that forcing disruptive children to leave the class is a temporary method, what's more, it can be arisen some adverse consequences. Firstly, as a result of severely mental effects, bad-behaved children are prone to retreat into their shells and turn into violent individuals as well. Secondly, this measure can not be achieved educational goals. On the grounds of interrupting the class, learning's quality might be affected tremendously. Furthermore, the obligation of teachers providing academic and moral education tend to be uncompleted.  
  
On the other hand, there are some effective alternative to address this problem. The first solution should be noticed is that parents and teachers ought to join hands together to generate moral lessons for their children. Thanks to the intimate relationship, parents can find easy to educate disruptive children and get them to turn over a new leaf. The second solution concerns about other fruitful punishments. This can be exemplified by the case that in some Japan school, disruptive children ask for plant trees, it is greatly constructive their heath.  
  
All things considered, asking bad-mannered children to leave the class can not be considered an optimal method. Additionally, other solutions should be mentioned to cope with this issue.
Hong, please remember to post the full prompt of the essay the next time you post. At this point, I am not sure about how to review your work because of the missing instructions. I have no way of telling how well you understood the discussion instructions and if you followed the discussion criteria because of the missing guidelines.  
  
Overall, your essay lacks a coherent presentation. There is a lack of cohesiveness because you only mention several ideas in each paragraph without thoroughly discussing why you chose to discuss these subjects in relation to the prompt. Please consider opting to present only one well explained idea in the paragraph because you are being judged as to how well you can develop your related English sentences, not your knowledge of public opinion.  
  
There is no relationship between your discussions and asking disruptive children to leave the class. You are talking about bullying while the prompt is just discussing an unruly child in class. There is a difference between a bully and an unruly child. This alone shows that you do not understand the discussion parameters, which I cannot explain to you because you did not include it in this presentation. This is not a very good essay. It has grammar structure and development problems that show a lack of ability to accurately develop simple English sentences. You have confusing sentences in every paragraph, and the discussions need more work. Even without the exact topic on hand, I can tell that this essay will not pass in an actual setting.
Please help me check my essay. Thank you.  
  
Please write about: laziness. ## The effects of laziness on your life?

  
  
There is a truth that never changes: laziness is a disease having no preventive vaccine. Everyone over the world, whether they are, may be lazy at any time. Despite negative impact, I firmly believe that laziness could offer many interesting things.  
  
Nowadays, the workloads and work pressure are getting more intense and have increased the stress level of many employees. Many people feel tired, depressed and hopeless due to their boring routine activities that seem to reduce the meaning of their lives. Therefore, losing the motivation to succeed makes them become lazy. This made me remember a famous quote: "On the way to success, there is no trace of lazy men". Hardworking does not ensure success but successful people must work hard. So, if we have a dream, we should remember grit is the key to make it become true. The power of passion and perseverance helps us overcome difficulties and obstacles to enjoy the sense of achievement.  
  
On the other hand, we cannot deny laziness is a motivation for creation and invention. Bill Gates once humorously said that: "I will always choose a lazy person to do a difficult job... because he will find an easy way to do it". I know a poor worker was bored with his repetitive job. So, he strove to find a new way to do it easily and automatically. The worker in this story is Elias Howe who invented the sewing machine that changed the world industry. His laziness made him become a great inventor.  
  
Therefore, if you consider it is difficult to leave your comfortable bed tomorrow morning, maybe this is the time for you to abandon old routines. Do not stop imaging about the fabulous things ahead and looking for new challenges, your laziness is a relaxing moment before continuing your life journey.