Secrets about IELTS Reading Topic Sentences

  

It is easy to suggest candidates that at first read the topic sentence of each paragraph, and then go for the details. It sounds very rosiest. But, IELTS is much trickier than that. IELTS loves to test you in all the possible ways. This is true for “topic sentence” too. There are many varieties of topic sentences are used in the reading test. As a result, most of the test takers find them perplexing: cannot get the message from it, on the top of that, in the worst case, many candidates even cannot identify topics. Click here to see related video
  

                             
Today, I would like to explain 4 types of topic sentences, which your teacher keeps secret to you.
  
                                  Number 1
Simple topic sentence: writer gives a fresh new idea with a simple sentence to write it.
Example: The River Turag is a sanctuary of many native aquatic species.




                                                    Number 2
Mixed topic sentence: it makes bridge between the previous paragraph and the new paragraph. This type is the most common in the IELTS reading test.

 Suppose, here it is the topic sentence of paragraph A: The River Turag is a sanctuary of many native aquatic species.

Now, we see the example of mixed topic sentence in paragraph B: this believe is the victim of its own success for few reasons.

With the words “this believe” in paragraph B writer refers, “The River Turag is a sanctuary of many native aquatic species” of paragraph A.
So, here, the topic sentence of paragraph B has made bridge with paragraph A.


                                          Number 3
Question topic sentence: often, paragraph starts with a question, which may act as a topic sentence.
Example: Can we calculate the economic benefits from the river?




                                         Number 4
To most of us, it is known that topic sentence is found only in the first sentence or in the second sentence. However, this is not always true. Sometimes writer can introduce topic sentence in the middle part, or rarely, even in the last part of a paragraph.

Now, let see an example,
 There is very little doubt about the contribution of industrial waste and polythene to cause river flow changes. These pollutants cause very thick sedimentation on the river bed. But, in the case of the Turag-even more negatively- nothing can be much more dangerous than land grabbing for her survival.
Here we see, the question maker has changed his/her mind very abruptly, and has introduced the topic sentence-which is blue colored-at the end of the paragraph.



To conclude, in my opinion, understanding topic sentence is difficult. But, if you can learn these 4 types, and can practice them regularly, hope, your skimming and scanning ability will be improved considerably. Therefore, you can get flexibility to read text effectively, and your time management becomes convenient in the test.