Blog
Reflect and connect with readers through audience-aware writing.
Write for the situation
Audience
readers of a student blog
Purpose
Reflect and connect with readers
Register and tone
Personal and conversational, with a clear public audience
Avoid
A private diary entry that never acknowledges readers
Conventions that help the reader
A title; an identifiable writer’s voice; reader awareness; cohesive paragraphs; optional invitation to respond. These are adaptable guidance: task, audience and purpose decide the choices.
A flexible route through the text
- 1Title and personal hook
- 2Describe the experience
- 3Reflect on why it matters
- 4Invite a response or give a takeaway
Language to develop
Choose precise verbs and examples. Connect reasons and consequences, qualify claims when necessary and vary sentence forms without forcing unfamiliar language.
Planning question
Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Model extract · Social organization
This original teaching extract shows selected choices. It is shorter than a complete Paper 1 response and is not an IB-marked exemplar.
The lunch break that changed my first week
I thought I would manage my first week by staying busy. Then lunchtime arrived, and I realised I did not know where to sit. My mentor did not make a grand speech. She asked whether I wanted to help choose music for the club fair, and suddenly we had something to talk about. If your school starts a mentoring programme, please give pairs a small shared task. Have you ever found it easier to talk while doing something together?
Read as a writer
Find evidence of the intended reader, purpose and register. Identify a convention that makes the text usable.
Explore the content
Underline an example, reason or practical detail. Explain what it contributes, then develop the next paragraph yourself.
Connect it to each core theme
Identities
You have taken part in a multilingual welcome project and your experience changed how you think about language, culture and belonging.
Write a blog for readers of a student blog. Describe a significant moment, explain your response and reflect on what you learned.
Theme connection: how language choices shape belonging.
Planning focus: Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Plan this taskExperiences
You have taken part in a student exchange programme and your experience changed how you think about travel, transitions and learning through experience.
Write a blog for readers of a student blog. Describe a significant moment, explain your response and reflect on what you learned.
Theme connection: what students gain from an unfamiliar experience.
Planning focus: Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Plan this taskHuman ingenuity
You have taken part in an AI-supported language-learning app and your experience changed how you think about innovation, media and technology.
Write a blog for readers of a student blog. Describe a significant moment, explain your response and reflect on what you learned.
Theme connection: how technology helps learners and where its limits lie.
Planning focus: Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Plan this taskSocial organization
You have taken part in a school peer-mentoring programme and your experience changed how you think about education, community and participation.
Write a blog for readers of a student blog. Describe a significant moment, explain your response and reflect on what you learned.
Theme connection: how a community can support newcomers.
Planning focus: Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Plan this taskSharing the planet
You have taken part in a student-led food-waste project and your experience changed how you think about environment, responsibility and shared resources.
Write a blog for readers of a student blog. Describe a significant moment, explain your response and reflect on what you learned.
Theme connection: how individuals and institutions can reduce waste.
Planning focus: Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Plan this taskTeach, practise and refine
- Read a real example of this text type and identify its readership and purpose.
- Annotate the model extract, then discuss how a different audience would change its wording.
- Select a theme task. Plan all required actions before writing; develop examples rather than listing them.
- Draft independently, review audience and task coverage, then revise one paragraph.
Teacher language
Which personal detail helps the reader understand your point?
Support without fixing every sentence
Offer an audience–purpose planning grid, a few useful connectors and oral rehearsal. Then remove the paragraph openings and ask for independent wording. Extend by developing an alternative viewpoint or a justified qualification.
Self-check
- Have I addressed every instruction?
- Do the reader, purpose, tone and conventions match?
- Does each main idea have a developed example or explanation?
- Have I checked verb forms, reference, spelling and punctuation?