雅思作文素材库.doc

雅思作文素材库I. Are cars doing more harm than good?Arguments1. Cars are evils resulting from modernization, for they make people suffer rather than enjoy life.2. Traffic accidents caused by cars not only bring death and injury, but also make people suffer mentally and psychologically.3. Every year car owners have to pay vast sums to the exchequer: road tax, purchase tax, oil tax, etc. This is a big drain on their resources.4. Since China has such a large population, the popularisation of private cars will only bring about serious social problems.5. Cars should be done away with. We should try to find a safer means of transport which will bring joy and comfort rather than injury and death.6. The roads are so often jammed with cars that ambulances and fire engines find it difficult to fulfil their duties.7. Peoples hidden frustrations and disappointments are brought to the surface when they drive.8. Road networks for cars have not only made cities uninhabitable, but also desecrated the countryside. 9. Cars often produce air pollution and fill the cities with unbearable noise.10. Cars are the cause of traffic accidents. All over the world thousands upon thousands of people are killed or injured every year.Counter-arguments1. Motor cars are highly desirable for obvious reasons. We should recognize this and adapt ourselves.2. Motor cars enable people to become more mobile. Without cars, the world would still consist of isolated communities.3. If there are more cars in Chinas rural areas, people can get to cities more easily. The gap between town and country will become smaller.4. Possessing a car gives one a much greater degree of mobility, enabling him to move around freely.5. The owner of a car is not forced to rely on public transport and is, therefore, not compelled to work locally.6. Long distances can be covered rapidly and pleasantly. 7. Buses are often crowded and slow, especially during rush-hour. If there are more cars, people can get around more easily.8. With the popularisation of cars, the suburbs will become more developed, and the downtown area will be less crowded.9. Cars and motorists are not to blame for road accidents. Problems like too many road signs, faulty traffic lights, sudden narrowing of a street and congested parking are the real cause of traffic accidents.10. There must be universal adoption of multi-storey and underground car parks so that car-parks wont become a problem.II. Are pets good for mankind?Arguments1. Pets are of particular importance to children in this Plastic Age when most of us live in large cities.2. Watching the everyday activities of a pet helps a child to understand nature and cope with problems.3. Learning to care for a pet helps a child to grow up into a loving adult who feels responsible towards those dependent on him.4. The great virtue of pets is that they can keep us company. 5. A pet is kept as a companion that makes us feel happy. Its suggested, that pets should be sent to astronauts in a spacecraft to help reduce the loneliness of space flights.6. Besides providing mere companionship, pets invite us to love and be loved.7. Often a cat or a dog can comfort us at times when human words dont help.8. Animals can communicate with each other in their particular way. They communicate with human beings, too, for they are quick to sense anger and sorrow.9. People keep pets for emotional rather than economic reasons.10. A pet dog brings its master (owner) a sense of confidence, for he can see in the dog that faithfulness does exist and he does have something to trust.Counter-arguments1. Keeping pets is just a waste of time and resources.2. The growing number of pets has caused serious hygiene problems that cannot be solved.3. The earth will no longer be a world of human beings and animals but a world of animals only if we dont take measures to stop the increase of pets. 4. Pet dogs and cats of both sexes should be sterilized because the animals themselves are in danger of becoming the first victims for the simple reason that their owners dont have enough time for too many of them.5. Pets are humanized by those who keep pets. Owing to their need for a home, for food and drink, pets are tamed and idealized by their owners.6. People nowadays are so crazy about pets that they even neglect caring for their own children.7. A campaign should be launched against the overpopulation of pets.8. As a matter of fact those who keep pets dont always treat their pets with kindness. They sometimes abandon their pets when they go away on holiday and are unable to take the pets along with them.9. Its really against nature to cage birds, chain dogs and keep cats within the house.10. Pets are animals. They should be seen in their natural habitat rather than in the homes of human beings.III. Do Advertisements Play a Positive or Negative role in our Society?Arguments1. Advertisements provide the most direct comprehensive and detailed information. We get to know about household goods from advertisements.2. Advertising itself is a business that has provided a great number of jobs.3. With advertisements, people save a lot of time in shopping, looking for jobs, etc. 4. Daily life needs advertisements because the main function of advertising is to disseminate information on commodities, services, culture, employment, student enrolment and even marriage.5. A cheerful, witty advertisement makes such a difference to a drab wall or a newspaper full of news of calamities.6. Without advertisements, newspapers, commercial radios and television companies could not survive. 7. You can find a job. rent an apartment, buy or sell a house, etc. by way of advertising.8. Advertising is a process of artistic creation. 9. Advertising creates mass markets. Without advertisements, manufacturers may find it difficult to sell their products.10. Advertising helps stabilize industry and employment, improves quality, and, by competition, helps keep prices within bounds.Counter-arguments1. Advertisements are imposed upon a captive audience: e.g. on television.2. Advertisements on TV are a nuisance: they interrupt television programmes at a shocking frequency. 3. Consumers have to pay more for the goods owing to the advertising expenses: high prices are maintained by such artificial means.4. Advertisements are simply misleading and cheating. They are filled with flowery phrases and empty promises.5. Fake advertising cheats consumers and, in some serious cases, threatens gullible peoples lives.6. Advertisers are inconsiderate to the public. What they care about is making money.7. Advertisements are not -based on the quality of the goods, but on the principle that if one keeps talking about the same thing long enough, eventually people will pay attention to it.8. Advertisements are an insidious form of brainwashing, using the same techniques, like slogans, catchphrases, etc.9. Advertising is offensive: it appeals to baser instincts.10. Advertising cheapens the quality of life: most ads are in poor taste.IV. Does fashion contribute anything to society?Arguments1. A good appearance may help people make a better impression in social contacts.2. When people are getting old, they should pay more attention to their appearance.3. The way people are dressed helps them to preserve a sense of their own value and personality.4. Fashion adds spice to life with its rich colour, variety, and beauty.5. Men and women follow fashions in order to please each other and themselves.6. The world will be a dull place to live in if people always wear clothes of the same style and colour.7. Mass production makes well-designed clothes cheap, available to everyone.8. The fashion industry is an enormous one. It provides employment for people like textile workers, designers, shopkeepers, etc.9. The fashion industry has helped industrial research in the sense that a lot of new materials, like nylon, rayon, etc. have been made to meet the demand of the consumers.10. Being well-dressed is of psychological importance because confidence in ones appearance leads to confidence in ones success in life.Counter-arguments1. People sometimes look odd with the so-called fashionable hair styles, make-up, and dresses.2. Top designers in Paris and London are dictatorial, for they lay down the law and the whole world rushes to obey.3. Fashion goes like this: one year, one thing; the next year, the reverse.4. People are so vain that they are afraid of being seen in old-fashioned clothes.5. People, especially the fashion-followers, are blackmailed by fashion-designers and stores.6. Changing fashions is a deliberate creation of waste because one will have to discard a lot of new clothes in order to follow fashions.7. Fashion designers are not interested in important things like warmth, comfort, and durability of the clothes. They are only interested in outward appearance and profits.8. The odder the clothes, the more expensive they are, and the more fashionable they become. Its a great pity that people have lost their appreciation of real beauty.9. In order to follow fashions, people have to put up with great discomfort, such as suffering from cold in winter.10. Ones confidence does not grow from the way one is dressed, but from the inner qualities one possesses.V. Does parental permissiveness affect childrens development?Arguments1. The excessive permissiveness of present-day parents is doing more harm than good to children and society as well.2. Children should develop the habit of working and living independently and, meanwhile, practise the virtue of being filial to their parents.3. Children who have a surfeit of happiness in their child hood often emerge like stodgy puddings and fail to make a success of life.4. The fact that young people nowadays are self-centred, indifferent and inconsiderate of others is largely the outcome of parental permissiveness in their childhood.5. Parental authority in a family helps a child to develop his character healthily.6. Parents should exercise strict discipline over their children because, the more permissive the parents are, the more rebellious against their parents the children will become.7. Lavish care and excessive permissiveness will only give rise to hedonism among the younger generation.8. If one lets the child do whatever he wants to, he will ruin the child for life.9. We have to admit the fact that we now have got a generation of spoilt, self-centred brats with no respect for their elders.10. The spread of juvenile delinquency in our age is largely due to parental permissiveness.Counter-arguments1. More care for children is not the same as permissiveness to them.2. The truth is that parents nowadays do not take enough care of their children and often neglect their development because the parents are only interested in their careers.3. Parents are not at all permissive to their children. Violence often takes place in families in which children are abused.4. Only a relaxed family atmosphere can help the physical and psychological growth of children.5. To let children do what they like contributes to their independence and competence in their adult lives.6. It is unfair to blame parents for the spread of juvenile delinquency. There are a lot of other causes involved.7. Many cases show that children leave home and become members of street gangs just because they can not bear authoritarian control over them by their parents.8. Strict discipline does not always work in terms of developing childrens personal qualities. Too much pressure on children leads to rebellion and other extreme actions.9. Parents are not justified in using violence to keep discipline and maintain their authority over the children. 10. Children are human beings, too. They need to be protected instead of being frequently scolded or physically abused.VI. Does television play a positive or negative role in the modern world?Arguments1. Television is now playing a very important part in our lives.2. Television is not only a convenient source of entertainment, but also a comparatively cheap one.3. Television keeps one informed about current events, allows one to follow the latest developments in science and politics and offers an endless series of programmes which are both instructive and entertaining.4. A lot of television programmes introduce people to things they have never thought or heard of before. 5. Television has been good company to those who do not work, like housewives, lonely old people, etc.6. Television provides enormous possibilities for education, like school programmes via closed-circuit television.7. Television provides special broadcasts for those in TV university, or open university. It also offers specialised subjects like language teaching, sewing, cooking, painting, cosmetics, etc.8. Television does the job of education in the broadest sense. Instructive programmes achieve their goal through entertaining the viewers.9. Compared with the radio, everything on television is more lifelike, vivid, and real.10. Television may be a vital factor in holding a family together where there are, for example, economic problems and husband and wife seem at breaking point.Counter-arguments1. Television is a great time-waster.2. Television makes the viewer completely passive because everything is presented to him without any effort on his part.3. Television is to blame for the fact that children take longer to learn to read these days and barely see the point at all of acquiring the skill.4. Television takes up too much of our time. We no longer have enough time for hobbies, entertaining activities, and other outside amusement like theatres, cinemas, sports, etc.5. People rush home, gulp their food, which is often as simple as sandwich and a glass of beer, and start watching the TV programmes.6. The monster, i.e. television, demands absolute silence and attention. No one dares to open his mouth during a programme.7. People have grown addicted to television, often neglecting the necessary and more important things like meals, sleep and even work.8. A lot of parents use television as a pacifier for their children. They put their children in front of the set and dont care whether the children are exposed to rubbishy commercials or spectacles of violence as long as the children are quiet.9. What the viewer receives from television is nothing but second-hand experience. He is completely cut off from the real world.10. Television prevents people from communicating with each other. It has done a lot of harm to the relationship between family members.VII. Does the younger generation know best?Arguments1. The young are better educated and more broad-minded.2. The young enjoy a lot more things than the old: they have money to spend; they are less dependent on their parents; they grow up more quickly; and they enjoy more freedom.3. The young question the values and assumptions of the older generation and they are right.4. The young enjoy more freedom and have a stronger sense of responsibility.5. The old tend to settle differences by conventional politics and violence.6. The old do not have noble ambitions and only strive for material possessions.7. The old are unable to keep away from the rat race, in which they have lost touch with the most important things in life.8. The old can learn from the young. Young people are more devoted to their friends.9. The young know how to enjoy work and leisure and not to be inhibited.10. The young live in the present rather than in the past or future.Counter-arguments1. The young do not assume their responsibility; they evade it.2. The young have too much money and they are spoiled. 3. The young are only interested in themselves.4. The young seek material possessions like clothing, cars, etc. They do not wish to work for them.5. The young should feel grateful to the older generation, who have created a good life for them.6. The old provide the young with a good education and money to spend.7. The older generation fought in the two world wars. They faced real problems, but the young have an easier life.8. Young people have too much freedom and have no sense of morality.9. The older generation is too kind and soft with the young. A tougher policy is needed and might work wonders.10. Young peoples outlook on the world is very bleak and they are sceptical of everything.VIII. Is it a good idea to control the worlds population growth?Arguments1. In modern times, a family with few children, or even with no children at all, is still a happy family.2. With fewer children in a family, parents spend less time on household chores and concentrate more on their own interests, and their children enjoy better material and educational opportunities than those in bigger families.3. The most pressing problem created by the rapid increase in population is a shortage of food. At present a large proportion of the existing population is not getting enough of the right kind of food (e.g. people in India, Ethiopia, etc. ).4. The rapid rise in world population is creating problems for all countries on earth because there simply arent enough resources.5. Both rich and poor countries of the world should take united action to deal with the population explosion. Otherwise, there will be more people fighting for less land and fewer resources, and the future will bring poverty, misery and war to us all.6. Population increase in developing countries has wiped out the material benefits that they have achieved.7. Statistics show that where the population rate is high, peoples living standards are low. This means, peoples living conditions cannot i