A step-by-step practice frame for the IB Language B Paper 1 writing exam. Choose the prompt you can answer best, pick the right text type for the audience, context and purpose, and write a response in the right register that fully answers the task — with the three assessment criteria and the text-type conventions built in. Language-agnostic guidance with French & Spanish worked examples.
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To cite a source, click “Insert citation” on any entry while a writing box is focused — it drops an in-text citation at your cursor.
This is roughly how your exported DOCX / PDF will read. Use it to rehearse a focused response that answers the exact task in the right text type and register.
The IB Language B Paper 1 is the productive-skills writing exam, worth 25% of the course. You are given a choice of three prompts — each related to one of the five prescribed themes — and you write ONE task in your target language, choosing a text type appropriate to the audience, context and purpose. SL candidates write 250–400 words in 1 hour 15 minutes; HL candidates write 450–600 words in 1 hour 30 minutes. This examiner-written practice frame walks you through the method step by step — read all three prompts and choose the one you can answer best, identify the audience, context and purpose, select the right text type and learn its conventions, plan content and register, then write an opening that signals the genre, develop the message so the task is fully addressed, lift the language, and check conventions, register and word count before you finish. The guidance is language-agnostic, with short worked examples in French and Spanish.
Paper 1 is marked across three criteria: A — Language (12 marks), for a wide and accurate range of vocabulary and structures where errors do not impede communication; B — Message (12 marks), for ideas that are relevant, developed and well organised so the task is fully addressed; and C — Conceptual understanding (6 marks), for how well the response fits the text type, audience, context, purpose and register. Criterion C is the distinctive criterion of Language B Paper 1 and the one candidates most often neglect — choosing the right text type and using its conventions, in a register suited to the reader, is where a strong response sets itself apart.
Choosing an appropriate text type — a blog or diary entry, an email, a formal or informal letter, an article, a speech, a report, a proposal, a brochure or leaflet, an interview, a review, a set of instructions or a social-media post — and observing its conventions is central to Paper 1. So is register: matching the level of formality (tu vs vous in French, tú vs usted in Spanish) to the audience and purpose, and sustaining it from the opening to the sign-off. Every prompt is tied to one of the five prescribed themes — Identities; Experiences; Human ingenuity; Social organization; and Sharing the planet — so revising connectors, idiomatic phrases and topic vocabulary across all five themes prepares you whichever prompt you choose.
The Language B Paper 1 tool is free to start: the planning sections are free, and the later sections are a one-time unlock per tool. You sign in to save your work to your own account and sync it across devices. The frame and its guidance are written by experienced IB educators.