How to write the IB English Literature Individual Oral

The Individual Oral is the spoken internal assessment for IB English A: Literature, and it carries serious weight — 20% of the course at HL and 30% at SL. Most candidates lose marks not because they cannot talk about books, but because they choose a global issue that is too broad, drift into retelling the plot, or let one of their two works swallow the clock. This guide takes you through the whole task: what the IO actually asks, how it is marked, exactly how to build each part, and what separates a top-band oral from an ordinary one.

What makes the IO unusual among IB assessments is that it rewards preparation you cannot see on the day. There is no essay for the examiner to mark line by line; instead, the quality of your thinking has to surface in ten minutes of controlled, unscripted speech. That puts a premium on three things you settle long before you sit down to speak: a global issue precise enough to argue, two works and two extracts chosen because they genuinely illuminate that issue, and a ten-point outline disciplined enough to keep you on track without a script to lean on. Get those three right and the oral almost delivers itself; get any one of them wrong and even strong literary insight struggles to score. The sections below work through each in turn, and every one is paired with the marking criterion it feeds.

The IB English Literature IO at a glance

The task is a single, tightly defined prompt: examine the ways in which a global issue of your choice is presented through the content and form of two literary works you have studied. You speak for ten minutes from a brief outline of no more than ten bullet points — never a script — and your teacher then asks you questions for about five minutes. One of your two works must have been written originally in the language you are studying, and the other must be a work in translation. You build your analysis around an extract of roughly forty lines drawn from each work, chosen because it genuinely represents how that work develops the issue.

How the IO is marked: the four criteria

Every mark comes from one of these four criteria, each worth ten. Plan your oral criterion by criterion and check what each rewards:

How to prepare an IO, step by step

1. Choose a specific global issue. Pick a precise, transnational issue from one of the five fields of inquiry — narrow enough to analyse closely in ten minutes, not a broad theme.
2. Select two works and a ~40-line extract from each. One work originally in your language, one in translation; choose an extract that genuinely shows how each work develops the issue.
3. Analyse how each author's choices present the issue. Work through the content and form of each extract — structure, imagery, voice, diction — and how they construct meaning around the issue.
4. Build a balanced 10-point outline. Plan ten minutes that give both works roughly equal time and keep every point anchored to the global issue.
5. Rehearse to ten minutes. Practise speaking from the outline alone, timing yourself so you land close to ten minutes without reading.
6. Prepare for the follow-up questions. Anticipate the five minutes of questions and rehearse extending your interpretation rather than repeating it.

IO structure: what goes into your ten minutes

There is no single mandated running order, but the clearest structure that maps onto the criteria is:

• Frame the global issue — define your issue precisely and explain why it has genuine transnational significance.
• Work one: the extract — analyse how the author's choices of content and form present the issue in the ~40-line extract.
• Work one: the wider text — connect the extract to how the whole work develops the issue.
• Work two: the extract — the same close analysis for your work in translation (or your other work).
• Work two: the wider text — how the second work, as a whole, treats the issue.
• Connect and evaluate — draw the two works together into one interpretation of the issue, weighing similarities and differences.
• Close — a short, pointed conclusion that answers the prompt rather than just stopping.

Aim for rough balance: if you find one work is eating six or seven of your ten minutes, rebuild the outline before you rehearse. A useful test is to write the global issue at the top of your outline and then check that every single bullet point could be followed by the words "and this presents the issue by…". Any point that cannot pass that test is commentary on the text rather than analysis of the issue, and it is quietly costing you marks under both Knowledge and Focus. The strongest orals also signpost the move between works explicitly — a single sentence that names what the second extract adds to, complicates or contrasts with the first — so the examiner hears one argument developing rather than two book reports placed side by side.

What a strong vs weak IO looks like

The fastest way to lift your marks is to see the difference. Here is the same oral approached two ways.

The global issue

Analysing an extract

Structure and balance

Common mistakes that cost marks

• A theme, not an issue. "Love", "power" or "death" are themes; the IO needs a specific, transnational issue you can argue.
• Retelling the plot. Narrating what happens caps Criterion A — the examiner wants interpretation, not summary.
• Naming devices without effect. "There is a metaphor here" earns little; analyse what the choice does to meaning.
• One work dominating. An unbalanced oral caps Focus and organisation — give both works their share.
• Forgetting the translation rule. One work must be in translation; choosing two works in your language invalidates the oral.
• Reading from a script. You may bring only a 10-point outline — a memorised script that drifts off-prompt reads as rehearsed, not analytical.
• Overrunning or underrunning. Aim for ten minutes; rambling past it or finishing in six both cost you under Focus and organisation.

IB English Literature IO — frequently asked questions

Guidance written by experienced IB examiners and aligned to the current Language A: Literature guide. Not affiliated with or endorsed by the International Baccalaureate Organization.