 The language of charts and graphs. This free English lesson is sponsored by the following English learning sites. There are various types of charts and graphs that we can use in presentations. The main types are bar charts, line graphs, and pie charts. This video will teach you how to describe various charts and graphs for your next presentation. Ready to move forward? Let's start with line graphs and bar charts. Line graphs and bar charts show changes over time. We can use various words to describe changes or movement from one time period to the next. Increase, decrease, rise, fall, go up, go down, improve or improvement, decline, jump, slump, surge, drop, skyrocket, plummet, reach, a point, approach. Some, but not all, of these words can be used as either nouns or verbs. There was a gradual decline in sales. Sales declined gradually. There was a 4% increase in enrollment in 2017. Enrollment increased by 4% in 2017. Notice the differences in sentence structure. When the change word is a noun, it is often preceded by there is or there was. How do we indicate types of change? We can use various words to indicate the degree of change or movement. For example, slight, slightly, gradual, gradually, sharp, sharply, dramatic, dramatically, steady, steadily. When the movement word is a noun, we use an adjective to describe it. For verbs, we use adverbs. There was a dramatic increase in taxes. Taxes increased dramatically. Other words like these include smooth, smoothly, great, greatly, rapid, rapidly, significant, significantly, slow, slowly. We can also describe movement with simpler words. We had a huge increase in revenues in 2019. There was a small decline in sales the same year. There was a minor increase in sales. Revenues decreased in a major way. Sales grew slightly in 2019. More details about charts and graphs. In some cases, we use different prepositions to indicate amount of change or point reached. For example, immigration rose to 800,000 in 2019 to a point or number. Immigration rose to 11% in 2019 to a percent of total. Immigration rose by 20,000 in 2019 by increment or amount. Immigration rose by 4% in 2019 by amount or percentage. There was a 4% rise in immigration percentage. 11% of the total population of the country. 4% of its immigration's previous amount. Let's look at some charts and graphs. This chart describes revenues in 2018 in millions of dollars. Revenues started at $2.5 million in the first quarter. Then they rose sharply to $4.5 million in the second quarter. Then revenues dropped dramatically to about $1.9 million in the third quarter. Then they went up slightly in the fourth quarter. Here's an example with a line graph. This graph shows company sales in early 2019 in millions of dollars. Sales started at around $2.5 million in January. There was a sharp rise in February to nearly $4.5 million. There was a dramatic decline in March to just under $2 million. There was a slight increase in April to about $2.8 million. Now you try it. You will see some charts and graphs. Do your best to describe them. Ready? Describe the bar chart below to your partner. Feel free to stop the video if you need more time. Describe the line graph to your partner. Feel free to pause the video if you would like more time. Pie charts. Pie charts require a different type of description because they don't show movement over time but comparison among sections or parts at a given point in time. For pie charts, we'll use percentages or fractions to indicate parts of the whole. For example, 30%, 19%, 1 fourth, 3 fifths. Language for pie charts. Some common words and phrases for pie charts are b, r, was, were, etc. Account or accounted for. Make or make up. Describing pie charts. To describe segments of pie charts, you can use words and phrases like these. Postal media made up 45% of our 2018 advertising budget. Television advertising accounted for another 15%. One tenth of our budget went to print ads. And one fourth was for trade shows and exhibitions. Note, past tense is commonly used with pie charts because they describe something that has already occurred. Try a pie chart. Talk to your partner about this one. Describe company expenses for 2018 using the chart below. You can make up your own numbers and categories of expenses. Pause the video if you'd like more time to describe this pie chart. For more information about describing charts and graphs, see the link below. Thanks for watching. Learn more English at ESLGold.com.