You have 24 hours 48 hours to suggest a topic sentence for the first supporting paragraph of this essay!

(This is a model essay in response to a question seen in the UK in April 2012.  This question was taken from ielts-blog.com.  Please leave your suggestion as a comment to this post.  Suggestions emailed to me will not be added.)

Some believe museums should entertain people, while others believe their purpose is to educate.  Discuss both views and give your own opinion.

Museums often represent different things to different people. On the one hand, many people feel a museum’s primary purpose is to entertain. However, others feel they function to house an educational resource. The merits of both arguments will be analyzed before a conclusion is decided upon.

________________Insert your sentence here!_______________. For example, the Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa minimizes the written descriptions normally found next to exhibits, instead preferring to provide visitors with a demonstrational experience to illustrate a scientific point. Although this setup leaves their museum visitors stimulated, it does little to provide them with a deeper understanding of a scientific topic. Thus, the merits of this opinion regarding the purpose of museums are hard to support.

However, many other people see museums as powerful educational resources. For example, the British Museum in London, England, is arranged to provide its visitors with a very informed look at the roots of the human race. Patrons leave this museum with a much more acute understanding of historical topics, and this understanding is something they can apply to their everyday endeavors. Thus, the heightened benefits of this opinion on the role of museums can clearly be seen.

After looking at these two opposing points of view, I feel that museums best serve the public when they are established to educate. Museums can therefore arrange themselves to be entertaining so long as the primary purpose of education is preserved.