Section 2 · Written Communication
Task A vs Task B
ACER separates the two writing tasks by what they are about, not by how you are supposed to write them. Almost every preparation source gets this backwards, and it costs candidates time they spend picking a genre nobody asked for.
- 2writing tasks
- 65minutes, pooled
- 4statements per task
- Nonegenre ACER assigns
The short version
Task A deals with socio-cultural issues. Task B deals with more personal and social issues. That is the whole of what ACER says. The difference is scope — public and collective versus individual and interpersonal — not emotional temperature, and not essay genre. ACER never tells you to write an argument for one and a reflection for the other.
What ACER actually says
One sentence in the Information Booklet does all the work, and it is worth reading without the prep-industry gloss on top:
ACER, Information Booklet 2026
“The first task deals with socio-cultural issues and the second task deals with more personal and social issues.”
| Task A | Task B | |
|---|---|---|
| ACER’s words | Socio-cultural issues | More personal and social issues |
| Scope | Public, collective — institutions, societies, systems | Individual, interpersonal — the self, and the self among others |
| Genre ACER assigns | None | None |
| Statements offered | 4 on a common theme | 4 on a common theme |
| Time | Guided at 30 minutes, drawn from one 65-minute pool | Guided at 30 minutes, drawn from the same pool |
The error worth unlearning
Search this topic and you will be told that Task A is the argumentative essay and Task B is the reflective or emotional one. Some sources go further and hand you a template for each. There are two problems with that.
First, ACER assigns no genre at all. It names subject matter. Nothing in the booklet or the preparation guidance says an argument suits Task A or that a personal narrative suits Task B. The marking criteria are identical across both tasks — the same two criteria, the same five examiner questions, the same three independent scorings.
Second, “more personal and social” is not the same as “personal”. ACER kept a social dimension in Task B deliberately. A Task B response that retreats entirely into private introspection has narrowed the theme, not answered it. The word most often dropped when this sentence gets quoted is the one that stops you writing a diary entry.
Why the genre framing costs you marks
If you walk in believing Task B must be reflective and the prompt turns out to invite an argument, you will spend part of your 30 minutes forcing a register that fits neither you nor the theme. ACER assesses what you make of the task. Picking a form that serves the ideas is part of what “the shape and form of the piece” means in the marking criteria — it is a decision you are being assessed on, not one made for you in advance.
The boundary is porous
Even the scope rule is a tendency rather than a classifier. Candidates debriefing after the September 2025 sitting reported thrill-seeking and originality as Task A themes. Neither is obviously public or collective. Both would have been filed under Task B by anyone applying the rule strictly.
This is candidate-reported rather than ACER-confirmed, so treat it as a caution rather than a fact about the syllabus. But the caution is the useful part: do not walk in with two separate essay machines and a plan to work out which one to switch on. Read the four statements, work out what tension they straddle, and write about that.
| Tendency | Task A | Task B |
|---|---|---|
| How the four statements relate | Skews oppositional — statements genuinely disagree | Skews facet-like — statements light the same thing from different angles |
| Typical subject | Institutions, systems, collective behaviour | The self, relationships, individual choice |
| Reliability of the rule | A tendency, with reported exceptions | A tendency, with reported exceptions |
How ACER itself organises the two tasks
One detail supports the theme-first reading directly. ACER’s own Online Test Generator supplied 16 task themes — 8 for Task A and 8 for Task B. The unit ACER organises prompts by is the theme, not the essay type. That is also how our quote generator is built, and why it presents four statements and a theme rather than telling you what kind of piece to write.
| Task A | Task B | |
|---|---|---|
| ACER practice themes published | 8 | 8 |
| Themes in our library | 55 | 60 |
| Scope we assign | Socio-cultural issues — public and collective in scope | More personal and social issues — the self, and the self among others |
What to actually do in the room
- Read all four statements before deciding anything. The theme is what they have in common; you cannot see it from one.
- Name the tension in a phrase. Not the topic — the disagreement or the spread of views the four statements cover between them.
- Decide your contention, then let the form follow it. If the honest answer is an argument, argue. If it is a case examined from inside, do that. Neither is off-limits in either task.
- Keep Task B social. A response that never leaves your own head has answered half the prompt.
- Do not spend the pooled clock evenly out of fairness. The 65minutes cover both tasks; 30 minutes each is ACER’s guide, not a gate. See how to use the 65 minutes.
Common questions
Is Task A argumentative and Task B reflective?
No. That framing comes from the preparation market, not from ACER. ACER distinguishes the tasks by subject matter — socio-cultural issues versus more personal and social issues — and assigns no genre to either. You choose the form that serves your ideas, and that choice is part of what is assessed.
Are Task A and Task B marked differently?
No. Both are assessed against the same two criteria — thought and content, organisation and expression — and each response is scored independently three times. There is no separate rubric for Task B.
Do I get 30 minutes for each task?
ACER describes them as two 30-minute tasks, but the clock is a single 65-minute pool covering both. If you spend 40 minutes on the first, you have 25 left for the second. Whatever you have typed when the pool runs out is what gets submitted.
Can a personal example appear in Task A?
Yes. The scope rule describes what the theme is about, not what evidence you may use. A personal example that illuminates a collective question is doing exactly what the criteria reward. Candidates have also reported themes in Task A that read as personal, so the boundary is not enforced as tightly as the rule suggests.
Which task should I write first?
They are presented in order and most candidates work in order. Because the clock is pooled, the real decision is not which to write first but how long to let the first one run. Fix a switch-over time before you start writing.