Cleft sentences

'Cleft' means split. A cleft sentence takes one plain statement — 'The commute annoys me' — and cleaves it into two clauses so that one element carries all the stress: 'It's the commute that annoys me' or 'What annoys me is the commute.' The facts are identical; the focus is not.

In speech, English can emphasise a word just by stressing it. Writing has no volume control, so clefts do the job structurally — which is why they are so valuable in essays, and why the 'full flexibility' wording of the IELTS Band 9 descriptors fits them perfectly.

• It was the coach's calm that won the players over.(it-cleft — focus on the calm)
• What convinced the panel was her fieldwork in Nepal.(wh-cleft — focus saved for the end)

The frame is It + be + focus + that/who. Almost any element can sit in the focus slot: the subject ('It was Marco who locked up'), the object ('It was the keys that he forgot'), or an adverbial ('It was on Tuesday that the pipes burst'). Whatever follows that/who is old, background information.

Two details keep it-clefts accurate. First, the verb after that/who agrees with the focus noun: 'It is the residents who decide', not 'decides'. Second, be changes tense to fit the situation — it was, it is, it must have been.

• It was the deposit that put students off, not the rent itself.(object in focus, contrast added)
• It was only after midnight that the queue finally cleared.(adverbial in focus)
• It was the neighbours who was complaining.(→ who were complaining — agree with the focus noun)

A wh-cleft puts a what-clause first and saves the focus for the end: 'What the city lacks is affordable housing.' Because English gives end position the most weight, wh-clefts build suspense — the listener waits for the payoff after is.

The what-clause acts as a singular subject, so it takes is or was. To spotlight a whole action rather than a thing, add do: 'What the government should do is invest in vocational training.' This 'What…do is…' frame is one of the most natural high-band moves in IELTS Part 3.

• What impressed me most was the staff's patience.
• What we should do is book the earlier ferry.(do-cleft spotlights an action)
• What I'm looking for are a two-bedroom flat.(→ is — the what-clause takes a singular verb)

All-clefts narrow the focus to a single thing and quietly imply 'nothing more': 'All the plant needs is indirect sunlight.' Noun-headed clefts use the reason, the place, the day or the person as the frame, and the formal pattern is 'the reason … is that', never 'is because'.

Finally, negative contrast clefts pair two halves to correct an assumption — it isn't X that matters; it's Y. This double-cleft move is the most conversational of all the patterns and slots straight into discussion answers.

• All the plant needs is indirect sunlight.(all = nothing more than this)
• The person you should speak to is the visa officer, not the travel agent.
• It isn't the heat that bothers visitors to Kuala Lumpur; it's the humidity.(contrast pair of clefts)

Clefts shine wherever you correct an assumption, contrast two ideas, or single out a priority — precisely the moves that IELTS Part 3 discussions and Task 2 essays demand. They show an examiner that you control information structure: you decide what lands with stress, not the sentence.

Use them sparingly. One or two clefts per essay or discussion reads as emphasis; five reads as a rehearsed tic. The Band 9 descriptor's own word is 'naturally' — a cleft should sit exactly where a fluent speaker would put vocal stress.

• It isn't money that motivates most volunteers — it's the sense of purpose.(correcting an assumption)
• What matters more than speed is reliability.(prioritising)
• It was the over-65 group that recorded the sharpest increase.(highlighting a standout figure in Task 1)