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Numbers that tell a story: language for describing graphs and trends

Learners practice describing graphs and trends for a demo and its questions in this B2 English for IT lesson plan.

Grammar
Graph vocabulary: trend verbs (rise, fall, peak, level off, double), verb + adverb against adjective + noun (rose sharply, a sharp rise), and by, to, from… to… and at for the numbers.
Topic
Six months of app metrics at a fictional payments startup, shown at a company demo, and Moore's law, with adoption, crash rate, peak and forecast.
Activities
The story of Moore's law and a demo script to read, a CFO's questions to hear, self-checking drills, a chat with sales, role cards, and speaker notes to write and record.

What's inside

  1. Chapter 1Warm-up: Numbers at Work

    • PictureUnlock
    • Spin the wheel and talk about numbers at workSpin the wheelUnlock
    • Study the words for trends and demosVocabularyTry it
    • Look at the pictures and choose the wordChoose by pictureUnlock

  2. Chapter 2The Story: A Line That Became a Plan

    • Read the story of Moore's lawArticleUnlock
    • Choose the correct answer about the storyQuizUnlock

  3. Chapter 3At Work: Six Months in Numbers

    • Read Iryna's demo scriptArticleUnlock
    • True or false? Check the demo scriptTrue or falseUnlock
    • Sort the numbers into the correct columns: which trend do they show?Sort into columnsUnlock

  4. Chapter 4Listen: Questions from the CFO

    • Listen to the end of Iryna's demo and the CFO's questionsListeningTry it
    • Transcript, for the teacherUnlock
    • Choose the correct answer about the Q&AQuizUnlock

  5. Chapter 5Grammar: Up, Down and Sideways

    • Study the scheme: describing trendsGrammar schemeTry it
    • Choose the correct form: verb or noun?Choose the optionUnlock
    • Choose the correct preposition: by, to, from, of or atChoose the optionUnlock
    • Fill in the table: rewrite each sentence with the other formFill in the tableTry it
    • Read the chart descriptions and choose the best sentenceQuizUnlock
    • Fill in the gaps in Jordan's demo scriptFill in the gapsUnlock

  6. Chapter 6Speak Up: Your Five-Minute Demo

    • Choose the right replies to a colleague from salesChatTry it
    • Open a box: role cards for the demo and Q&AOpen the boxUnlock

  7. Chapter 7Homework: Your Numbers, Your Story

    • Read your phrase bankReal-life documentTry it
    • Do you remember? Choose the correct answerQuizUnlock
    • Is the sentence correct? True or falseTrue or falseUnlock
    • Find the matching pairs: words and meaningsMemory gameUnlock
    • Write the speaker notes for your demo's numbersWriting, checked by the teacherUnlock
    • Record a two-minute demo summarySpeaking, checked by the teacherUnlock

26 exercises in 7 chapters. Start a 7-day free trial to open all of them, copy any part into your own lessons, and teach the lesson live.

Graph vocabulary

12 words and phrases from the lesson, each with a picture and audio in edio.

+9 more with pictures and audio in the lessonMore words

  • a crash rate
  • a peak
  • a forecast
  • a transistor
  • a Q&A
  • level off
  • shoot up
  • double
  • fluctuate

Grammar: describing graphs and trends

A chart shows the shape of the data, but on a call not everyone can read it, so the speaker has to say the trend aloud. Turning six months of app metrics into a company demo, learners say which way each number went and how fast, add the size of the change, and switch between verbs and nouns so the story never sounds repetitive.

Describing trends: which way, how fast, how much

Say where the number went, how quickly it moved and by how much. A chart shows the shape; your words tell the story.

Up, down, flat, double, zigzag

Up is rise, increase, grow, climb or shoot up; down is fall, drop, decrease or decline; the top is peak. Some trends have no noun, so use the verb: level off, double, halve, fluctuate.

DirectionVerbs (past in brackets)Nouns
Uprise (rose), increase, grow (grew), climb, shoot up (shot up)a rise, an increase, growth
Downfall (fell), drop (dropped), decrease, declinea fall, a drop, a decrease, a decline
The highest pointpeak (peaked)a peak
No changelevel off (leveled off), stay stable (stayed stable)use the verb
Twice or half as bigdouble (doubled), halve (halved)use the verb
Up and downfluctuate (fluctuated)use the verb

Rose sharply or a sharp rise?

Speed and size come in two shapes: a verb takes an adverb, a noun an adjective. Adoption rose sharply and There was a sharp rise in adoption mean the same; so do fell steadily and a steady fall, or increased slightly and a slight increase.

MeaningVerb + adverbAdjective + noun
big and fastrose sharply / dramaticallya sharp / dramatic rise
slow and evenfell steadily / graduallya steady / gradual fall
smallincreased slightlya slight increase

By, to, from… to…, of and at

By gives the size of the change (fell by 75%), to the new level and from… to… both ends; after a noun, of does the work of by (a fall of 75%). At marks a top or a flat line: Tickets peaked at 120 a week.

How much? Prepositions

PrepositionIt givesExample
bythe size of the changeThe crash rate fell by 75%.
tothe new levelAdoption climbed to about 1,800.
from … to …the start and the endLoading time fell from four seconds to two.
of (after a noun)the size of the change or the topa fall of 75%, a peak of 120
atwhere it peaks or stopsTickets peaked at 120 and leveled off at 40.
between … and …the range of an up-and-down lineRefunds fluctuated between 600 and 900.

From the lesson

  • The number of components on a chip had doubled roughly every year.Moore's graph, 1965
  • In the first two months, adoption rose sharply, from 300 to 1,200.verb + adverb, then from … to …
  • The crash rate fell steadily: that's a fall of 75%.the verb, then the noun + of
  • Tickets peaked at 120 a week and leveled off at about 40.at for the top and for the flat line
  • The app's loading time halved, from four seconds to two.halve: become half as big

Rise or raise? Four slips to catch

Rise has no object and raise needs one, so errors rose but we raised the limit. Watch for rose with 20%, a sharply increase, the errors raised and decreased of 10%, and spell leveled off with one l in American English.

Rise or raise?

Rise (rose, risen) has no object: “Errors rose.” Raise (raised) needs an object: “We raised the limit.” So a number rises by itself, and a person raises a number. In American English, write leveled off and leveling off with one l.

Typical mistakes

  • Adoption rose with 20%.

    Adoption rose by 20%.

    by for the size of the change

  • There was a sharply increase in tickets.

    There was a sharp increase in tickets.

    an adjective before a noun

  • The errors raised after the release.

    The errors rose after the release.

    rise has no object

  • Crashes decreased of 10%.

    Crashes decreased by 10%. / a decrease of 10%

    verb + by, noun + of

Try the describing graphs exercises

Try them yourself: these are the same exercises your students do in edio.

More exercises

What's in the lesson

  • 13 auto-checked exercises
  • 3 games
  • 2 teacher-checked tasks
  • 1 real-life document
  • 2 articles
  • 1 grammar scheme
  • 1 set of word cards
  • 1 audio clip
  • 1 picture
  • 1 transcript

The main objectives of this lesson are to:

  • say which way a number moved and how fast: Adoption rose sharply. The crash rate fell steadily. Tickets leveled off.
  • switch between a verb with an adverb and a noun with an adjective: Sign-ups increased sharply. There was a sharp increase in sign-ups.
  • give the size of a change with by, to, from… to… and at: fell by 75%, peaked at 120 a week
  • present three metrics in a five-minute demo and handle the questions: I don't have that number with me, but let me come back to you on that.

Numbers that tell a story is lesson 15 of English for IT B2 · Beyond the Code and the last of unit 5, Demos and tech talks, so it carries the unit's task: a five-minute demo with questions, run with role cards. Lesson 13's signposts and lesson 14's cleft sentences come back in the demo script and in a homework review of the unit, and lesson 16 opens unit 6 with diplomatic language.

Students spin a wheel of questions about numbers at work, then learn twelve words with pictures and audio, from a metric and a crash rate to shoot up, and name pictures. The story shows how Gordon Moore's 1965 graph of components per chip became a forecast, revised in 1975, that an industry planned around. Iryna's demo script turns six charts into words, with a true-or-false check and numbers to sort by trend; the AI-voiced listening is the CFO's questions after her demo. The grammar chapter's five self-checking drills include a table that swaps verbs and nouns. A colleague from sales asks for numbers in the chat, and role cards run the demo and the questions after it.

Homework adds a phrase bank, a unit review in a quiz and a true-or-false drill, and a memory game of words and meanings, all checked automatically. Students then write speaker notes for three slides, one trend each, and record a two-minute summary that hands over to questions, both for the teacher.

Grammar:
describing trends · by, to, from… to…, of · adjectives and adverbs
Topic:
demos · metrics and trends · Moore's law

Teaching tips

  • Give the numbers before the script: write 300, 600, 1,200 and 1.2%, 1.0%, 0.8% on the board, and let pairs say what each series did before they read Iryna's version.
  • Play the CFO's questions twice: first for the numbers, then for how Iryna handles the one question she can't answer. Students write her reply on the board and reuse it with the role cards.
  • Use the group's own dashboards: in-company learners each bring one chart from work, describe it in three sentences with by, to or from… to…, and colleagues ask finance-style questions.
  • One-to-one, present a chart badly on purpose: say rose with 20% or a sharply increase, and let the learner, playing finance, question the numbers and correct each slip.

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The whole course: English for IT B2 · Beyond the Code

24 lessons at B2 for software teams, in American English. A year on at Kestrel Cloud, a fictional payments startup, Iryna and her team estimate work, write docs and postmortems, argue trade-offs, give demos and negotiate scope. Each lesson starts from a real case, from the Apollo 11 alarms to Conway's law.See the course

  1. Unit 1 Planning and estimates

    estimates and deadlines: approximating numbers, the future continuous and perfect, likelihood

    1. Lesson 1It always takes longerApproximating numbers in estimates
    2. Lesson 2By New Year's Eve, we'll have fixed itFuture continuous and future perfect
    3. Lesson 3Let's play planning pokerLikelihood with bound to, likely to and may well

  2. Unit 2 Docs people read

    specs and design docs: modals for requirements, participle clauses, plain English

    1. Lesson 4MUST, SHOULD or MAY?Modal verbs for requirements in specs
    2. Lesson 5Four kinds of docsParticiple clauses in documentation
    3. Lesson 6Just a request for commentsPlain English for design docs

  3. Unit 3 Incidents and postmortems

    telling an incident without blame: narrative tenses, the passive, the third conditional

    1. Lesson 7The 1202 alarmNarrative tenses for incident stories
    2. Lesson 8Blameless by designActive vs passive voice in a postmortem
    3. Lesson 9If we had had an alert…The third conditional: a different past

  4. Unit 4 Architecture and trade-offs

    comparing options and recording decisions: contrast linkers, modals of deduction, mixed conditionals

    1. Lesson 10Your system copies your org chartContrast linkers for comparing options
    2. Lesson 11It's always DNSModals of deduction for troubleshooting
    3. Lesson 12Write down the whyMixed conditionals for looking back on decisions

  5. Unit 5 Demos and tech talks

    a clear structure on stage: signposting, cleft sentences, describing trends

    1. Lesson 13The mother of all demosSignposting language for demos
    2. Lesson 1420 slides, 15 secondsCleft sentences for emphasis
    3. Lesson 15 · you're hereNumbers that tell a storyDescribing graphs and trends

  6. Unit 6 Stakeholders and scope

    saying no and finding yes: diplomatic language, as long as and unless, negotiating

    1. Lesson 16Pay down the debtDiplomatic language for hard messages
    2. Lesson 17Why meetings argue about the bike shedAs long as, provided, unless and otherwise
    3. Lesson 18Yes, if…Negotiating language for scope and deadlines

  7. Unit 7 AI, security and ethics

    AI tools, passwords and team rules: be used to and get used to, past modals of deduction, purpose linkers

    1. Lesson 19Your new pair programmerUsed to, be used to and get used to
    2. Lesson 20Change your password? Maybe notPast modals of deduction
    3. Lesson 21Rules for AI at workPurpose linkers for rules with a reason

  8. Unit 8 Growing your career

    feedback, retros and goals: phrasal verbs, reporting verbs, wish and if only

    1. Lesson 22Your next levelCareer phrasal verbs and goal frames
    2. Lesson 23Feedback that helpsReporting verbs and their patterns
    3. Lesson 24Start, stop, continueWish and if only for wishes and regrets

Questions about this lesson

How do you describe a graph in English?
Describe a graph by saying which way the line goes, how fast and how far: In the first two months, adoption rose sharply, from 300 to 1,200. Name the metric, pick a trend verb (rise, fall, peak, level off), add an adverb for speed and a preposition for size, then give a reason. The B2 English for IT lesson Numbers that tell a story on edio.ai puts six charts into words this way.
What vocabulary do you need to describe a graph?
Graph vocabulary starts with verbs of direction: rise, increase, climb and shoot up; fall, drop and decline; peak, level off, double, halve and fluctuate. Add words for speed (sharply, steadily, slightly) and nouns for what you measure: a trend, a metric, adoption, a crash rate. A forecast says where the line will probably go next.
How do you describe a chart in a presentation?
In a presentation, say the trend in words instead of reading numbers, because people on a call can't always see your chart. Give one trend per slide, with its size and a reason: The crash rate fell steadily, from 1.2% of sessions to 0.3%. That's a fall of 75%. Then sum up (Let me sum up: more merchants, fewer crashes) and hand over with I'm happy to take questions.
What does "rise sharply" mean?
Rise sharply means go up a lot in a short time: In the first two months, adoption rose sharply. As a noun phrase, it becomes a sharp rise, with an adjective: There was a sharp rise in adoption, never a sharply rise. For a slow, even climb, say rose steadily or gradually; for a small one, rose slightly.
Is it "rose by 20%" or "rose with 20%"?
It's rose by 20%, because by gives the size of a change. To gives the new level (climbed to about 1,800), from… to… both ends (fell from four seconds to two) and at a peak or a flat line (peaked at 120). After a noun, use of: a rise of 20%, but decreased by 10%, never decreased of 10%. Jordan's demo script in Numbers that tell a story on edio.ai asks for by or to.
What's the difference between rise and raise?
Rise has no object, but raise needs one: a number rises by itself, and a person raises it. So Errors rose after the release, but We raised the limit. The forms differ too: rise, rose, risen is irregular, while raise, raised, raised is regular. The errors raised after the release is a classic slip when describing graphs.
What is Moore's law?
Moore's law is a forecast that chip components keep doubling at a steady rate. In 1965, Gordon Moore saw that the number of components on a chip had doubled roughly every year since 1959 and predicted about 65,000 per chip by 1975; in 1975, he slowed the forecast to about every two years. It was an observation that became a goal, not a law of nature, and every 18 months is not what Moore wrote.
How do you answer a question when you don't have the number?
Admit it and promise a follow-up, rather than guessing: That's a great question. I don't have that number with me, but let me come back to you on that. For a forecast you can't support, I wouldn't promise that is honest and still polite. In Numbers that tell a story, a B2 lesson on edio.ai, a developer handles a CFO's questions with these phrases after her demo.
How do I teach describing graphs to B2 learners?
Teach the shapes before the words: draw a steep line, a slow slide, a hill and a zigzag, and let learners name them. Then sort real numbers into trend columns, drill verb + adverb against adjective + noun, and end with a short demo in which colleagues ask questions. This lesson ends with role cards for finance, sales, support, engineering and product, each with its own question for the presenter.
What's good homework for describing graphs?
Good homework has students describe numbers from their own work, one trend per slide, with its size and a reason. In Numbers that tell a story, a B2 English for IT lesson on edio.ai, a review quiz, a true-or-false drill and a memory game check themselves first; then students write speaker notes for three slides and record a two-minute summary that answers two expected questions, for the teacher to review.
Are there interactive exercises for describing graphs?
Yes: verb-to-noun tables and reply-choice chats give instant feedback on trend language. Four parts of Numbers that tell a story, a B2 English for IT lesson on edio.ai, play on this page with no account needed: the CFO's questions after a developer's demo, a table that rewrites rose sharply as a sharp rise and back, a chat with a colleague from sales and the homework phrase bank. The rest is locked.
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