IB DP Language B: Sharing the Planet – Theme

This guide covers Sharing the Planet, one of five compulsory themes for IB Diploma Programme Language B, first assessment 2020. The full syllabus guide confirms all five themes are examined through unseen material on Paper 2, so this theme cannot be safely under-revised relative to the others.

Where this fits in the syllabus

Sharing the Planet explores the challenges and opportunities faced by individuals and communities in the modern world, asking what environmental and social challenges the world faces, how they might be overcome, and what challenges and benefits globalization brings. Unlike a theme built around personal or cultural experience, this theme leans toward issues and debate, which changes the kind of language required: opinion, cause-and-effect, and comparison structures matter more here than for a theme such as Identities.

Syllabus coverage

IB DP LANGUAGE B — SHARING THE PLANET: RECOMMENDED TOPICS

• The environment — climate, natural resources, conservation and environmental impact, plus opinion language for discussing environmental policy
• Human rights — rights, freedoms, justice and equality, plus the more formal register this topic often calls for
• Peace and conflict — cooperation, negotiation, tension and resolution
• Equality — comparison and contrast (more/less, similarity/difference), since equality-focused texts frequently compare groups, regions or outcomes
• Globalization — cause and effect (because of, as a result, this leads to), since globalization texts often trace chains of consequence across borders
• Ethics — expressing and justifying an opinion or moral position
• Urban and rural environments — comparing settings and describing change over time

How to approach it

Because all five themes are compulsory and examined through unseen material, build genuine breadth across all seven recommended topics rather than concentrating only on the one or two your class discussed most. Because this theme leans toward opinion, cause-and-effect and comparison language more than some of the other four themes, make sure your target-language toolkit for expressing and justifying a position, and for tracing cause and consequence, is genuinely fluent, not just recognised passively when reading. Paper 2’s combined 50% weighting for listening and reading comprehension equals the writing task and internal oral combined, yet revision time tends to default toward speaking and writing output — Sharing the Planet is a theme where unseen texts (news reports, opinion pieces, documentary-style audio) are especially likely to appear, since the theme is inherently issue-driven and current-affairs adjacent, so build comprehension practice specifically around authentic or course-level materials discussing environmental, social or global issues in the target language, not just vocabulary lists.

Worked example: preparing one topic across all four skills

Take the Globalization topic as an example of preparing a single topic thoroughly across the whole assessment.

Vocabulary:     cause-and-effect connectives (because of, as a
                result, this leads to, consequently)

Reading/listening: practise unseen news-style texts tracing a chain
                    of consequence across borders (e.g. how a change
                    in one country's economy affects another)

Writing (Paper 1): practise a formal article or report arguing a
                    position on a globalization-related issue, using
                    the real conventions of the text type set for that
                    session (drawn from the syllabus's professional or
                    mass-media categories)

Speaking (oral):    prepare to discuss a globalization-related image
                    or, at HL, connect a studied literary work's
                    engagement with globalization to this theme

Preparing one topic across reading, listening, writing and speaking together, rather than treating vocabulary and skills practice as separate activities, produces revision that transfers directly to whichever paper or task actually uses that topic.

Preparing Paper 1’s writing task for this theme

If a Paper 1 writing prompt draws on Sharing the Planet, the text type set for that session (drawn from the syllabus’s three broad categories – personal, professional, and mass media – whose own examples, such as a blog post, an article, a formal letter, or a report, are explicitly neither prescriptive nor exhaustive) is likely to call for the more formal, argument-structured register this issue-driven theme often needs, since Sharing the Planet suits professional and mass-media text types particularly well. Practising an opinion-based article or a formal letter arguing for a specific environmental or social position, written in the target language’s real conventions for that text type, is more targeted preparation than only reviewing topic vocabulary in isolation – examiners assess whether the register and structure genuinely match the specified text type, not only whether the content is on-topic.

Preparing the individual oral around this theme

At SL, the individual oral’s visual stimulus could be an image relevant to any of the five themes, including Sharing the Planet – practise describing and discussing an environmental, human-rights or globalization-related image spontaneously in the target language. At HL, if either of your two studied literary works engages with issues from this theme, identify and prepare that connection explicitly ahead of the assessment, since being able to draw a literary work into a discussion of a compulsory theme demonstrates range that a purely theme-focused response does not.

Common mistakes

Concentrating revision on only one or two of the seven recommended topics, when Paper 2’s unseen material could draw on any of them. Under-preparing listening and reading comprehension relative to speaking and writing, despite comprehension carrying an equal 50% weighting on Paper 2. Using descriptive or personal-experience language where this theme calls for opinion, comparison, or cause-and-effect structures. Preparing only formal writing register without also building comprehension fluency for authentic, issue-driven texts.

Quick revision checklist

• Build vocabulary and structures across all seven recommended topics, not just one or two.
• Dedicate genuine revision time to listening and reading comprehension, not only speaking and writing.
• Practise a formal, argument-structured text type (article, report, formal letter) for Paper 1 if a prompt draws on this theme.
• Prepare to discuss an environmental, human-rights or globalization-related image spontaneously for the individual oral.
• At HL, identify any connection between your studied literary works and this theme ahead of the oral assessment.

Official syllabus

International Baccalaureate Organization, Diploma Programme Subject Brief – Language B, first assessment 2020, © 2018 – the same source already cited by the full syllabus guide, which first identified Sharing the Planet’s recommended topics. Verified 2026-09-06.