Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 16 · 2026-09-17
IELTS Writing Task 1 question
The diagram below shows the manufacturing process for making sugar from sugar cane.
Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
How sugar is produced from sugar cane
Student answer (Band 5.5)
The diagram illustrates the manufacturing process of sugar, sucrose from sugarcane.To begin with,the process iniatiates with ripened sugarcanes grown in the fields for 12 to 18 moths. Sugarcanes collected from the fields are harvested to transfer to the crushing machines for extraction of juice from them. The crushers extracts the sugarcane juice which is furthur processed.The extracted nectar is transferred to limestone filter to be purified.The nectar is kept in the filter to eliminate impurities, which maybe remained during the harvesting. The juice after filtration is transferred to the evaporator, where sufficient heat is provided, to thicken the juice. Here, juice becomes condensed resulting into a syrup with little crystals.This syrup is the processed in the centrifuge machine where sufficient centrifugal force converts the syrup into purified one by separating the low density particles from the syrup.The purified syrup is then converted to the huge containers where it is dried and cooled.Moisture free manufactured sugar is extracted from the containers after drying and cooling.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.5 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.5 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5
The student successfully addresses all parts of the task by reporting the main stages of the sugar manufacturing process, starting from the 12-18 months of growing sugarcane through to final drying and cooling. Key steps such as harvesting, crushing, purifying juice with a limestone filter, evaporation, and centrifuging are accurately captured and sequenced. However, the response lacks a clear introductory overview paragraph highlighting the overall nature of the process, which keeps the score at Band 6.0. Additionally, some minor details are slightly imprecise, such as mentioning 'low density particles' instead of sugar crystals being separated from syrup in the centrifuge stage.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5
The writing demonstrates an overall coherent arrangement as the steps of the diagram are followed in chronological order. However, the cohesion is somewhat flawed due to a lack of proper paragraphing—the entire response is presented as a single block of text. While transitional phrases such as 'To begin with', 'The juice after filtration', and 'The purified syrup' are used to connect ideas, the absence of paragraph breaks significantly impedes readability and organizational clarity, making Band 5.5 the most appropriate descriptor.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.5
The student displays an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, attempting less common technical terms such as 'evaporator', 'centrifuge', 'centrifugal force', and 'limestone filter'. However, there are noticeable lexical and spelling inaccuracies throughout the text, including 'iniatiates' instead of 'initiates', 'moths' instead of 'months', 'furthur' instead of 'further', and 'converted to the huge containers' instead of 'transferred'. These word-choice and spelling errors do not completely impede communication but prevent the response from achieving a higher band score.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5
The response exhibits a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, such as relative clauses and participial phrases ('Sugarcanes collected from the fields are harvested...'). There are, however, several grammatical errors and punctuation issues, including missing spaces after commas, a comma splice, and awkward phrasing like 'This syrup is the processed in the centrifuge machine where sufficient centrifugal force converts the syrup into purified one'. While these errors do not prevent the overall meaning from being understood, they occur frequently enough to warrant a Band 6.0.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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