Band 4.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 4.5 · Cambridge IELTS 19 · 2026-09-16
IELTS Writing Task 1 question
The plans below show a harbour in 2000 and how it looks today.
Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
Student answer (Band 4.5)
The map illusrates structure modification that occur in a coatal harbour area and various faclities
Overall,the harbour underwent a major transformation from a functional marine space into a highly commercilialized,leisure space foucused, and tourist friebdly waterfront layout. The most significant developments include the relocation of boating sector, expasion of transport facilities, and the replacement of historical infrastructure with holiday amenities
The nothern marine zone southwestern fishing boat area completely interchanged locations.Ferry dock are added second platform to accomdate an increased number of passenger ferries and new blockl of shower anmd toilet was bulit next soutern car park and other soputh road , northern car paking remained unchanged
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 4.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.0 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 4.0 |
| Overall | 4.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 4.0
The response fails to meet the minimum length requirement of 150 words, containing only 107 words. This severely limits the development of the task. Although the student attempts an overview and mentions some key transformations, such as the relocation of the boating sectors and the replacement of the castle with a hotel, the details are heavily truncated and incomplete. For instance, the discussion of the ferry dock and shower blocks is fragmented and lacks necessary context and precision. Because the response is significantly under length and the information is under-developed, it cannot achieve a band score above 4.0 for this criterion.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.0
The essay is divided into an introduction, an overview paragraph, and a very short body paragraph, but the paragraphing is underdeveloped due to the overall brevity of the text. There is an attempt at logical sequencing, and cohesive devices such as 'Overall' are used. However, cohesion is often faulty or mechanical, and referencing is unclear in places (e.g., 'other soputh road'). The progression of ideas is abruptly cut short by the inadequate length, making the overall arrangement somewhat disjointed.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.0
The student attempts some less common vocabulary relevant to the topic, such as 'commercialized', 'transformation', and 'relocation'. However, there are numerous spelling errors throughout the text, including 'illusrates', 'coatal', 'faclities', 'foucused', 'friebdly', 'expasion', 'nothern', 'interchanged', 'accomdate', 'blockl', and 'soputh'. These lexical inaccuracies and spelling errors occasionally strain the reader, placing the response firmly at Band 5.0.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 4.0
The response displays a very limited range of structures. Many sentences are grammatically incomplete, lack verbs, or contain severe syntactic errors, such as 'The map illusrates structure modification that occur in a coatal harbour area' and 'Ferry dock are added second platform'. Punctuation and capitalization are also erratic, with missing spaces and comma splices. While simple ideas are occasionally attempted, the frequent errors cause considerable difficulty for the reader and prevent the score from exceeding Band 4.0.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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