Band 4.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 4.5 · Cambridge IELTS 19 · 2026-09-28
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 two maps illustrates the layout of a harbour in 2000 and present year .
Overall, it can be seen that there several changes are happened in the past and now.major one is castle disused area are replced by the hotal and some basic public facilites are added.
To begin with, in the north side public beach was located in 2000 . the showers and toilets , car park were introduced in the west side . passenger ferries was located in the centre . in the southeast corner castle disused area was construtreted. fishing boats
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 4.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 4.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 4.5 |
| Overall | 4.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 4.0
The response fails to meet the minimum word count requirement of 150 words, stopping abruptly at only 95 words and trailing off mid-sentence. Consequently, it only partially addresses the task. While it attempts to identify a few key changes, such as the disused castle being replaced by a hotel and the addition of public facilities, the overview is extremely basic and the body paragraph is incomplete and lacks adequate development and comparison of the visual data. To achieve a higher band score, the candidate must fully describe the main features of both plans and ensure the writing is comprehensive.
Coherence and Cohesion: Band 4.5
The text lacks proper structure and cohesion due to its severe under-length and incomplete final sentence. Although the writer attempts to use paragraph breaks and transition phrases like 'Overall' and 'To begin with', the lack of progression and the abrupt ending disrupt the flow of information. Paragraphing is not used effectively because the body paragraphs are undeveloped and incomplete. Cohesive devices are minimal, and referencing is unclear.
Lexical Resource: Band 5.0
The vocabulary used is very basic and repetitive (e.g. 'changes', 'area', 'added'). There are noticeable spelling and word choice errors, such as 'illustrates' used with plural 'maps' ('The two maps illustrates'), 'hotal' instead of 'hotel', and 'facilites' instead of 'facilities'. The range of vocabulary is limited and minimally adequate for the task, which restricts the lexical score.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 4.5
The response contains a very limited range of structures and frequent grammatical errors. Examples include subject-verb agreement errors ('The two maps illustrates', 'there several changes are happened'), incorrect passive/active voice constructions ('castle disused area are replced by the hotal'), and missing articles. Punctuation is also faulty with inappropriate spacing around commas and full stops. Because the text breaks off mid-sentence, it demonstrates poor control over sentence boundaries.
See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.
Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.