Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Momentum Workout · 2026-09-21

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The bar chart below shows the average number of hours that women in various age groups and women with varying levels of education spend on primary activities each week.

Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

Average hours per week women spent in selected primary activities, by age and educational attainment, 2009

Student answer (Band 5.5)

In the chart we can see the differences in how many hours women spend in different activities in their life and also what educational achievements they have.

Firstly, we can see that women that ages 75 and older, highly spend their time in doing sport and have recreation time for like 51.7 hours per week, while the time spent on working is considerably lower and that is 1.3 hours per week. Also, women who are 45 to 54 are working more than the ones who are little, for instance 15 to 19. The difference is almost 20 hours per week.

Secondly, most of the girls who did not receive a high school diploma have more free time per week and that is 38.9 hours,than the ones who have higher degrees, higher than a bachelor which is 28.6. However, the number of hours spent per week on working by the ones who have higher degrees is significantly higher than the ones who did not graduate high school with approximately 16 hours per week.

In conclusion, what we can observe from this chart is that most of the women spend the most number of hours on their free time and that is over 20 hours for every category.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5

The student addresses the main features of the prompt by selecting key data points, such as the leisure and working hours for women aged 75 and older and those aged 45 to 54. Comparisons are made between different age groups and educational attainment levels. However, there are some data inaccuracies: for instance, the student states that girls who did not receive a high school diploma spend 38.9 hours on free time, whereas the chart shows that 38.9 hours corresponds to high school graduates with no college, and leisure for less than a high school diploma is 43.1 hours. Similarly, the phrasing regarding degrees 'higher than a bachelor' is unsupported by the chart. Despite these minor misreadings, an overview is provided, placing this performance at Band 5.5 to 6.0.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5

The response is organized into clear paragraphs, utilizing basic sequencing markers like 'Firstly,' 'Secondly,' and 'In conclusion.' However, the progression is sometimes hampered by awkward phrasing and loose referencing. For instance, 'the ones who are little' is an unclear reference to younger age groups. Paragraphing is present and logically attempts to separate age data from education data, but overall cohesion feels somewhat mechanical rather than fluid. This corresponds to the Band 6 descriptor, where the overall arrangement is coherent, but referencing and cohesive devices are occasionally faulty.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully employing terms like 'educational achievements,' 'considerably lower,' and 'significantly higher.' However, there are instances of unnatural word choices and phrasing, such as 'highly spend their time,' 'free time' instead of 'leisure and sports,' and 'the ones who are little.' Additionally, the misinterpretation of data categories indicates limitations in precision. Spelling is generally accurate, but the lexical control is basic rather than flexible. This performance aligns comfortably with Band 5.5 to 6.0.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, utilizing relative clauses and comparative structures (e.g., 'while the time spent on working is considerably lower'). However, grammatical errors and awkward syntactical patterns occur frequently, such as 'women that ages 75' (instead of aged), 'do sport and have recreation time for like 51.7 hours,' and 'most of the girls who did not receive...' where 'women' would be more appropriate given the chart title. While these errors do not completely obscure meaning, they reduce the proportion of error-free sentences, supporting a Band 5.5 to 6.0 score.

See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.

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