Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-08-08

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The chart below gives information about how families in one country spent their weekly income in 1968 and in 2018.

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

1968 and 2018: average weekly spending by families

Student answer (Band 6.0)

The given bar chart illustrates details regarding how families in one particular country expended their weekly earnings over 5 decades from the year 1968.

On a cursory glance, it is clearly evident that leisure activity is accounted for the highest proportion of spending weekly wages after the period, whilst, using money for food witnessed a huge decline over the period.

In terms of spending income for leisure, transport, personal goods and households goods, individuals spent their money in similar proportion on all of them, approximately 8% .However, spending money for leisure activities increased significantly to about 23% in the year 2018, followed by transport, stood at about 14%. In contrast, spending money for households remained same and personal goods declined slightly to 5%.

Moving to the remaining things, food was the highest thing where all citizens spent their most of the money in 1968 and the proportion was 35%, though it decreased dramatically to 17% after 5 decades. Conversely, utilizing money for households surged to around 18% from 10% in the year 2018. Furthermore, fuel and power and clothing and footwear was 6% and 10% respectively, though the both dropped to under 5% .

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.0

The response covers all key features of the chart and makes relevant comparisons between 1968 and 2018. You successfully identified the major trends, such as the significant decline in food expenditure and the rise in leisure spending. However, the report contains some factual inaccuracies regarding the data. For instance, you stated that leisure accounted for the highest proportion in 1968, whereas the chart shows food was clearly the highest. Additionally, your description of the 1968 figures for leisure, transport, and household goods as being 'similar' at 8% is not entirely accurate based on the visual data. More careful observation of the specific percentages is required to reach a higher band.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The response is logically organized with a clear introduction, overview, and body paragraphs. You use cohesive devices such as 'In terms of', 'In contrast', 'Moving to', and 'Conversely' to guide the reader through the data. However, some transitions feel slightly mechanical, and the referencing is occasionally unclear, such as in the phrase 'after the period' in the introduction, which is ambiguous. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate the different categories of spending, which helps the overall flow of the report. To improve, ensure that your cohesive devices are used to link ideas more naturally rather than just acting as signposts for new sentences.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, using terms like 'expended', 'proportion', 'witnessed a huge decline', and 'surged'. However, there are some awkward collocations and word choices, such as 'highest thing' and 'utilizing money for households'. These choices are somewhat informal or imprecise for an academic report. While the vocabulary is sufficient to convey your meaning, it lacks the precision and sophistication required for higher bands. Focusing on more academic collocations and avoiding repetitive phrasing will help you improve your lexical score.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

You use a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, which is appropriate for this task. There are several grammatical errors, such as 'leisure activity is accounted for' (should be 'accounted for'), 'spending money for households remained same' (missing 'the'), and 'the both dropped' (should be 'both dropped'). While these errors are noticeable, they do not impede the overall communication of the data. To reach a higher band, you should aim for greater accuracy in subject-verb agreement and the use of articles, and try to incorporate a wider variety of complex structures with fewer errors.

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

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