Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

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

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

Overall,food accounted for the largest proportion of household spending in 1968,whereas leisure became the biggest expenditure in 2018.Spending on food,clothing and footwear,fuel and power and personal goods decreased over the period,while housing,transport and leisure increased.

In 1968,family spent approxmiately 35% of their weekly income food,making it by far the largest expense.This was followed by housing and clothing and footware at around 10% each.Lesire accounted for about 9%,while household goods,personal goods and transport were all close to 8%.Fuel and power represented the smallest proportion at,roughly 6%.

In 2018,the pattern had changed considerably.Leisure the largest catrgory,accounting for approxmiately 22% of weekly income,followed by housing at about 20%.Transport also increased significantly at around 14%.In contrast,spending on food fell down at around 17%.Expenditure on clothing and footware declined to about 5%,while fuel and power and personal goods both declined to around 4%.Spending on household goods remained same at around 8%.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.5

The response effectively covers the main features of the data. You successfully identified the shift in the largest expenditure category from food in 1968 to leisure in 2018. The overview is clear and highlights the key trends, such as the decline in food and clothing spending versus the rise in housing and leisure. You provided sufficient data points to support your descriptions, although some figures are slightly imprecise. To reach a higher band, ensure that all data points are clearly linked to the specific years and categories without ambiguity, and avoid minor omissions in the comparison of all categories.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.5

The essay is logically organized with a clear introduction, an overview, and two body paragraphs focusing on the two distinct years. The progression of ideas is easy to follow. You used some cohesive devices like 'In contrast' and 'followed by', which help the flow. However, the use of cohesive devices is somewhat mechanical at times. To improve, try to vary your linking phrases and ensure that the transition between sentences is smoother. The paragraphing is appropriate and contributes to the overall clarity of the report.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

You have a sufficient range of vocabulary to convey the information clearly, using terms like 'proportion', 'expenditure', and 'significantly'. However, there are several spelling errors, such as 'approxmiately', 'catrgory', and 'footware' (footwear), which detract from the quality of the writing. Additionally, some word choices could be more precise; for example, 'fell down' is not the most natural collocation for describing a decrease in a chart. Focusing on accurate spelling and more sophisticated collocations will help you achieve a higher band score.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5

The response uses a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. While the meaning is generally clear, there are frequent minor errors, particularly with articles (e.g., 'family spent' instead of 'families spent') and missing prepositions (e.g., 'income food' instead of 'income on food'). There are also some punctuation issues, such as missing spaces after commas. While these errors do not impede communication, they occur frequently enough to prevent a higher score. Increasing your control over basic grammar and proofreading for small slips would be beneficial.

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