Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-09-04

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 5.5)

The given Horizontal bar graph depicts about the information of families in one country depleted their weekly income between the year in 1968 and 2018. The data had been calibrated in percentage.

Overall, it is crystal clear that food was the dominant expense in first year while housing became the largest household cost by 2018 while fuel and power, personal goods experience moderately decline in percentage over the given period of time.

At a fleeting glance, initial year highest income is drained by food approximately upto 35% and experience steadily decline by 2018 plummeted by roughly half to 17%. Similarly the proportion spent on clothing and footwear dropped by half falling from 10 to 5%. Similar to personal goods also experienced tragicaly drop from 8 to 5% respectively. While spending on fuel and power experience 6 to 4%.

Moving Further, spending on leisure activities witnessed the most rise surging from 9% in 1968 to 22% in 2018. Housing costs followed similar upward direction doubling from 10 to 19%. Transport sector also face significant grow through half-a-decade from 8% to 14% while household goods experience similar no change at 10% income expenses

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5

The response covers all key features of the chart, including the main trends and relevant comparisons between 1968 and 2018. You successfully identified the shift in dominant spending from food to housing and leisure. However, the analysis is slightly hampered by inaccurate reporting of data in some places, such as stating transport grew 'through half-a-decade' when the period is 50 years. Additionally, some descriptions are imprecise, such as 'household goods experience similar no change', which is slightly contradictory. To reach a higher band, ensure that data points are cited with greater precision and that the timeframes are correctly interpreted.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5

The essay is logically organized with a clear introduction, an overview, and two body paragraphs. You use some cohesive devices such as 'Overall', 'Similarly', and 'Moving Further' to guide the reader. However, the use of these devices is sometimes mechanical or slightly awkward, such as 'At a fleeting glance'. Paragraphing is present, but the internal flow within paragraphs could be improved by using more sophisticated linking phrases rather than relying on repetitive sentence structures. The referencing is generally clear, but the transition between ideas occasionally feels abrupt.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, using terms like 'dominant expense', 'plummeted', and 'surging'. However, there are several instances of awkward word choice and collocation errors, such as 'depleted their weekly income' (instead of 'spent'), 'tragicaly drop' (incorrect adverb usage), and 'significant grow' (should be 'growth'). These errors occasionally impede the natural flow of the text. To improve, focus on using collocations correctly and ensuring that word forms (nouns vs. verbs) are used accurately in context.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5

The response contains a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. While you attempt to use complex sentences, there are frequent grammatical errors, particularly with verb tenses and subject-verb agreement, such as 'spending on fuel and power experience' (should be 'experienced') and 'transport sector also face' (should be 'faced'). Punctuation is generally functional, but there are missing articles and minor errors in sentence construction throughout. The errors are noticeable but do not prevent the reader from understanding the main points of the report.

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