Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-10-08

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 bar chart compares the average weekly expenditure of families across four different catagories-food, housing, fuel and power, clothing and footware, in the years 1968 and 2018.

Overall, the significant shift in houshold spending priorties over the 50-year period.While food was the dominant expense for families in 1968, it was overtaken by housing as the highest area of expenditure by 2018. Conversely, proportion spending on fuel and power, as well as clthing and footwear, experienced noticable declines.

In 1968, families allocated the largest proportion of their weekly budget to food, making it the highest on chart but in 2018 the expenditure of food are exponentially, decreased and falling half of its original level. In contrast housing costs saw a dramatic rise over the same period. In 1968, housing the second largest expense, but become the single largest weekly expense forn families.

Looking at the remaining catagories, spendiong on clothing and footwear was relatively high in 1968, but was dropped significantly by 2018,

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You identify the main change accurately: food was the largest category in 1968, while housing became the largest in 2018, and you note declines in fuel and power and clothing. However, the report covers only some of the chart’s important features. It gives no figures and says little about leisure, transport, household goods or personal goods, despite substantial changes in several of these categories. The claim that food spending fell “half of its original level” is broadly consistent with the chart, but “exponentially” is not an appropriate description of the change. The final paragraph is also incomplete, leaving the comparison of remaining categories underdeveloped. Include key figures and summarise the major rises, falls and stable categories to make the account more complete.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response has a recognisable structure: an introduction, an overview and paragraphs for details. Its central comparison is easy to follow, and transitions such as “Overall” and “In contrast” help signal relationships between ideas. However, the final paragraph ends abruptly after the clothing comparison, so the report does not progress through the remaining categories or reach a complete conclusion. Some sentences also combine several points without clear punctuation, as in the sentence beginning “In 1968, families allocated…” and continuing with “but in 2018…”. The overview repeats ideas that are then revisited in the detail paragraph. Grouping categories by their trends and using clearer sentence boundaries would make the progression more consistent and cohesion less repetitive.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.0

You use a reasonable range of task-related vocabulary, including “allocated,” “dominant expense,” “proportion” and “dramatic rise,” and the reader can generally understand your comparisons. There are also attempts at more descriptive language, such as “shift in household spending priorities.” However, several word-choice and spelling problems reduce precision: “exponentially decreased” is unsuitable for describing a fall shown in a chart, while “the expenditure of food are” is an inaccurate construction. Misspellings such as “catagories,” “houshold,” “priorties” and “clthing” are noticeable. Aim for accurate, conventional chart language—such as “fell from 35% to 17%”—rather than intensifiers that imply a mathematical pattern not shown by the data.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

You attempt both simple and more complex sentences, including a contrast with “While…” and clauses introduced by “but” and “as well as.” The main comparisons remain understandable, but some grammatical errors affect clarity. The overview begins with a fragment: “Overall, the significant shift…” needs a verb, for example, “Overall, there was a significant shift…”. Other problems include “the expenditure of food are,” “housing the second largest expense,” and “but become the single largest,” where verb forms or sentence structure are incomplete or incorrect. Punctuation is also inconsistent, particularly around sentence boundaries. Practise complete clauses and consistent past-tense reporting; accurate control of these patterns would make your varied sentence attempts more effective.

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