Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Complete Catalyst · 2026-10-03

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The bar charts and line graph below show the results of a survey conducted over a three-year period to discover what people who live in London think of the city.

Write a report for a university lecturer describing the information below.

What are the best things about living in London?

Student answer (Band 5.5)

The graph demonstrates the result of the survey to find out that what people think of London, who live there for 3 years and, explaing good and bad things about London.

To begin with the best things about living in London. Variety of the shops is considered as the best aspect of living there, almost 40% people agreed with it. Furthermore, intrest of people grew in museums and art galleries as its percentage increases from 30% to 35% over a three-year period.

Apart from that, there are numerous things which are not liked by people living in London i.e traffic congestion, cost of living and housing. Crime rate decreased over the time spn of three-years from approximately 57% to 40% whearas cost of housing elevated.

At last, a decline is seen in all major problems in London; litter, air quality and noise pollution.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 4.5

The response addresses the prompt only partially and falls slightly short of the minimum word count requirement of 150 words. While the student attempts to describe the charts and line graph regarding the best and worst aspects of living in London, the overview of the data is limited and lacks a clear, comprehensive summary of the main trends. Certain details, such as the interest in museums and art galleries increasing from 30% to 35%, are mentioned, but other key data points are presented with minimal development or slight inaccuracies. To reach a higher level, the writer needs to ensure the word count requirement is fully met and provide a more thorough, well-supported overview of the most striking features across all provided visual data.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The text presents a coherent overall arrangement with a clear attempt to structure the report into paragraphs. The writer uses basic transition signals such as 'To begin with', 'Apart from that', and 'At last' to guide the reader through the different sections of the visual data. However, referencing and cohesion are occasionally mechanical or somewhat abrupt, and the logical progression between sentences could be smoother. Paragraphing is present, but it is not always used effectively to group related ideas together. To improve further, the student should employ a wider and more natural variety of cohesive devices and ensure that each paragraph flows logically into the next without abrupt shifts in topic.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The vocabulary used is minimally adequate for the task, providing enough range to communicate basic information about the charts. The writer attempts some less common vocabulary, such as 'traffic congestion', 'elevated', and 'percentage increases', but this is accompanied by noticeable lexical and spelling errors like 'explaing', 'intrest', 'spn', and 'whearas'. Word choices are sometimes awkward or imprecise, such as 'Variety of the shops'. These errors do not completely block communication, but they restrict the response to a lower band. To achieve a higher score, the student needs to expand their range of vocabulary, improve spelling accuracy, and use words and collocations more naturally and precisely.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The writing demonstrates a limited range of sentence structures, relying heavily on simple sentences alongside some faulty attempts at complex forms. There are frequent grammatical errors throughout the text, including issues with article use ('Variety of the shops'), prepositional patterns, subject-verb agreement, and clause structure, as seen in 'to find out that what people think of London'. Punctuation and tense control also show frequent inaccuracies that can occasionally cause difficulty for the reader. To move up to the next band, the student must increase their control over complex grammatical structures and significantly reduce the frequency of basic errors by paying closer attention to sentence construction and grammar rules.

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

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