Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-10-15

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The plans below show a college cafe before it was redesigned and how it looks now.

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

The plans below show a college cafe before it was redesigned and how it looks now.

Student answer (Band 5.5)

The following graphs illustrate informations of a cafe of college before and after redesigned it.

Overall, it describes all the facillities that changed after redesign. the outdoor seating and other facilities are added with redesigned.

Before redesign, there is a kitchen in the cafe with the served area for food and drinking facillities in west side of cafe, There is one bin in the east side of cafe with near toilets in northern corner. In the center of cafe, there are tables and chairs for people to seating down and the last thing is a staff dining rooms is near to the center of cafe.

After redesigned, there is several facillities are added to cafe like to added the outdoor seating in the north side of the cafe with the barbecue. They also added salad bar in the east side of cafe.The served erea is replaced to the hot meals of the cafe.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You identify the broad purpose of the plans and note some genuine changes, including the new outdoor seating, barbecue, salad bar and hot-meal counter. However, the account is only partial and several details are inaccurate or unclear. The outdoor seating is to the south of the café, not the north; the salad bar is on the western wall, not the east; and the toilets are in the south-east corner, not the northern corner. You also omit important changes such as the take-away food and coffee bar replacing the staff dining rooms, and the recycling bins replacing the single bin. Give a clearer overview of the main transformation, then compare the key features accurately and systematically.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response has a recognisable sequence: an introduction and overview are followed by descriptions of the café before and after the redesign. This gives the reader a basic framework, and phrases such as “Before redesign” and “After redesigned” signal the comparison. However, the progression within the paragraphs is not always clear: features are listed without consistently guiding the reader around the plan, and the overview repeats the general idea that facilities changed rather than summarising the main changes. Some linking is also awkward, as in “There is one bin… with near toilets.” Organise each description by location or by what was replaced, and use clear references to connect old and new features.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use some task-relevant vocabulary, including “kitchen,” “tables and chairs,” “outdoor seating” and “barbecue,” so the basic subject is understandable. However, the range is limited and several word choices or forms are inaccurate or repetitive. “Graphs” is not appropriate for plans, “informations” is incorrect, and “facillities” is repeatedly misspelled. Phrases such as “served area for food and drinking facilities” and “people to seating down” are also unnatural and make parts of the description harder to follow. Use precise plan vocabulary such as “counter,” “located,” “replaced by” and “adjoining,” and check spelling and collocations carefully.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The response mainly relies on simple sentence patterns, with a few attempts to combine ideas. Errors occur frequently and sometimes make relationships between features unclear. For example, “before and after redesigned it” has an incorrect verb construction, while “there is several facilities are added” combines incompatible sentence patterns and has an agreement error. The sentence beginning “Before redesign, there is a kitchen…” also shifts awkwardly between present and past forms, and “the last thing is a staff dining rooms” has article and plural agreement problems. Practise accurate past-tense descriptions and straightforward comparison structures, such as “The staff dining rooms were replaced by…” before attempting longer sentences.

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

Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.