Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-10-26

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 plane illustrate the information between two college cafe's. one is make before construction and one make after some changes.

The cafe redesign has one kitchen and one toilet. In contrast today cafe has some different changes including hot meal, salad bar and barbecue.

Before design cafe has entrance on east side one bin with the entrance and also toilet on left side. large area of cafe consists on chairs and tables. In front of entrance are two staff dinning rooms. kitchen and serving area are on upper side of the cafe at the end point. Today cafe has little bit changes. Entrance is same. Recycling bin and toilet are also same. on the place of dinning room take away food and coffee bar are replaced. The big area of cafe including on tables and chairs. Outside of the cafe has five tables for outdoor sitting. One barbecue is situated with sitting area. The portion of salad bar and hot meals are extra in today cafe. location of kitchen is also same

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You identify several important changes, including the new hot-meal counter, salad bar, coffee bar, takeaway section, recycling bins and outdoor seating, and you note that the kitchen and toilets remain. However, some details are inaccurate or unclear: the toilets are in the bottom-right corner, not on the left, and the outdoor area has four tables rather than five. The entrance remains on the east wall, but the new southern doors leading outside are not mentioned. Your overview is also limited: it would be clearer to state that the redesign adds food-service options and outdoor seating while retaining the central seating area and key facilities. These omissions and misreadings leave parts of the plan only partially covered.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response makes a basic attempt to compare the two plans, moving from the original café to its current layout, and phrases such as “In contrast” and “Today” help signal the time change. However, the information is not consistently grouped or sequenced: the opening repeats the comparison, and details about the current layout are scattered between comments on the old plan. Some connections are unclear, as in “The cafe redesign has one kitchen and one toilet,” which does not establish which plan is being described. Organise the report into a brief overview followed by one paragraph on the former layout and another on the changes and retained features. This would make the progression clearer and reduce repetition.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use some relevant vocabulary for describing a plan, including “entrance,” “recycling bin,” “serving area,” and “outdoor sitting.” However, the range is limited and several choices are inaccurate or unnatural, which sometimes makes the layout difficult to understand. For example, “construction” does not clearly describe the café before redesign, and “the portion of salad bar and hot meals are extra” is not an appropriate way to report added facilities. There are also spelling and word-form errors, such as “dinning” and “plane.” Use precise labels from the plan and practise common map-description phrases such as “was replaced by,” “was added along the western wall,” and “remained unchanged.”

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The response mainly uses short, simple statements and attempts a few longer comparisons, but grammatical errors are frequent and sometimes make relationships between features unclear. Examples include “The plane illustrate,” “one is make before construction,” and “The big area of cafe including on tables and chairs,” where verb forms, agreement, and sentence construction are faulty. Articles and prepositions are also often missing or incorrect, as in “on the place of dinning room” and “on upper side of the cafe.” Punctuation and capitalisation are inconsistent, particularly where sentences begin with lowercase “one” or “on.” Practise forming complete sentences with a clear subject and verb, and check tense and agreement when describing past and present layouts.

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