Band 5.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.0 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-09-27
IELTS Writing Task 1 question
It is ten years since you left college. You'd like to organise an event to celebrate this anniversary with all your friends and classmates from college.
Write a letter to one of your college friends. In your letter
• say what kind of celebration event you'd like to organise
• explain why you think it would be good to celebrate in this way
• describe what help you need to organise this event
You do NOT need to write any addresses.
Begin your letter as follows:
Dear ....................................,
Student answer (Band 5.0)
Dear Ali as you know that we left the college since ten years and we all did not organise any event to celebrate with eachother and all the classmates of college i would like to organise an event to celebrate with all of us
I like to organic an event like a birthday party as you know that my birthday month is aslo coming and i would like to celebrate wih all of my college friends i think that it would be a good celebration for us like when we all get together and enojy with dinner and drinks we all remind a college memories
i am thinking about that to invite all of my friends in my birthday party we all celebrate it with together
i will arrage a hotel for birthday party
where we all get together and enjoy the moments
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.0 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 4.5 |
| Overall | 5.0 |
Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.0
The student attempted all three bullet points by mentioning a birthday party celebration, explaining it would allow everyone to get together with dinner and drinks to remember college memories, and stating a need to arrange a hotel. However, the purpose of the letter is misunderstood or mixed up: the prompt asks to organise an event to celebrate a ten-year college anniversary with friends and classmates, whereas the student turns it into their own personal birthday party. Furthermore, the response falls short of the 150-word minimum, containing only 143 words, which requires a downward penalty on the Task Achievement score. Ideas are repetitive and lack sufficient development. Therefore, the response is awarded a band score of 5.0.
Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.0
The letter lacks proper paragraphing, as the entire text is essentially presented as one continuous block without any formatting or clear division of ideas. Cohesive devices are severely lacking, and punctuation is almost entirely missing, with run-on sentences dominating the response. For example, phrases like 'Dear Ali as you know that we left the college since ten years...' blend multiple clauses together without commas or full stops, making the progression of ideas difficult to follow. Although there is a basic chronological attempt to move from the opening to the event type and then to the arrangements, the mechanical and structural flaws place this criterion firmly at a band 4.5, which rounds to 5.0.
Lexical Resource: Band 5.0
The vocabulary used is very basic, repetitive, and restricted to everyday terms such as 'event', 'celebrate', 'friends', 'hotel', and 'party'. There are notable word choice errors, such as 'organic' instead of 'organise', and 'since ten years' instead of 'for ten years'. The student attempts some less common phrasing, but inaccuracies in collocation and word formation are frequent. While the meaning remains mostly discernible despite these lexical limitations, the range is restricted and insufficient for higher bands. This performance aligns with the descriptors for a band 5.0.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 4.5
The writing demonstrates a very limited range of grammatical structures, relying almost entirely on simple sentences joined improperly by conjunctions or run together without punctuation. There is a complete lack of complex sentence forms, and major grammatical errors occur frequently, including tense and preposition misuse such as 'we left the college since ten years' and 'celebrate wih all of my college friends'. Punctuation is virtually absent throughout the text. These persistent errors and the lack of structural variety heavily impede readability and result in a band score of 4.5, which is evaluated at 4.5.
See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.
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