Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-10-03
IELTS Writing Task 1 question
The younger sister of one of your friends is thinking about spending a year studying abroad as part of her university course. You did this recently, and she has asked you about your experience.
Write a letter to your friend's sister. In your letter
tell her where you studied during your year abroad
describe what you learnt about the country you studied in
explain why your year abroad was helpful for your studies
Begin your letter as follows:
Dear........,
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Dear Alexa,
I hope you are doing well. I am writing in response to your queries regarding studying abroad as a part of your university programme.
I enrolled in German language course last year. This particualr programme was offered by many universities but I choose University of Wales as this had a great educational value.
German is the second most famous language spoken all over the world but only a few people are able to understand and converse in it.
By taking this course it helped me a lot because I was working for a German company and all my working staff easily understood my commands so I didn't had a problem in conversation with them. Moreover, it enabled me to understand German traditions and heritage which proved great help for my thesis completion in history.
That one year which I spend abroad allowed me to develop better communication skills, leadership qualities and gave me a sense of confidence in me to deal with difficult situations. So, I would definitely recommend to you as this will help you develop your career.
Kin
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 6.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.5 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0
Your letter covers all the required bullet points, meaning you address the task adequately. You successfully tell the reader where you studied by mentioning the University of Wales, describe learning about traditions and heritage, and explain how the experience helped your thesis and career. However, some parts are less fully developed or slightly inaccurate. For instance, your claim that German is the second most famous language spoken all over the world is factually unsupported and detracts from the realism of the response. Furthermore, the first bullet point asks where you studied during your year abroad, but you mention studying a German language course at a university in Wales, which creates a slight contradiction regarding the study destination. To move higher, ensure all your ideas are completely accurate, thoroughly extended, and directly aligned with the specific prompt requirements.
Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5
Your letter has a coherent overall arrangement, allowing the reader to follow your main points from your greeting to your sign-off. You use basic paragraphing and simple transitions like 'Moreover' and 'That one year' to connect your thoughts. However, cohesion is sometimes mechanical and referencing is not always clear. For example, the sentence 'By taking this course it helped me a lot' suffers from a dangling structure where 'it' is redundant because you already started with the prepositional phrase. Additionally, the progression between sentences could be smoother; jumping abruptly from language learning to thesis completion and then to general leadership qualities creates a slightly disjointed flow. To achieve a higher band, you need to use cohesive devices more flexibly and ensure that referencing throughout the text is precise and natural.
Lexical Resource: Band 5.5
You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'educational value', 'heritage', and 'leadership qualities'. However, there are some noticeable lexical errors and spelling mistakes that prevent you from reaching a higher band. For instance, you misspelled 'particular' as 'particualr', and used 'choose' instead of the past tense 'chose' in the sentence 'I choose University of Wales'. Additionally, the collocation 'working staff' is less natural than 'colleagues' or 'staff members'. These errors do not impede communication, but they show that your control over word choice and spelling is not yet consistent. To improve, focus on expanding your range of precise vocabulary and double-checking your spelling and past tense verb forms.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5
You demonstrate a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, incorporating relative clauses and conditional-like structures to convey your experience. There are, however, some grammatical errors in your writing. For example, you wrote 'so I didn't had a problem', which contains an incorrect verb form after the auxiliary 'didn't'—it should be 'didn't have'. You also missed an article in 'I enrolled in German language course', which should be 'a German language course'. Despite these errors, they rarely impede communication, and your meaning remains generally clear. To reach a higher band, you need to produce a greater frequency of error-free sentences using complex structures with consistent accuracy across tenses, articles, and verb complementation.
See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.
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