Band 5.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.0 · Cambridge IELTS 16 · 2026-09-25

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

A magazine wants to include contributions from its readers for an article called 'The book that influenced me most'.

Write a letter to the editor of the magazine about the book that influenced you most. In your letter

- describe what this book was about
- explain how this book influenced you
- say whether this book would be likely to influence other people

You do NOT need to write any addresses.

Begin your letter as follows:

Dear Sir or Madam,

Student answer (Band 5.0)

dear sir,

i am writing ths letter to you to share my views on the book which influenced me the most is "rich dad and poor dad" written by "ROBERT T.KIYOSAKI" this book was about how rich dad raise their children and poor dad raise their children and we can see a large amount of difference in it. firstly, lets talk about the poor people mindset, the tell their children to save trheir money for future use on the other hand rich tells their children about investments,stocks,mutual funds etc. this book motivated and inspire me very much to educate my children like a rich dad's mindset because they teach their to circulate the money rather than making it to be set ideal. i would if people are reading this book it will make them to change the mindset of poor peoples in the society. and teach them about money.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.0

The student covers all bullet points required by the prompt, such as describing the book ('Rich Dad Poor Dad'), explaining its influence, and discussing whether it would impact others. However, the response falls slightly short of the 150-word minimum, containing only 149 words, which results in a penalty under Task Achievement. Furthermore, the development of ideas is somewhat limited and repetitive, reflecting the features of a Band 5 response. For instance, the explanation of the book's content and its influence is quite brief and lacks depth. To improve, the student should expand on their personal examples and ensure the word count exceeds the minimum threshold.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 4.5

The response suffers significantly from a lack of paragraphing, appearing as a single dense block of text. Cohesive devices are minimal or poorly handled, with basic links like 'firstly, lets talk about' and run-on sentences that blur the logical progression. Although the overall topic is clear, the mechanical nature of the cohesion and the absence of clear paragraph breaks prevent the writing from achieving a Band 6. Referencing is also somewhat confusing in places, particularly in sentences like 'the tell their children'. To reach a higher band, the student must divide their ideas into distinct paragraphs and use a wider variety of accurate cohesive devices.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is generally basic and repetitive, with noticeable spelling and word choice errors such as 'ths', 'raise' instead of 'raised', 'trheir', and 'set ideal' instead of 'idle'. While the student attempts less common terms like 'investments', 'stocks', and 'mutual funds', the frequent inaccuracies in collocation and word formation restrict the score. Furthermore, basic mechanical errors like failing to capitalise proper nouns ('rich dad and poor dad') and the author's name detract from lexical control. The range is minimally adequate for the task, fitting the Band 5 descriptors well.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The text relies heavily on simple and run-on compound sentences, joined mostly by commas rather than proper punctuation or conjunctions (e.g., 'this book motivated and inspire me very much...'). There are frequent grammatical errors, including tense inconsistencies ('raise' instead of 'raised', 'tell' instead of 'tell'), missing subjects, and poor control over complex sentence structures. Punctuation is largely neglected, with sentences running into one another without proper terminal punctuation or capitalisation. These persistent errors cause some difficulty for the reader and place the response firmly in the Band 5 category for grammatical accuracy.

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