Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 16 · 2026-10-06

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 6.5)

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to respond to your invitation for readers to write an article about the book that influenced me most.

As an avid reader, I have read alot of books but one particular book had a major impact in my life. The title of the book is Deep Work written by Cal Newport. It is all about how to achieve success in this distracted world through by time effectively. The author discussed so many ways to do that, for instance, going off social media for some times in order to focus on something more important.

I was introduced to this book by a friend when i was strugging to achieve my monthly goals. I decided to implement what I learnt by limiting or infact going off the internet for some time, I was able to complete most of my scheduled tasks and also achieved my goals for the month. My productivity at work was also improved just because I reduce distractions.

I believe that many people will be motivated and influenced by this book especially young people because most of them are having issues with managing their time effectively. Therefore, by them reading and implementing what they have learnt from this book, the issues will be resolved.

Thank you for this opportunity. I hope that many individuals will benefit from reading this book.

Yours faithfully,

Ikechukwu Gift

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 7.0

You successfully addressed all parts of the bullet points outlined in the prompt. You described what the book was about, explained how it influenced you, and considered whether it would likely influence other people. Your ideas are relevant and generally clear, presenting a transparent overview of Cal Newport's 'Deep Work'. However, certain areas show a slight tendency to over-generalise or remain slightly under-developed, such as the specific mechanisms of how the book changed your professional output beyond general productivity. To elevate this criterion further, you would need to extend your supporting details with deeper elaboration and more nuanced exploration of the prompt's themes.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 7.0

Your letter demonstrates a clear logical organisation and progression throughout. You made effective use of paragraphing to structure your thoughts, moving from an introductory purpose to the book description, personal impact, and finally potential readership. Cohesive devices are employed with reasonable flexibility, such as transitional phrases like 'As an avid reader', 'For instance', and 'Therefore'. Nonetheless, some connections feel slightly mechanical or could be integrated more smoothly to avoid occasional choppy transitions. Overall, the flow remains transparent, allowing the reader to follow your narrative effortlessly from beginning to end.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.0

You demonstrated an adequate range of vocabulary suitable for the task, attempting less common lexical items such as 'avid reader', 'distracted world', and 'implement what I learnt'. However, there are notable spelling errors, such as 'alot' instead of 'a lot', and minor word-choice or collocation slips like 'impact in my life' instead of 'impact on my life' and 'productivity at work was also improved just because I reduce distractions'. These vocabulary and spelling inaccuracies do not impede overall communication, but they prevent you from achieving a higher score. Expanding your use of precise collocations and ensuring accurate spelling will greatly strengthen your lexical control.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 6.5

You displayed a functional mix of simple and complex sentence forms, incorporating clauses using words like 'when', 'that', and 'because'. There are several error-free sentences, demonstrating good control over basic grammatical structures. However, a few grammatical and punctuation errors persist, such as run-on constructions and comma splices in sentences like 'I decided to implement what I learnt by limiting or infact going off the internet for some time, I was able to complete most of my scheduled tasks', as well as lowercase letters for pronouns like 'i'. To reach the next level, you should incorporate a wider variety of complex sentence structures while maintaining higher overall accuracy and cleaner punctuation.

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.