Band 7.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 7.0 · Cambridge IELTS 16 · 2026-10-03

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

Your friend has been offered a place on a course at the university where you studied. He/She would like your advice about finding a place to live.

Write an email to your friend. In your email

• describe where you lived when you were a student at the university
• recommend the best way for him/her to look for accommodation
• warn him/her of mistakes students make when choosing accommodation

You do NOT need to write any addresses.

Begin your email as follows:

Dear ..........,

Student answer (Band 7.0)

Dear Hakeem,

I was really excited to read from you last week as regards accommodation for your admission in University of Benin, Nigeria.

First and foremost, let me congratulate you for getting admitted into University of Benin, a first class University in the comity of Universities in Nigeria. Like, that was an amazing feat and I am so proud of you my guy. Of course, you know I also graduated there and you even visited twice while I was an undergraduate.

My suggestion for you would be to get an accommodation inside campus. There are many different hostels on campus but I will advice you choose hall 2 as that was where I also stayed. The hostel is well maintained and the porters are active. There are only four students in a room and squatters are not allowed. It also has a mini reading room that you can go to revise your class lectures. You can apply early on the school hostel portal as it usually gets filled fast.

Most people use to make the mistake of staying off campus, especially in Ekosodin. Meanwhile, that area is notorious for cult activities and insecurity. Many students that stayed there had poor results in their academics. They were unable to attend classes most times due to unrest.

I hope my suggestion will come in handy for you in making your decision and I wish you all the best. Let's hang out and celebrate before you finally leave for school.

Regards,

Lekan.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 7.0

The response successfully covers all parts of the prompt, achieving a solid standard. You clearly describe where you lived by recommending Hall 2, outline the best way to look for accommodation through the school hostel portal, and effectively warn your friend about the pitfalls of staying off-campus, particularly regarding security issues in Ekosodin. All three bullet points from the task instructions are fully addressed. The tone is appropriate for an informal email to a friend, maintaining a clear and consistent personal perspective throughout. To reach the highest band levels, some of the supporting details could have been slightly more elaborated with additional context, though your ideas are already well-extended and effectively supported with relevant local examples, showing a tendency to over-generalise slightly in your warnings which fits well within this performance tier.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 7.0

Your email demonstrates clear logical organisation and progression from start to finish. The message is well-structured into distinct paragraphs that logically separate the greeting, the context, your personal accommodation recommendation, the warning about off-campus housing, and the closing remarks. You use cohesive devices flexibly and appropriately, such as transitional phrases like 'First and foremost' and 'Most people use to make the mistake', which help guide the reader smoothly through your thoughts. Referencing is handled clearly with pronouns and appropriate signposting, ensuring that the relationships between your ideas are easy to follow. To push further into the highest bands, paragraph transitions could occasionally be even more seamless, but overall your use of cohesive devices is natural and effective for this task type.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.5

You demonstrate an adequate and sufficient range of vocabulary for the task, attempting some less common items such as 'comity', 'notorious', and 'cult activities' with some awareness of style and collocation. However, there are a few minor lexical inaccuracies and awkward word choices, such as writing 'read from you' instead of 'hear from you', and 'advice you choose' instead of 'advise you to choose'. You also used the phrase 'Most people use to make the mistake', which contains a slight tense error regarding habituation. These vocabulary and spelling choices do not impede communication at all, allowing the reader to easily understand your message, but eliminating these occasional slips and demonstrating a slightly wider and more precise range of lexical items will help lift your writing further.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 6.5

You display a satisfactory mix of simple and complex sentence forms throughout the email. There are frequent error-free sentences, such as your complex structures in the concluding paragraphs and your detailed descriptions of the hostel amenities. Good control of grammar is generally maintained, though a few persistent errors occur, such as the prepositional slip in 'admission in University of Benin' (instead of 'admission to') and the verb form error in 'I will advice you' (where 'advise' as a verb is needed). Punctuation and sentence boundary control are generally sound, and these minor errors rarely impede communication. To achieve a higher standing, you would need to produce a wider variety of complex structures with even greater frequency and eliminate minor slip-ups in verb forms and prepositions.

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