The diagram below shows the life cycle of a salmon, from egg to adult fish.
Sample Response
The diagram illustratesdiagrammatic description is about different stages of a salmon fish's life. Overall, there are eight main stagessix stages in the lifecycle of salmon - starting from eggs to adult fish. To start with, after mating, a female fish lays eggsfemale fish lays eggs. These eggs are laid in groupsmultiple and are then incubatedkept further for an incubation period. Once the incubation time is over, they undergo emergence with the formation of body and head of the fish. Later they are develop into young salmontransformed into infant salmon, and they are reared in freshwater before proceeding to an estuaryfor further rearing, these proceed to an estuary. AfterwardHowever, from the estuarybay, they enter the oceanenter into the ocean to grow and mature. The next two stagescycles occur in the ocean. They feedtake food and keep on growing further till these small fishfishes attain the proper size of salmon. As soon as they reach maturitytheir adolescence and maturity, they start the journey back to the riverriver water for spawning. Then they swim all the way from the ocean to river to spawnregenerate. Once again in the river, these salmonsalmons start reproducing, and the life cycle continues in the same way.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response communicates the cyclical nature of salmon development and presents the broad movement from river to estuary, ocean, and back to the river in a logical sequence. Its main weakness is incomplete and sometimes inaccurate representation of the labelled stages, especially freshwater rearing and the stated stage count. The priority is to follow every labelled stage precisely and avoid adding unsupported biological descriptions.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The main cycle and most environments are covered, but the overview miscounts the stages and freshwater rearing is not clearly reported.
Trace each labelled stage in order, including freshwater and estuary rearing, both migrations, growth and maturation, and spawning.
Coherence and Cohesion
The stages are presented in a clear chronological sequence with effective overall progression around the cycle.
Group the river, estuary, and ocean phases into distinct paragraphs and avoid connectors such as 'However' where no contrast exists.
Lexical Resource
There is sufficient vocabulary for the process, but several choices such as 'regenerate', 'cycles', and 'laid in multiple' are inaccurate or unnatural.
Use the diagram's precise process terms and natural collocations such as 'lay eggs', 'rear in freshwater', 'mature', and 'return to spawn'.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The response uses varied sentence structures and remains clear, although article, agreement, preposition, and plural-form errors recur.
Check countable nouns and agreement carefully, particularly forms such as 'a female fish lays eggs' and the uncountable species noun 'salmon'.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The diagram below shows the life cycle of a salmon, from egg to adult fish.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.