The chart shows student expenditure over a three-year period in the United Kingdom.
Sample Response
The bar graph compares the expenditure by studentsexpenses of students who were under 26less than 26 years old and were in higher educationstudies in the UK. It is based onIt was presented based on the ‘Student Income and Expenditure Survey’ conducted by the Department for Education and Employment. The data is for the years 1996 and 1999 and the expenditures were classified into eight7 main categories. Overall, expenses by those students on food, course fees, bills, accommodationaccommodations and non-essential traveltravels decreased whereas the amount spent on entertainment, credit repayment, and essential traveltravels increased. As the data suggests, entertainment accounted forentertainment drained the highest amount of money both in 1996 and 1999 and expenditure on foodthe expenses on food, accommodation, household goods, non-essential travel and course expenditurenon-essential travels and course decreased in 1999. Students in the UK spent 26% onfor entertainment in 1996 and after three years, this shareafter three years, it increased to 31%. They spent 23% on accommodationspent 23% for their accommodation in 1996 and it dipped to 20% in 1999. A similar pattern can be observed for the food, household goods, bills, course cost and non-essential travel for which students spent a smaller percentage of their moneyfewer percentages of their money. About 1% of total expenses were for children in 1996, possibly by students who were also parents. Moreover, in 1996, the expenditure on coursesexpense for courses was 10% and that decreased to 7% after three years. Non-essential consumer items and credit repayments were categories in ‘Other’ and that comprised 12% cost in 1996 whereas it increased by 4% in 1999.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response provides a clear, largely accurate overview and supports it with well-selected percentage comparisons, while showing a good range of complex sentence forms. Its main weaknesses are the single-block organisation and a few imprecise or unsupported details, including calling the chart seven categories and speculating about student parents; prioritise clearer paragraphing and strictly objective reporting of the visual data.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The main increases and decreases are accurately summarised and supported with relevant figures, despite a wrong category count and minor unsupported speculation.
State that eight categories are shown and report the children category objectively without inferring that the students were parents.
Coherence and Cohesion
Information progresses logically from overview to examples, but the lack of paragraph breaks makes the report visually and structurally dense.
Use separate paragraphs for the overview, declining categories, and increasing categories so comparisons are easier to follow.
Lexical Resource
The response displays a good range of topic vocabulary, though several collocations and plural forms are imprecise.
Prefer natural phrases such as higher education, spending on accommodation, and a smaller proportion rather than fewer percentages.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Complex sentences are used confidently and meaning remains clear, with only occasional errors in articles, prepositions, and noun forms.
Polish preposition choices and uncountable nouns, particularly in phrases describing spending on travel and accommodation.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The chart shows student expenditure over a three-year period in the United Kingdom.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.