You are trying to improve your knowledge of a language that is not your first language. You have a friend who speaks it fluently. Write a letter to your friend. In your letter: - explain why you want to improve your knowledge of the language - ask for suggestions on how to learn more quickly - propose meeting your friend to talk about it
Sample Response
Dear Olivia,
I hope that you're doing wellexcellent. It's been a very long time since we last saw each otherIt's been awfully long since we've last seen each other and spent some quality time together. I really miss those days when we could hang out almost every day.
Anyway, after graduating from university next summer, I'll start looking for a job in a multinationalmultination company. Besides, I have plansI've plans to pursue my master'sMaster's degree at a UK university a couple of years after thata couple of years later. Considering my plans and expectations, I've started honing my English language skills, which, I believe, will be vital for my further studiesstudy and career success. In a multinational company, English would be essentialhighly essential for communication.
You already know that my command of Englishcommand of the English language is limitednot so good. I make many grammatical mistakes and can't express my feelings and ideas effectively in complex situations. As a native English speakerAs a native speaker of the English language, your skills are enviable. I hope you can suggest how I can improve my skills and learn the language efficiently while reducing my grammatical mistakeswithout making any grammatical mistakes. I also want to learn quicklyfast and you're the best person to advise me on that.
If it's not too much to ask, I'd like to meet you in person to discuss everything in detail and spendhave some pleasant time together. We have a lot to catch up onwith, I believe.
Your suggestions would be quite valuable to me. I hope we can plan our meeting soonHope we can plan our meeting soon.
Yours truly,
Polina
Why this response received Band 7.5
The letter fully covers the reasons for improving English, requests advice on learning faster, and proposes a meeting, all in a warm and convincing tone. Its main limitation is a cluster of non-idiomatic expressions and several grammatical slips despite otherwise flexible language. Prioritise proofreading verb forms and common collocations so phrases such as “doing excellent,” “multination company,” and “have some pleasant time” sound natural.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The purpose is clear, all three bullet points are fully developed, and the friendly tone is consistently suitable for the recipient.
Make the proposed meeting more concrete by suggesting a possible day or time while retaining the informal tone.
Coherence and Cohesion
Ideas are organised into focused paragraphs that progress naturally from personal context to reasons, advice, and the proposed meeting.
Trim repeated references to improving skills and learning quickly so the request paragraph is more concise.
Lexical Resource
The letter shows good range and flexibility, although several collocations and word choices are noticeably unnatural.
Replace expressions such as “doing excellent,” “multination company,” and “pleasant time” with idiomatic alternatives.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A broad range of sentence forms is used with generally good control, but errors in tense, possession, and clause joining remain.
Correct forms such as “since we last saw each other” and “I have plans,” and check punctuation between independent clauses.
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IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
You are trying to improve your knowledge of a language that is not your first language. You have a friend who speaks it fluently. Write a letter to your friend. In your letter:
- explain why you want to improve your knowledge of the language
- ask for suggestions on how to learn more quickly
- propose meeting your friend to talk about it
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.