The pie charts below show the average household expenditures in a country in 1950 and 2010.
Sample Response
The pie charts show the spending on housingexpenses made in housing, food, healthcare, education, transportation and other items in a country in 1950 and 2010. As is observed from the pie charts, in 1950 almost two-thirds of expendituretwo-third expenditure was in housing whereas this average expenditure increasedhas been increased for food, transportation etc. in 2010. According to the given data, more than 70% expenditure of the people in this country went on housingwent on in housing in 1950. The second-largest expenditureThe second most expenditure in this country was for food. Spending on other itemsAll other expenditures including healthcare, education, transportation etc. were less than 20% in total. After 60 years the trends of expenditure in this country significantly changed: people’s expenditurechanged. People’s expenditure in housing decreased to only 22% while the expenditure for food increased to just over one-third of the total. Interestingly, the expenditure on education decreased over timedecreased over the time while the expenses for transportation increased to 14%. All other expenditure in 1950 was only 4.4% which increased to roughly 20% in 2010 which indicates the new addition in the category where people started spendingexpensing more than they did in 1950. In summary, the spending patternexpenditure nature of people had changed significantly in 2010 than that had been in 1950 and it is obvious that expenses on food upsurged.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response’s strongest feature is its clear overview of the substantial shift from housing-dominated spending to a more balanced household budget, supported by mostly accurate figures. Its impact is weakened by imprecise details, repetitive and overloaded phrasing, awkward collocations, and inconsistent tense and comparison structures; the priority is to present the largest changes in concise comparative sentences using exact data and natural spending vocabulary.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The report gives a clear overview of the major shift from housing dominance in 1950 to a more balanced distribution in 2010, and most figures are accurate. Some details are imprecise, and the conclusion repeats rather than adds a sharp comparison.
Highlight the exact largest increases and decreases: housing fell from 72.1% to 22.0%, while food rose from 11.2% to 34.0% and other spending rose to 19.2%.
Coherence and Cohesion
The response is logically organised by year and has a summary, but some sentences are overloaded and cohesion is repetitive.
Use shorter comparative sentences and avoid repeating “expenditure” in nearly every clause.
Lexical Resource
Topic vocabulary is adequate but includes awkward collocations such as “expenses made”, “expenditure nature”, and “expensing”.
Use natural phrases such as “spending on”, “household budget”, “accounted for”, and “allocated to”.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Grammar is mostly clear but article use, tense choice, and comparative structures are inconsistent.
Revise sentences with “increased/decreased” and use past simple for the two fixed years.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The pie charts below show the average household expenditures in a country in 1950 and 2010.
Your response
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