The chart below shows the sales of handmade olive oil soaps to tourists in Turkey in 2015.
Sample Response
The chart details the sales of manufactured soaps (produced in olive oil) to travellers in Turkey in 2015. Overall, sales at the beginning and end were similarboth the starting point and the end almost share similar data, while sales rose sharplysales skyrocketed to peak in March and reached lows in July and Septemberfell significantly in July and September. Units are measured in millions of Turkish liraLira.
The sales started with 200 million in the month of January, have seen a gradual increase in the next month before reaching the highest number of the year in the month of March (350 million worth of soaps sold during this period). From there, the sales saw a substantial decrease until Julytill the month of July.
Sales increasedThe numbers increased in the month of August as sales rose to about 225 million lirathe sale crossed 200 million. However, that trend was not sustained for a longer period. The product sold only for around 125 million in September (sales similar to July), and then the statistics exhibited some hope, finishing the year with around 175 million.
Why this response received Band 7.0
The response presents a clear chronological account and identifies the peak, troughs, and broad recovery accurately. Its main limitation is selective coverage: several important intermediate months, particularly the sharp fall from March through July and the late-year plateau, receive little or no quantified support. Add a few strategically chosen figures for April, June, October, and December while keeping the overview concise.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
A clear overview and accurate values capture the principal peak, lows, and overall movement, though several intermediate stages lack quantified detail.
Support the March-to-July decline and the October-to-December plateau with a few well-selected monthly figures.
Coherence and Cohesion
Information is logically sequenced in chronological paragraphs, and cohesive devices make the changes easy to follow.
Strengthen continuity by linking the omitted middle and final months more explicitly into the chronological account.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a good range of trend vocabulary, but several choices such as 'statistics exhibited some hope' are imprecise or unnatural.
Prefer neutral, precise chart language such as 'sales recovered' and 'remained broadly stable.'
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A mix of simple and complex forms communicates clearly, although tense control and sentence construction are occasionally uneven.
Maintain past-tense narration throughout and revise the long sentence beginning 'The sales started' to avoid the shift to 'have seen.'
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The chart below shows the sales of handmade olive oil soaps to tourists in Turkey in 2015.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.