After being involved in an accident, you were looked after by a person you did not know before. Write a special thank you letter to express your gratitude. In your letter: - introduce yourself and let him/her know why you are writing - express your appreciation and offer him/ her to visit your home with his/her family
Sample Response
Dear Mr Ralph, I hope you are doing wellHope you are doing well Deleteby the grace of the Almighty. My name is Roger Freddie, whomwho you took care of after an accident last week. I am writingAnd, I am writing this letter to express how grateful I am to you for saving my lifebecause of saving my life. I am greatly indebted to you because if you were not brave and decisive enough to immediately transport me to the nearest hospital after that big truck had hit my motorbike from behind on that terriblefatal day, I do not think I would be alive todayI don’t think that I would be alive today to say “thank you” to you. I would also like to say that it is because of kind people like youSamaritans like you, this world is still a good placethis world still is a good place to live and still has some hope and goodness left in it. I know that I would never be able to repay yourepay you back for the most wonderful kind actcharitable deed you did for me, but it would make me feel a little better if you would be kind enough to at least visit my home next Saturday eveningsometime in the next week and have dinner with my family. Please also bring your family with you, if you like. Yours sincerely, Roger Freddie
Why this response received Band 7.0
The letter succeeds through its sincere, warm gratitude, clear account of the accident, and direct invitation to the helper's family. Its main limitation is linguistic control: one long, repetitive paragraph contains exaggerated or unnatural phrases alongside errors in sentence openings, relative clauses, and prepositions. Prioritise dividing the message into focused paragraphs and simplifying the central thank-you sentence, while making the invitation more specific with a date or contact detail.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The letter introduces the writer, explains the accident, expresses strong gratitude, and invites the helper and family to visit. The task is fully covered and the tone is warm.
Make the invitation slightly more specific by giving a date, time, or contact detail for the visit.
Coherence and Cohesion
The message progresses clearly from greeting to identity, gratitude, explanation, and invitation. It would benefit from paragraph breaks and less repetition in the middle.
Divide the response into three paragraphs and shorten the long gratitude sentence.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is expressive and appropriate for gratitude, with phrases such as "brave and decisive" and "greatly indebted". Some expressions are too dramatic or unnatural, including "fatal day" and "repay you back".
Keep the sincere tone but replace exaggerated or redundant phrases with natural thank-you language.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
There is a good range of complex grammar, but errors occur in relative clauses, prepositions, redundancy, and sentence fragments. Meaning remains clear.
Check sentence openings and preposition patterns, especially after "grateful" and "because".
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IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
After being involved in an accident, you were looked after by a person you did not know before. Write a special thank you letter to express your gratitude. In your letter:
- introduce yourself and let him/her know why you are writing
- express your appreciation and offer him/ her to visit your home with his/her family
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.