As part of a student social survey project, you are organising a group to visit a historical exhibition in a small town. Write a letter asking for information about the exhibition. In your letter: - ask about the contents of the exhibition - ask for its opening and closing dates - ask whether any discounts are available
Sample Response
Dear Sir or Madam, I am organising a visit for a group of pupils toadministering a group of pupils to visit the historical exhibition in Shaftesbury, UK next month. This tour will be part of our school activitiesbe a part of our school activities to encourage young students to participate in social surveys and developgrow their interest in history. I would really appreciate it if you could sendforward me some information regarding the exhibition. First of all, when the exhibition will be held and what are the daily opening hours? Secondly, is the exhibition suitable for fourth- and fifth-grade pupilsthe fourth and fifth graders? Please tellnotify me about the theme and objects on displaytheme and exhibited objects on display. This would help me better explain to my students the content during our trip. Finally, what are the other activities being held in connection with the exhibition? I am planning to bring over twenty students to the exhibition. So I would like to inquire whether we are eligible for any discount on entrance tickets. If there is no general discount, could you please offer a student discountarrange one for students? Thank you in advance. I look forward to hearing from you soon. Yours faithfully, Sarah Johnson
Why this response received Band 7.0
The letter has a clear purpose, maintains an appropriately polite tone, and addresses the exhibition content, timing, suitability, and group discount with useful supporting detail. Its main limitation is presentation: all ideas appear in one dense paragraph, while several awkward word choices and question structures reduce naturalness. The highest-priority improvement is to divide the requests into logical paragraphs and phrase each question more idiomatically and accurately.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The purpose is clear, all three required areas are addressed, and the requests are developed with relevant details in an appropriate formal tone.
Ask explicitly for both the opening and closing dates to make coverage of the timing requirement completely precise.
Coherence and Cohesion
The requests progress logically through clear sequencing, but presenting the entire letter as one paragraph weakens organisation and readability.
Separate the introduction, exhibition enquiries, discount request, and closing into distinct functional paragraphs.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is sufficiently varied and generally precise, although phrases such as administering a group and grow their interest sound unnatural.
Use more idiomatic collocations, such as organising a group and developing their interest in history.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A range of sentence forms is used with generally good control, and the few structural errors do not impede meaning.
Improve question formation, especially by using either a direct question or a correctly structured indirect question consistently.
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IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
As part of a student social survey project, you are organising a group to visit a historical exhibition in a small town. Write a letter asking for information about the exhibition. In your letter:
- ask about the contents of the exhibition
- ask for its opening and closing dates
- ask whether any discounts are available
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.