The charts below show the proportion of people's total spending on different commodities and services in a particular European country in 1998 and 2008

Proportion of peoples total spending on different commodities and services in 1998 and 2008 - IELTS Writing Task 1

You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.

Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

Write at least 150 words.

A student's answer to this task, and the feedback on it

Written by an IELTSX user under exam conditions and published unedited and anonymously. Band 6 · 201 words.

The bar charts illustrates the proportion of people's total spending on different services in an European country from 1998 to 2008.

Overall, it is clear that the demand for electronic goods and clothing remained consistenly the highest whereas the demand for newspaper magazines and cinema was the lowest. Further, the demand for eating cut remained unchanged, while the demand for holiday decreased and being exceeded by the service of eating cut.

Looking at the chart in more detail, the demand for service of electronic goods accounted for 16 % in 1998, then it increased to 20% in one decade. Regarding the demand for commodities of clothing, it represented 12% in 1998, after which it rose significantly to 18%, meaning that the demand for clothing rose considerably in one decade.

Regarding remaining figures, the figure for holiday stood at 8% in 1998 and it declined to 5% at the end of the period, being exceeded by the figure for eating cut. The demand for services of eating cut remained unchanged at 6% in one decade, while the figures for newspaper magazines and cinema, which accounted for 3% in 1998, saw a similar downward trend and decreased slightly to 1% in 2008, respectively.

Examiner feedback

The response effectively covers the main trends shown in the charts but suffers from some inaccuracies in data reporting and lexical misuse. Improving the precision of your descriptions and correcting basic grammatical errors will help elevate the score.

Task Achievement - 6

- The essay addresses all requirements of the task, covering the time period and categories. - The overview highlights main trends, although it contains some factual inaccuracies regarding which categories were the 'highest'. - Data is used to support the description, but there are lapses in precision when describing the trends.

Coherence & Cohesion - 6

- The essay is organized into logical paragraphs, following a standard introduction-overview-body structure. - Cohesive devices such as 'Overall', 'In more detail', and 'Regarding' are used, though they are somewhat mechanical in their placement. - The progression of ideas is generally clear, but the relationship between sentences could be smoother in the second body paragraph.

Lexical Resource - 6

- The vocabulary is adequate for the task, using terms like 'proportion', 'accounted for', and 'downward trend'. - There are instances of word misuse, such as 'eating cut' (likely meaning 'eating out') and spelling errors like 'consistenly'. - Collocations are generally functional but lack the variety expected at higher bands.

Grammatical Range & Accuracy - 6

- There is a mix of simple and complex sentences, but accuracy is inconsistent. - Errors in subject-verb agreement appear, such as 'The bar charts illustrates'. - Punctuation is generally accurate, but some phrasing, such as 'being exceeded by', creates awkward grammatical structures.

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