Writing Task 1: Bar Chart: Question 1
Syllabus W.task1
The chart below shows the average monthly household spending in Denmark and Portugal in 2024, broken down by category, as a percentage of total household spending. Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant. Write at least 150 words.
| Spending category | Denmark (%) | Portugal (%) |
|---|---|---|
| Housing & utilities | 32 | 24 |
| Food & drink | 15 | 20 |
| Transport | 13 | 15 |
| Leisure & culture | 14 | 10 |
| Education | 4 | 6 |
| Other | 22 | 25 |
The bar chart is a grouped bar chart with six spending categories on the horizontal axis and one bar per country for each category, with the percentage of total household spending shown on the vertical axis.
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Worked solution
Examiner notes: why this is a band 9 response
Task Achievement
The overview paragraph immediately identifies the two most significant comparisons, the housing and utilities gap and the food and drink gap, rather than listing every category in the order given. Every figure quoted in the body paragraphs is taken accurately from the table, and comparisons are made using specific percentages and percentage-point gaps rather than vague language, fully meeting the task of selecting and reporting the main features.
Coherence & Cohesion
Information is grouped logically rather than presented category by category: the largest and most contrasting figures (housing, food and drink) come first, followed by a paragraph on the more moderate differences (transport, leisure and culture, education), and a final paragraph on the residual “other” category. Cohesion is built through paraphrase and contrast markers (“showed the opposite pattern”, “a clearer difference appeared”) rather than a mechanical list of linking words.
Lexical Resource
The response uses precise report language (“devoted a considerably larger share”, “accounted for the smallest share”, “a gap of only two percentage points”) and avoids repeating “spent” or “percentage” mechanically, instead varying between “share”, “proportion” and “budget”. Numbers are always paired with the correct unit (%) and category name.
Grammatical Range & Accuracy
A range of comparative structures is used accurately: comparatives (“a larger proportion… than”), contrast clauses (“though Portuguese households allocated…”), and passive/nominal structures (“was divided”, “accounted for”) are all controlled with no errors of agreement or tense, and sentences vary in length and structure rather than following a single repeated pattern.
Common pitfalls specific to this task
See commonMistakes above: the most damaging is bar-by-bar description, which produces a report that reads as a list rather than a set of grouped, meaningful comparisons, band 9 responses group data before describing it.