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Task 1 Academic · Process diagram · Consumer

How coffee is produced

A strictly linear process that also splits geographically, and three answers that differ in whether they notice the split at all.

The question

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.

The diagram below shows how coffee is produced, from harvesting to packing.

Stages shown in the diagram
  1. 1Ripe red coffee cherries are picked by hand from the bushes.
  2. 2The cherries are fed into a pulping machine, which strips off the outer skin and flesh.
  3. 3The beans ferment in water tanks for 24 to 36 hours to loosen the remaining pulp.
  4. 4The beans are washed in channels of clean water.
  5. 5The wet beans are spread on drying tables in the sun for up to two weeks.
  6. 6A hulling machine removes the dried parchment layer around each bean.
  7. 7The green beans are graded by size and density, and defective beans are discarded.
  8. 8Graded beans are packed into sacks and shipped to the destination country.
  9. 9The beans are roasted in rotating drums at around 220°C.
  10. 10The roasted beans are ground and packed into vacuum-sealed bags for sale.

A 150-word factual summary of a graph, chart, table, process or map. This prompt is original, written in the standard format for teaching purposes — it is not taken from any past paper.

What separates the three answers

The process divides in two places at once — by phase and by country — and each answer sees one more of those divisions than the last.

The three answers

Band 6.5

175 words (the task asks for at least 150)

The answer works. It addresses the task, the reader follows it, and the meaning survives — but ideas stay general, linking is mechanical, wording repeats, and small errors are visible throughout.

The answer

The diagram is about the production of the coffee, starting from the farm and finishing in the shop.

Firstly, the farmers are picking the red coffee cherries from the bushes by their hands3. Secondly, they put the cherries in a pulping machine which is removing the outside skin and the flesh. Thirdly, the beans go in the water tanks4 and they stay there for 24 to 36 hours for the fermentation.

After the fermentation, workers wash the beans in the channels with clean water, and then they put them on the drying tables under the sun for two weeks. Then a hulling machine remove the dry layer around each bean, and after that the beans are graded by the size and the bad beans are throwed away2.

Then the beans are put in the sacks and sent to another country by the ship.1 There they are roasted in the rotating drums in 220 degrees. Finally the roasted beans are grinded and packed in the vacuum bags, and after that they are ready for the sale.

What an examiner notices

  1. 1. Task achievement

    “Then the beans are put in the sacks and sent to another country by the ship.”

    The turning point of the whole process is reported as one more step in a list. Nothing marks it as the moment the description crosses from farming to manufacturing.

  2. 2. Grammatical range and accuracy

    “the bad beans are throwed away”

    An irregular participle regularised. Paired with 'grinded' three lines later, it is the clearest single signal of the band.

  3. 3. Grammatical range and accuracy

    “the farmers are picking the red coffee cherries from the bushes by their hands”

    Continuous aspect for a repeated, general action, plus 'by their hands' for the fixed phrase 'by hand'. Both are recoverable but both are noticeable.

  4. 4. Coherence and cohesion

    “Thirdly, the beans go in the water tanks”

    An ordinal system is started and then dropped after three stages, so the last seven are all introduced with 'then' or 'after that'.

One honest caveat

Band labels here describe what each piece of writing demonstrates against the four published assessment areas, paraphrased in plain language. They are teaching illustrations produced for this site, not official material, and no sample has been marked by a test provider. Real scripts are marked whole; two answers with the same label can still look quite different from each other, and nothing on this page can promise anyone a particular result.

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