Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 14 · 2026-09-12

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Many people work long hours, leaving very little time for leisure activities.

Does this situation have more advantages or more disadvantages?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

 

Student answer (Band 5.5)

There is an ongoing debate about people who choose to work more than doing extra curriculam activity. Although I believe individuals should work hard to support their family, but spending time in their hobbies make them more creative and productive.

On the one hand, there are numurous benefits of doing leisure activity. firstly, if person do their favourite activity, it relise thier stress. For instance, due to the busy worklife, people often feel stress and become unproductive. As a result, they are not able to concentrate in their work. Secondly, due to high level of responsibility they have to work long hours, not only it create helath risk but also incerese the conflict in family. For example, a person who work long hours is not able to spend time with their family, which enhance issues between them. If they spend their time to doing iesiur activities with their family, its enhance family bonding

as well as give them satisfaction feeling.

Moreover, in their free time they can persue their hobies and make it profesnal, so they do not have to do job, they can invest their time in business which is releted to that. However, If individuals work hard enough, it assist them to better carrier opportunity. it can incerese their pay. Hence they can support their family.

In conclusion, eventhough, spending a time to do different activity can be more usefull and also create different ideas and gives opportunity to think extra miles wheras working long hours only craete stress and health risk.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.0

The response addresses the prompt by discussing both the advantages and disadvantages of working long hours versus engaging in leisure activities, presenting a clear position. The introduction outlines the writer's view, and body paragraphs explore ideas such as stress relief, health risks, family bonding, and career advancement. However, the development of these ideas is somewhat limited and repetitive. For example, the points regarding family issues and stress are touched upon but not fully extended with precise, developed reasoning. While all parts of the task are addressed, the support remains basic and lacks deeper elaboration. According to the Band 6 descriptors, the task is addressed with relevant ideas, but some are under-developed. Therefore, a score of 6.0 is appropriate.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The essay is arranged into an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion, showing an overall coherent structure. Logical connectors such as 'On the one hand', 'Firstly', 'Secondly', and 'Moreover' are used to guide the reader through the text, although some cohesive devices are mechanical or awkwardly placed (e.g., 'persue their hobies and make it profesnal'). Paragraphing is generally appropriate, separating the discussion into advantages of leisure, career benefits, and a conclusion. However, referencing and transitions are occasionally faulty, and logical progression falters slightly in the final paragraphs where thoughts are compressed. This aligns closely with the Band 6 descriptor, which notes a coherent overall arrangement with cohesion that is sometimes faulty or mechanical.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.0

The student attempts a range of vocabulary relevant to the topic, such as 'leisure activities', 'productivity', 'health risk', and 'family bonding'. However, there are frequent spelling errors ('curriculam', 'numurous', 'relise', 'thier', 'helath', 'incerese', 'iesiur', 'persue', 'hobies', 'profesnal', 'releted', 'wheras', 'craete') and word choice inaccuracies (e.g., 'satisfaction feeling' instead of 'feeling of satisfaction', 'enhance family bonding' instead of 'enhance' used incorrectly for relationships). The range is adequate for the task, but spelling and morphological errors impede clarity in several places. These characteristics match the Band 5 descriptors, where vocabulary is minimally adequate with noticeable spelling and word choice errors.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, using conditional and subordinate clauses such as 'Although I believe individuals should work hard...' and 'If they spend their time...'. However, there are frequent grammatical errors throughout the text, including subject-verb agreement issues ('if person do', 'a person who work'), punctuation errors, and awkward phrasing ('not only it create helath risk but also incerese the conflict'). These errors cause some difficulty for the reader and prevent the text from achieving a higher band. Because there is a mix of simple and complex forms alongside frequent errors that do not completely obscure the meaning, the response fits the Band 5 criteria for grammatical range and accuracy.

See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.

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