Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Barron's Writing · 2026-08-12

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

A growing number of people rely on restaurants and convenience food (frozen food and packaged meals) rather than home-cooked food to supply most of their meals.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of eating this way?

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

Student answer (Band 6.0)

In recent times, ready to eat meals have become increasingly common modern society instead of family cooking. "Time saving" and "easy availability" are the merits while, "health issues" and "laziness "are the weakness. Followed by conclusion.

To commence with, by each passing day lifestyle of citizens is changing swiftly. It is getting harder and harder to manage time. So, canned food is the best alternative to save time instead of spending hours on cooking food. Moreover, packed food is freezed with advanced techniques to maintain its natural flavour. furthermore, it just take few minutes to defreez it either by the help of microwave or in Owen. Furthermore, masses can buy ready to eat meal from every small to big shops or by ordering it online using various websites like Uber and Door Dash.

On the flip side, there are numerous drawback of this craze. First and foremost, health issues is growing concern among the masses they are getting obese, malnutrition, and mental issues. Although, there are some food which can be eaten frozen and they are healthy but majority of canned food are unhealthy. companies who are making these foods are adding preservatives to increase the shelf life moreover, adding low quality ingredients like palm oil. Secondly, nowadays folks are getting lethargic instead of doing hard work they need convenience in every thing so they avoid cooking they prefer to eat junk food intstead of cooking themself a nutricious and fresh meal.

TO conclude, healthy citizens are the back bone of any nation. In my opinion making balance between fresh and canned food is very vital. Masses can consume ready to serve meals on occasionally basis or when there schedule is so hectic.

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response6.0
Coherence and Cohesion6.0
Lexical Resource5.5
Grammatical Range and Accuracy5.5
Overall6.0

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.0

The response addresses both the advantages and disadvantages of relying on convenience food. The position is clear throughout, and the main ideas—time-saving, availability, health risks, and lethargy—are relevant. However, the development of these points is somewhat superficial. For example, the mention of 'mental issues' as a consequence of convenience food is introduced but not explained or supported with evidence. To reach a higher band, you should expand on your arguments with more detailed explanations or specific examples. The introduction is also quite brief and lacks a clear thesis statement, which limits the overall depth of the response.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The essay is organised into logical paragraphs, each with a clear focus. You use some cohesive devices such as 'To commence with', 'Moreover', and 'On the flip side' to guide the reader. However, the use of these devices is sometimes mechanical or repetitive, particularly the overuse of 'furthermore'. Additionally, the transition between the introduction and the first body paragraph is abrupt. The concluding paragraph is also quite short and does not effectively synthesise the points made in the body paragraphs. Improving the variety of linking words and ensuring smoother transitions between sentences would enhance the flow.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, using terms like 'convenience food', 'nutritious', and 'hectic'. However, there are several instances of awkward phrasing and word choice errors, such as 'freezed' (should be 'frozen'), 'defreez' (should be 'defrost'), and 'on occasionally basis' (should be 'on an occasional basis'). Some collocations are also unnatural, such as 'masses can buy'. While the vocabulary is sufficient to convey your meaning, the frequent errors in word formation and collocation prevent the response from reaching a higher band. Focusing on learning word families and common collocations will be beneficial.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5

The essay contains a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, but there are frequent grammatical errors throughout. Common issues include subject-verb agreement ('health issues is growing concern'), missing articles ('in modern society'), and punctuation errors (misuse of commas and quotation marks). For instance, 'companies who are making these foods are adding...' would be more naturally expressed as 'companies that produce these foods add...'. While these errors do not completely impede communication, they are frequent enough to be noticeable. To improve, focus on mastering basic sentence construction and proofreading for common errors like pluralisation and article usage.

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

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