Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Cambridge IELTS 19 · 2026-09-25

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Some people think that competition at work, at school and in daily life is a good thing. Others believe that we should try to cooperate more, rather than competing against each other.

Discuss both these views and give your own opinion.

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

Student answer (Band 6.0)

It is believed by some people that competition play a crucial role in an individuals’ life. While other believe cooperation has a greater impact on it. Many argue that competition is undoubtedly the most significant factor of a persons’ success. In contrast, other suggest cooperation plays a vital role in a persons’ everyday life. This essay will assess both perspectives before reaching an agreeable conclusion.

Competition not keeps a person motivated to achieve his future goal, but make them more concentrated and hard working. Every year numerous students compete each other to secure their position in world recognised universities. This is the reason most students start preparing from a young age to maximise their chances to get admitted to their dream universities. Additionally, most employees in a company tend to work harder to gain promotions and bonuses. Moreover, businesses often try to overcome their rivals by introducing better product and services. For example, most car companies compete with each other in term of features and reliability which makes most companies to introduces more features so they could have advantage over their competitor.

On the other hand, cooperation can have its own benefits as well. Cooperation can make various brains to work together, which could increase creativity. Furthermore, it encourages many individuals to work together making them more confident and boosting their team work skills. This could also have good influence on their social skills. For example, many people who have never worked in a group seems more nervous when speaking in front of other, compared to ones who have worked in a group.

Ultimately, it would not be wrong to say that both views have both advantages and drawbacks. However, I personally believe a balance should be kept between competition and cooperation. Competing where it is necessary and cooperating when it is required.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.5

The response successfully addresses all parts of the prompt by discussing both competition and cooperation while presenting a clear personal opinion in the introduction and conclusion. Ideas are relevant and supported with examples, such as students competing for university admissions and employees seeking promotions. However, some arguments tend to over-generalise or remain slightly under-developed, which prevents the response from reaching the highest band. For instance, the discussion on how cooperation increases creativity could be expanded with more specific details. Nevertheless, the position is maintained clearly throughout, and the main tenets of the task are well covered, fitting comfortably into Band 7.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.5

The essay demonstrates a clear overall progression and logical organisation. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate the introduction, the two body paragraphs discussing each view, and the conclusion. Cohesive devices are employed with reasonable flexibility, using transition words like 'In contrast', 'Additionally', and 'On the other hand' to guide the reader. However, some referencing is slightly faulty or mechanical, such as the repetitive use of 'most' and introductory phrases, and minor cohesion issues appear in sentence transitions. Overall, the logical structure remains clear throughout, justifying a Band 7 score.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, attempting less common items such as 'world recognised', 'maximise their chances', and 'overcome their rivals'. There is some awareness of collocation, though occasional word choice errors and awkward phrasings are present, such as 'competition play' instead of 'plays' and 'product' instead of 'products'. Spelling and word-formation errors do not impede communication, but they restrict the range from achieving higher precision. The lexical control aligns well with the Band 6 descriptors.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

The response displays a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, demonstrating attempts at varied structures such as conditional and relative clauses. There are, however, several noticeable grammatical and punctuation errors throughout the text, including subject-verb agreement issues ('competition play', 'other believe', 'product and services', 'group seems'), apostrophe misplacement ('an individuals'', 'a persons''), and missing words ('Competition not keeps'). While these errors occur frequently, they rarely impede communication, allowing the essay to meet the criteria for Band 6.

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