Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 19 · 2026-10-31

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 5.5)

The work place for an adult and school for a student have enormous impact on someones life. As we all spend almost half of our day at these places. The fellows in school and co-workers at he work place playes an important role during our stay in school or at work.At first we will elaburate the negative aspects of compitition at work or at school.As we already know that we have to spend almost half of our day at a work place so, to have a competiton with someone with which we works is not a good thing to do. The reason of not doing this is that if we start to have a competition with someone at our work place or with which we spend half of our day it will tear up our internal peace.The other one is that it will lead us to lately develop a sense of jealousy to someone we regularly interact.It can also lead to some mistakes at our work place as if we have a competition with someone and we have to troubleshoot some of our problems with their help we just cannot ask them as our own ego does not allow us to do so.

On the other hand if we talk in favor of having competition at our work place or at school it will be in such a way that this can help some type of people to grow and reach to their life goals.It can help the students alot as if they have a competition with another student in school the pericular student will work hard to go pass his opponent.As for my own opinion i will say that if you are in your professional life you have no need to do any type of competitions with your co-workers as it will cost too much to your team's unity,but if you are in your student life can have a competition with your fellow as it will push you to work harder on your studies. The conclusion of this talk is that if you are a professional there is no need of any competition and if you are at your school the competition will help you to achieve your goals.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You address both sides of the discussion and give a clear personal view: you argue that workplace competition can damage team unity, while competition among students may encourage harder study. The examples of jealousy, reduced cooperation, and students trying to surpass a peer are relevant to the question. However, the discussion is only partly developed. The prompt also refers to cooperation in daily life, but your response focuses almost entirely on work and school, and the benefits of cooperation are implied rather than explained. The claim that competition helps students reach their goals would be stronger with a specific example or explanation of how this happens. Develop both viewpoints more evenly and make your position explicit from the introduction onward.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response has a recognisable overall structure: an opening, a paragraph about disadvantages, a contrasting paragraph about benefits and your opinion, and a conclusion. Transitions such as “On the other hand” help signal the shift between views, and the conclusion restates your main distinction between professional and student life. However, progression within paragraphs is sometimes difficult to follow because several ideas are joined into long sentences, and the opening does not clearly preview the argument. Phrases such as “The other one” and “The conclusion of this talk” are imprecise, while repeated references to spending half the day at work make the development feel circular. Use clearer topic sentences, divide related points into shorter units, and connect each example directly to the claim it supports.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use some relevant vocabulary for the topic, including “jealousy,” “ego,” “team’s unity,” “opponent,” and “life goals.” These choices help communicate the contrast between harmful workplace rivalry and motivating academic competition. However, the range is limited and several spelling errors or inaccurate word choices make the writing less precise, for example “compitition,” “elaburate,” “pericular,” and “go pass.” Some phrases are also unnatural, such as “tear up our internal peace” and “have a competition with someone.” Aim for more accurate topic collocations and check spelling carefully. Replacing repeated general wording with precise terms such as “workplace rivalry,” “collaborate,” and “academic performance” would make the discussion clearer and more appropriate for an academic essay.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and complex sentences, including conditional structures such as “if we start to have a competition … it will tear up our internal peace” and a contrastive sentence beginning “but if you are in your student life.” This shows an effort to express cause, contrast, and consequences. However, complex sentences are often faulty or difficult to control, and errors in agreement, articles, and sentence boundaries recur. For example, “co-workers … playes” has incorrect subject–verb agreement, while “the particular student will work hard” is not integrated smoothly into its sentence. The opening fragment beginning “As we all spend…” also needs to be joined to a main clause. Practise building accurate sentences first, then add subordinate clauses and check agreement, articles, and punctuation.

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