Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-11-08

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In many countries, primary and secondary schools close for two months or more in the summer holidays.

What is the value of long school holidays?

What are the arguments in favour of shorter school holidays?

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

Student answer (Band 5.5)

Summer holiday is most common long-term holiday is many countries especially countries which as seasons. Some people argued that long school holidays are better due to students can enjoy use that time for many puposes, while others think shorter school holidays are effective for students education.

One of the main advantages of long term holidays is that, students may use this for attending summer courses, traveling around the world or find part time employment. For example, lot of school students do part time jobs in summer and collect money for their daily expenses and school fees. As a result, they donot want to completely rely on their parents. In addition, students may attended for summer courses, can have additional knowledge. However, after a long term holidays, student may not in right track and have lack of memory of perivous lessons. Therefore they may got time to revising lessons, causes additional time consuming.

One the other hand, short term holidays provide students to relax after busy schedules. It is essentail for students to get break after tight time and then came back with previous knowledge. Long term school may cause exhasuting. Therefore short term holidays is better.

Student can use this short term holidays for spending their time with families and enjoying with friend, without completing foretten about subjects. Therefore they do not need to spending more time with revising previous lessons. In addition, after a holiday, student may come with refreshed and relax mind.

In conclusion, although long term holidays provides more time for students, it has drawbacks such as completely forggoton lessons, while short- term holidays allows them to relax after exhasted time. I believe that short term holidays provides more advantages for studn

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response6.0
Coherence and Cohesion6.0
Lexical Resource5.0
Grammatical Range and Accuracy5.0
Overall5.5

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

You address both questions and present a clear preference for shorter holidays in the conclusion. The discussion of long holidays includes relevant benefits—summer courses, travel and part-time work—and explains that employment can help students cover expenses. You also identify a drawback: students may lose track of earlier lessons. The case for shorter holidays is less fully developed: relaxation and family or friend time are mentioned, but the educational benefit is mainly repeated as avoiding forgotten material and revision. Develop this point with a specific explanation or example, and make the comparison between the two holiday lengths more explicit. The final sentence is incomplete, which also leaves your concluding position less fully expressed than the earlier discussion suggests.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response has a recognisable overall structure: an introduction, a paragraph on long holidays, a paragraph on shorter holidays, and a conclusion. The contrast signalled by “One the other hand” helps readers follow the shift between the two sides, while “For example” introduces supporting detail. However, some links are mechanical or unclear. For instance, “However, after a long term holidays” shifts abruptly from benefits to a drawback, and “Therefore they may got time to revising lessons” does not clearly express the relationship between lost knowledge and revision. The conclusion also ends mid-sentence, disrupting closure. Use clearer links between each claim and its consequence, and ensure each paragraph develops one main line of reasoning before moving on.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use enough topic-related vocabulary to communicate the main ideas, including “summer courses,” “part time employment,” “daily expenses,” and “previous lessons.” There are also attempts at more specific expressions such as “tight time” and “refreshed and relax mind,” but these are not natural collocations. Noticeable spelling and word-choice errors—such as “puposes,” “perivous,” “exhasuting,” and “foretten”—sometimes make the reader pause, and “long term holidays” is repeated frequently. Build accuracy by checking spelling and learning common word partnerships for education and holidays. A wider set of precise terms, used consistently and naturally, would make the argument easier to follow and more convincing.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and complex sentences, including a reason clause in “due to students can enjoy” and a conditional-style explanation of the effects of long holidays. However, control is uneven, particularly in verb forms, agreement, and sentence construction. Examples include “students may attended,” “student may not in right track,” and “short term holidays provides,” where the verb pattern or subject–verb agreement is incorrect. The sentence beginning “In addition, students may attended for summer courses” is also structurally incomplete. These errors sometimes make relationships between ideas difficult to interpret. Practise forming sentences with modal verbs (“may attend”), checking singular and plural subjects, and proofreading each sentence for a complete main clause.

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

Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.