Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-10-06

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)

There is an ongoing debate about the duration of summer vacation for primary and secondery schools. Some poeple argue that they should be close for two months or more in summer so that students can relax and learn extra skills. While others believe that vacation should be short because long vacations may allow student to distracted by another activities or lack of interest in studies.

A certain group of people thinks schools should give vacation for two months or more to childrens so they can improve extra skills. To explain it, some individual says, during the academic year children spends most of their time in schools, whole year they took pressure about homework, regular attendence and exams. So during the summer vacation they should be given enough time to take a break from their hectic routines and also it gives more energy to their mind so they can come back to their next class with new energy and concentration. Additionally, this vacation period can be use to learn new skills such as music and dance, which can make their mind more relax. To give an example, according to a survey of World Health Organization, is it proved that students who gets longer vacation they usually learns new skills such as music, drawing and dancing.

On the other hand, it is said that shorter school holidays are always best for students because longer holidays can distract their minds by other activities or they may have lack of interest in persue study. Children who had not interested in study they can get chance to escape from study and they turn to other activities. Moreover, it is also argued that childrens who were the topper of the school they also found with the lack of interest in study. To quote an instance, according to a report of the BBC News, in 2020 due to corona isolation peiod majority of smart students have left studies just because of the lack of interest in studies.

To conclude, although longer vacation can provide students much time for relaxing their mind and learn extra activities, it can also create some negative consequencies such as lack of interest in study. In my opinion vacation period should be decided according to the appropriate situations of school and student.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

The response successfully addresses all parts of the prompt by discussing both the value of long school holidays, such as relaxation and skill development, and the arguments in favour of shorter holidays, such as preventing distraction and loss of study habits. A clear position is maintained throughout the essay. However, some ideas are more fully developed than others. For instance, the arguments regarding students losing interest in studies are somewhat repetitive and rely on generalisations rather than fully extended, specific explanations. To move to a higher level, all main ideas would need to be thoroughly supported with robust, well-analysed examples rather than broad assertions.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.5

The essay demonstrates a coherent overall arrangement with a clear, logical progression of ideas from introduction to body paragraphs and a concluding summary. Paragraphing is used sufficiently and appropriately, separating the two main discussion points into distinct sections. Cohesive devices are employed to signal transitions, such as 'On the other hand' and 'To conclude', which helps guide the reader. However, some referencing is occasionally mechanical, and a few cohesive links feel slightly repetitive or awkward. To achieve a higher level, the integration of cohesive devices needs to be smoother, ensuring seamless transitions both between and within paragraphs without relying on formulaic expressions.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The writer uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'hectic routines' and 'consequencies'. However, there are noticeable lexical inaccuracies throughout the text, including spelling errors like 'secondery', 'poeple', 'childrens', 'persue', and 'peiod'. Additionally, there are word choice and collocation issues, such as 'turn to other activities' instead of turning away from studies, and 'appropriate situations' rather than appropriate circumstances. These errors do not seriously impede communication, but they reflect a limited and developing control over word formation and precise lexical choice.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The student attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, demonstrating some capacity to build multi-clause sentences. However, there is a frequent presence of grammatical errors, particularly regarding subject-verb agreement ('children spends', 'students who gets', 'majority of smart students have left'), incorrect article usage, and awkward prepositional phrases. While these errors rarely completely obscure the intended meaning, they occur frequently enough to cause occasional difficulty for the reader. To improve, the writer needs to demonstrate better control over basic grammatical structures, verb forms, and agreement rules within complex sentence patterns.

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