Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-10-27

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)

Several countries around the world tend to stop teaching in primary and secondary schools during summer holidays ,for more than two months. In my opinion long school holidays can be beneficial to the development of the pupils skills if well exploited.

Long school holidays allow the pupils to practice a varity of sport and activities like swimming ,football , drawing without being pressured by the time and schedule it allows them to refresh their minds and get well ready for the next school entry . learning new technical skills such as programming and building small projects , some people find the summer holiday an oppotunity to get their children involved in useful summer classes. most importantly a long summer holiday will allow the pupils to spend more time with their families and strengthen the familial bonde which is really important for the children's well being as a result their grade become higher when school time comes.

although the benefits of long school holidays some people argue in favour of shorter vacations. children who spend a long time interrupted from school often forget the basics of a simple subject they have been so disconnected from school to the point of not remembering their lessons , children of low income families who don't afford summer learning classes don't have the opportunity to learn new skills as a result there will be no expansion of skills .people believe that a shorter holiday wouldn't interrupt the learning process and pupils would remember their previous lessons easily.

In conclusion, it's very important to have enough time in summer vacation to develop new skills.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You address both questions and give a relevant position: long holidays can support pupils’ development, while shorter breaks may help them retain what they have learned. The examples of sports, programming, family time, and learning loss show an understanding of the topic. However, the discussion is only partly developed. For instance, the claim that stronger family bonds lead to higher grades is asserted without explaining how, and the case for shorter holidays is mainly about forgetting lessons rather than other possible advantages. The conclusion repeats the value of summer time but does not bring the two sides together. Develop each main point with a clearer explanation or a specific example, and make your overall position more explicit.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response has a recognisable structure: an introduction, a paragraph on the benefits of long holidays, a paragraph presenting the case for shorter breaks, and a conclusion. This helps the reader follow the broad direction of the argument. However, progression within paragraphs is uneven, and several ideas are joined together in long, loosely connected sentences. The benefits paragraph moves from activities to technical skills and family relationships without clearly separating or linking the points. Connectors such as “as a result” are used where the cause-and-effect relationship needs more explanation, and the transition to the opposing view begins abruptly with “although.” Use clearer topic sentences, divide distinct ideas, and make references and links between claims more precise.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You use a relevant range of topic vocabulary, including “technical skills,” “summer classes,” “low income families,” and “learning process.” These choices help communicate the main ideas, and there are attempts to express concepts beyond basic holiday vocabulary. However, the range is not consistently controlled: some phrases are imprecise or unnatural, such as “school entry,” “familial bonde,” and “expansion of skills.” Spelling errors, including “varity” and “oppotunity,” also reduce accuracy. Some wording is repeated, particularly “children,” “skills,” and “school.” Build a bank of accurate collocations for education and development, check spelling carefully, and choose more precise expressions to make your points clearer.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and more extended sentence forms, including a conditional phrase (“if well exploited”) and cause-and-effect structures. However, complex sentences are often difficult to control, and frequent errors in sentence boundaries, agreement, articles, and punctuation sometimes make the relationships between ideas unclear. For example, “Long school holidays allow the pupils to practice … it allows them to refresh” joins clauses without a clear boundary and shifts from plural to singular. In “their grade become higher,” the subject and verb do not agree. Capitalisation after full stops is also inconsistent. Practise building complete sentences around one main idea, then check agreement and punctuation before adding subordinate clauses.

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.