Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS General Essentials · 2026-09-15

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In many countries, people do not recycle their rubbish as much as they could.

Why do you think this is?

What can be done to change this?

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

Student answer (Band 5.5)

In this world, most of the pupils become careless to the process of recycling as they were in past.

In this busy era, most of the people are busy doing their regular task, but they forget that how important is recycling for us. They don't even care what they are throwing in bins while throwing their garbage. In fact, almost all the countries and cities have three different bins for waste like in our city we have green bin for bio, black for garbage and most important blue for recycled products. For instance, one of my friend dumps his all waste in 1 bin and I ask him why you are doing this when we have 3 different bins for that. he reacted, No one care about that if I am throwing this in 1 bin. Afterthat, I told him how recycling can save our money for about 40 percent.

To solve this major problem, the city should announce fines for those who are not doing this correctly. However, if the person should know about the drawbacks of not treating well of their rubbish, they will definetly do this in right manner. For example, In my city municipal charge 100 dollars to every home if the are not dumping waste correctly. by doing this 90 percent of population start doing it safely, and they were all happy to see the lower cost of plastic products due to recycling. All cities should do this effective immediately to stop the problems they were facing.

In my opnion, everyone should know their responsibilities to make their city clean and green.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.0

The response addresses both parts of the prompt, discussing reasons why people do not recycle as much as they could, such as being busy and careless, and suggesting solutions like fines and education. The position is generally clear, and ideas are supported with personal examples, such as the friend who dumps waste in a single bin and the municipal fine system. However, the development of ideas tends to be simplistic and relies heavily on anecdotal evidence rather than broader societal analysis. The scope of ideas is somewhat limited, which places the response securely in the Band 6 category. To achieve a higher band, the student should expand on the underlying psychological or systemic causes of low recycling rates and provide more generalized, well-reasoned arguments rather than relying solely on personal anecdotes.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The essay is divided into paragraphs, each with a discernible focus, moving from an introduction to causes, solutions, and a brief conclusion. However, the overall organizational structure lacks smooth transitions between ideas, and the paragraphing is somewhat erratic, with the first paragraph consisting of only a single sentence. Cohesive devices are used, but sometimes mechanically or inappropriately, such as 'Afterthat' (written as one misspelled word) and 'by doing this'. Referencing is occasionally unclear, as seen in the transition between ideas in the body paragraphs. While the text has a coherent overall arrangement and the progression of thought is generally understandable, the faults in mechanical cohesion and referencing limit the score to a Band 5.5 or 6.0. Band 6 is appropriate as the overall flow is logical enough to follow.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is adequate for communicating basic ideas, featuring terms related to the topic such as 'recycling', 'garbage', 'rubbish', and 'municipal charge'. However, the range is limited, and there are noticeable lexical errors and awkward word choices, such as 'pupils' instead of 'people', 'how important is recycling' instead of 'how important recycling is', and 'not treating well of their rubbish'. The writer attempts some less common vocabulary, but word formation and collocations are frequently inaccurate. Spelling errors like 'definetly' and 'opnion' further reduce lexical accuracy. Although these errors do not severely impede communication, they clearly reflect the characteristics of Band 5, where a limited range and noticeable errors cause some difficulty for the reader.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, utilizing conditional and subordinate clauses such as 'if the person should know about the drawbacks... they will definetly do this'. However, control over complex structures is weak, leading to frequent grammatical errors. Examples include tense inconsistencies ('as they were in past', 'municipal charge 100 dollars'), modal verb misuse ('if the person should know'), and preposition errors ('in 1 bin'). Punctuation is also flawed, particularly with capitalization after periods and commas. Because the attempts at complex sentences are frequently faulty and errors occur consistently throughout the text, the performance aligns with Band 5 descriptors.

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

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