Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Academic Practice Accelerator · 2026-10-02

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Smoking can cause serious illnesses and should be made illegal.

To what extent do you agree?

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

Student answer (Band 5.5)

it is widely acknowdgedthat somkkiing is a major cause of serious diseases such as lungf cancer ,heart desease and chronic respirotory conditions.while i the dvere health risk associated with tobacco use ,i only partly agrree that it should be completely banned.in my view sticct regulation in publlic education is more realistic effective approach than banning.on the ither hand the argument in favour of making smoking illegal are compelling .tobaco isresponsibleof millions premature deaths every year worlswide,and ssecond hand smoke possses a great danger to non smokers.inclusing children and vulnerable adults.goverment already spend enormous sumstrreating smoking realting illnesses.money that could be tha could be used for otherpublic services.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

Your response is significantly under the required word count, reaching only 107 words instead of the minimum 250 words. Because of this severe length deficiency, the task is addressed only partially, and your ideas remain underdeveloped. You do present a clear position, stating that you partly agree with the proposition and that strict regulation is more effective than a total ban. You also mention relevant points such as health risks and economic costs. However, to achieve a higher band, you must fully explore these ideas with extended explanations and relevant examples, while meeting the minimum word length requirement.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.0

Your response shows some overall organization, as you introduce your stance in the opening and attempt to present counter-arguments and your own views. However, there is a distinct lack of clear overall progression and paragraphing, as the text is presented as a single dense block without proper breaks. Furthermore, cohesive devices are inadequate and mechanical, with missing spaces and basic transitions that fail to guide the reader smoothly through your argument. To improve, you need to structure your writing into distinct paragraphs and use a wider, more accurate range of cohesive markers to connect your ideas logically.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You demonstrate a limited but minimally adequate range of vocabulary for the task, touching upon relevant topic-specific terms like 'chronic respiratory conditions' and 'second hand smoke'. Nevertheless, your writing contains numerous noticeable spelling and word-choice errors, such as 'acknowdgedthat', 'somkkiing', 'lungf cancer', 'desease', 'sticct', and 'publlic'. These lexical and orthographic errors are frequent enough to cause some difficulty for the reader and impede the fluency of your communication. To raise your score, you need to expand your control of spelling and ensure your word choices are accurate.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

Your grammar displays a limited range of sentence structures, and your attempts at complex sentences are often faulty or obscured by punctuation issues. There are frequent errors in basic sentence construction, such as missing capitalization and run-on phrasing without proper spacing or punctuation between clauses (e.g., 'while i the dvere health risk', 'tobaco isresponsibleof millions premature deaths'). These persistent errors in punctuation, spacing, and agreement can cause strain for the reader. To move up to a higher band, you should incorporate a wider variety of complex grammatical structures while significantly reducing basic errors and improving sentence demarcation.

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

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