Band 5.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.0 · IELTS Academic Practice Accelerator · 2026-10-10

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 5.0)

as we know health is how much important for our lives. smoking can cause serious conditions like cancer. so yes i think smoking should be ban in our counrty . in daily basis we can see how many people suffering lung cancer , mouth cancer from smoking . it is distroying our youth. there so many student have bad habit of smoking and this can be distroy their career. they are less foucing on their studing, and in very young age thay can be face illnesses like coughing, problem like difficulty in breathing. so it is right to stop this.

i can give you a relevant example from my own knowledge. fee months ago my youger brother was coughing and had a difficulty to breath also he had a fever. so we went to the hospital and here we know about and he is smoking from last one year it ws very damage his lungs ,so it took a month to heal .

but then he promise us to never smoke.

my grandfather has also a issue of lungs , coughing beacause of smoking we always request him to stop smoking but he never stop .

so yes i realy want to be this illegal in our country beacase there is benefit of this its totally killing our health.

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response5.5
Coherence and Cohesion5.0
Lexical Resource5.0
Grammatical Range and Accuracy4.5
Overall5.0

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You give a clear opinion that smoking should be illegal and support it with relevant health concerns, including lung and mouth cancer, breathing difficulties, and the examples of your brother and grandfather. These details show an attempt to explain why you agree. However, the response addresses the issue only partially: it focuses mainly on health effects and does not consider why making smoking illegal might be difficult or whether other measures could work. Several points are asserted rather than developed, such as the claim that smoking destroys young people’s careers. The response is also 31 words below the required minimum, limiting the space available to explain your reasons. Develop fewer points more fully and connect each example directly to the case for prohibition.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.0

There is some organisation: you state your position first, give health-related reasons, and then provide personal examples. The examples are relevant, but the progression between them is not always clear. For instance, the shift from students’ studies to your brother’s illness and then your grandfather’s condition feels like a list rather than a connected argument. Linking phrases such as “so” and “but” are repeated, and some references are unclear, as in “here we know about” and “this.” Use separate paragraphs for your main argument and examples, and make the relationship between each point explicit. A clearer sequence—claim, explanation, example, and link back to your opinion—would make the response easier to follow.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use some relevant topic vocabulary, including “serious conditions,” “lung cancer,” “difficulty in breathing,” and “career,” so the reader can understand the main subject and your concerns. However, the range is limited and several word choices or spellings make the message less clear or natural. Examples include “distroying,” “foucing,” “studing,” and “illnesses like coughing”; coughing is a symptom rather than an illness. Phrases such as “it is right to stop this” and “there is benefit of this” are also vague. Build a more precise set of expressions for health effects and policy, and check spelling and collocations. This will help you express your ideas more accurately without relying on repeated general words.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 4.5

Your response communicates a basic position using mostly simple sentences, with a few attempts to connect ideas through clauses. However, the range of sentence structures is limited, and errors occur frequently enough to make some sentences difficult to interpret. For example, “smoking should be ban” has an incorrect passive form, while “there so many student have bad habit” lacks a clear grammatical structure and correct agreement. Verb forms and tense are also inconsistent in “he is smoking from last one year” and “he never stop.” Punctuation and sentence boundaries need attention, particularly where several ideas run together. Practise accurate simple sentences first, then add controlled complex sentences using “because,” “although,” and “which.”

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

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