Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Academic Practice Accelerator · 2026-10-31

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)

Smoking should be made illegal as it can cause serious illnesses. I fully agree with this statement as smoking can impact your mental as well as physical health. In my view, smoking is an addiction which should be banned as it affects our surroundings as well as health of the individual who is consuming it.

There are several reasons why smoking is injurious to health. The smoke produced from the cigrattes damage the lunges of the person consuming it. It not only affect the consumer, it also affects the people around them. As a result, it can also cause damage to the lunges of the person consuming the smoke. To quote an example, smoke gets vanished into the thin air which not only pollute the enviornment but also affect the persons health. If a person consumes ten cigrattes in a day , they become addicted to it.

The addiction of consuming smoke cause serveral health problems such as cancer, lunges failure or any internal disease which are cureless. As a result, It is also harmful for the people and patients as air gets polluted and by consuming that air, other person can also adapt several diseases. To give an example, If there is a cancer patient nearby and consume the same air. It could cause problems to them, they might encounter more diseases such as asthma, migraine or lunges failure. Which will lead to death of the person. This could also effect the financial as well as mental status of the person.

In my opinion, smoking should be banned and serious measures should be taken to control the addiction of it by every individual as it contains drugs and chemicals and can cause serious illness.

In conclusion, the government should take strict measures and spread awareness among the people through advertising, seminas or workshops, so that people should get aware what damage it can cause to their health and people around them.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

Your position is clear from the opening: you fully agree that smoking should be illegal, and you give relevant reasons involving harm to smokers, second-hand smoke, addiction, and wider health effects. The response also offers practical measures, such as advertising and workshops, which helps address the issue. However, some points are asserted rather than explained. For example, the claim that smoke around a cancer patient could lead to asthma or lung failure is unclear and not convincingly supported; the example about ten cigarettes mainly illustrates addiction without showing why prohibition is the best response. Develop fewer points with accurate explanation and a specific example, and briefly address a possible counterargument, such as personal freedom or enforcement, to make the argument more complete.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response has a recognisable structure: an introduction, two body paragraphs, and a conclusion. The main ideas are generally grouped by topic, and linking expressions such as “As a result,” “To quote an example,” and “In conclusion” help signal relationships. However, progression within the body paragraphs is sometimes difficult to follow. The discussion moves from second-hand smoke to pollution, addiction, and then specific illnesses without clearly showing how each point connects. Some transitions are also repetitive, and the sentence beginning “Which will lead to death” is detached from the preceding sentence. Organise each paragraph around one central claim, explain it in sequence, and connect examples directly to that claim. Clearer referencing would also help readers identify who is affected.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

You use relevant topic vocabulary, including “addiction,” “serious illnesses,” “cancer,” “second-hand” (in meaning), and “strict measures,” so the reader can understand the subject and your position. There are also attempts to use more formal expressions, such as “financial as well as mental status.” However, the range is limited and several word-choice, collocation, and spelling problems reduce precision: “lunges” is repeatedly used for “lungs,” “smoke gets vanished” is unnatural, and “adapt several diseases” does not express the intended meaning. “Cureless” is also an unsuitable form in this context. Aim for accurate topic collocations and check spelling carefully; using precise phrases such as “develop a disease” and “exposure to second-hand smoke” would make the argument clearer and more natural.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and more complex sentence forms, including clauses introduced by “as,” “which,” and “if.” This gives the response some structural variety, and the overall meaning is usually recoverable. However, errors in agreement, verb forms, articles, and sentence boundaries occur often enough to make some sentences awkward or unclear. For example, “The smoke … damage” needs subject–verb agreement, while “It not only affect” and “The addiction … cause” also require matching verb forms. The fragment “Which will lead to death” should be joined to the previous sentence, and the conditional example beginning “If there is a cancer patient nearby” is incomplete. Practise checking each sentence for a clear subject and main verb, and use complex clauses only when their grammatical structure is complete.

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