Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Summit Mastery · 2026-09-17
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
Tourism is one of the fastest growing industries and contributes a great deal to economies around the world. However, the damage tourism can cause to local cultures and the environment is often ignored.
To what extent do you agree or disagree?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Tourism is one of the industries which is growing rapidly and contributes significantly to the different economies around the world. But, the effects of tourism on local cultures and enviornment are often get sidelined. I strongly agree with this statement and the following essay contains my reasons and opinion about this.
To start with, tourism is one of the most important sectors in world which affect all of us significantly. Many nations economy depends on tourism and also helps them to share and represents their cultures on global stage. Countries with rich, historical and strong cultures are often mostly visited by tourists in high numbers such as European countries, India, China, Japan and many more are the prime example of this. People mostly do not know that some things common in their culture can be avoided or missapropiate in other culture such as tipping is mostly done by people in many countries but in Japan its is considered as disrespect.
Current trends shows that with high numbers of tourists visiting each year many nations begin to loose their own culture such as Indonesia, Thailand and Emirates, these countries have economy depends significantly on tourism. Due to high number of people visiting their way of living, food get affect. Such as United Kingdom most famous food is an Indian dish.
To sum up, Tourism is one of the most critical industry in world economy and i agree it has significant effects on cultures and enviornment, to manage this people should learn to respect each other culture's and countries also need to implement policies which protect their culture and heritage.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.5 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.0 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5
The response addresses the prompt by discussing both the benefits of tourism and the negative impacts on local cultures and the environment, clearly stating a position agreeing with the prompt ("I strongly agree with this statement"). The main ideas are presented, such as economic dependency and cultural loss in countries like Indonesia and Thailand. However, the development of ideas tends to be somewhat superficial and unsupported by detailed elaboration. For example, the mention that "United Kingdom most famous food is an Indian dish" is a weak and inaccurate support for the point regarding cultural erosion. Furthermore, the environment is mentioned in the introduction and conclusion but is never actually discussed in the body paragraphs, representing a minor omission in addressing all parts of the prompt fully. Therefore, this performance aligns well with Band 6.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5
The essay has a recognizable overall structure with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Paragraphing is attempted, though the division of ideas could be more logical. Cohesive devices are used, such as "To start with" and "To sum up", but referencing and transitional links within paragraphs are sometimes faulty or mechanical ("People mostly do not know that some things common in their culture can be avoided or missapropiate in other culture such as tipping..."). The progression of ideas occasionally feels disjointed, as the transition from economic benefits to cultural differences in the second paragraph lacks smooth logical flow. Overall, the organizational framework meets the criteria for Band 6.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.5
The student demonstrates an adequate vocabulary range for the task, attempting some less common phrases like "missapropiate" and "cultural erosion" (implied). However, there are frequent noticeable spelling and word-choice errors, including "enviornment" instead of environment, "missapropiate" instead of inappropriate, "loose" instead of lose, and "industry" instead of industries. Despite these lexical inaccuracies, the meaning remains mostly clear to the reader, meaning communication is not significantly impeded. This sits comfortably within the Band 5 to Band 6 threshold, leaning towards Band 6 due to the sufficient breadth of terms attempted.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0
The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, such as relative clauses ("which is growing rapidly") and conditional-style constructions. However, grammatical accuracy is weak throughout the text. There are frequent errors in verb agreement, tense consistency, and article usage, such as "Many nations economy depends" (nation's economies depend), "cultures are often mostly visited", and "tourism is one of the most critical industry in world economy". Punctuation is also flawed, particularly with run-on sentences and comma splices. While these errors do not completely obscure the message, they are frequent enough to prevent the response from achieving a Band 6.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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