Band 4.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 4.5 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-09-26

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Some people say that the main environmental problem of our time is the loss of particular species of plants and animals. Others say that there are more important environmental problems.

Discuss both these views and give your own opinion.

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

Student answer (Band 4.5)

In the modern era, juveniles spend most of their time on smartphones. It is due to easy access and parental negligence. I believe it is negative development because it can have detrimental effect on children's studies and both physical and mental health are also affected.

On the one hand, minors spend most of their time on smartphones due to easy accessibility of everything. Numerous activities are avaliable on a single screen, which makes it more captivating for children. Furthermore, parents provide their children with smartphones to get rid of them when they are busy. For instance, in many Asian nations, parents provide their offspring with smartphones during their office work and told them to watch YouTube videos or some sort of entertainment videos.

Moreover, when children use excessive smartphones,therefore this can have bad effect on their grades. Children, when spend most of their time on smartphone just for entertainment purpose. As a result they perform worse in their exams and in calss activities. In addition, children with excessive use of smartphones are less involved in physical activities like football and cricket ,so they suffer from different diseases. Using social media all time can lead to depression and anxiety. For example, children suffer from anxiety and depression when they watch the lifestyle of the affluent people and try to be like them.

In conclusion, more accessibility and parents free hand are significant reasons behind using smartphones. I believe excessive use of smartphones affect children's studies and health in a bad manner.

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response3.0
Coherence and Cohesion5.0
Lexical Resource5.0
Grammatical Range and Accuracy4.5
Overall4.5

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 3.0

The candidate has completely misunderstood the prompt, which asks to discuss whether loss of species is the main environmental problem compared to others and to give an opinion. Instead, the student wrote an essay about children spending too much time on smartphones. Because the response is entirely off-topic and addresses a completely different prompt, it fails to meet the core requirements of Task Achievement. While ideas related to the smartphone topic are presented and supported with examples, they do not answer the set question. Consequently, the task response cannot receive a passing score for content relevance. Band 3.0 reflects this total misinterpretation of the task prompt.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.0

Despite the severe off-topic content, the text demonstrates a basic organizational structure. The essay is divided into distinct paragraphs, including an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Cohesive devices such as 'On the one hand', 'Furthermore', 'Moreover', and 'In conclusion' are utilized to signal transitions between ideas, although some of these links are mechanical or misused, such as 'Moreover, when children use excessive smartphones,therefore this can have bad effect'. Paragraphing is attempted appropriately, providing a discernible flow to the writing even though the underlying subject matter is incorrect. This places the response in Band 5.0 for coherence and cohesion.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is relatively limited and repetitive. The candidate frequently repeats words like 'children', 'smartphones', 'time', and 'depression'. There are attempts at less common vocabulary such as 'detrimental effect', 'accessibility', 'captivating', and 'affluent people', but these are often accompanied by inaccuracies in collocation or word choice, such as 'parents free hand' or 'use excessive smartphones'. Spelling errors are also present, including 'avaliable' and 'calss'. However, the vocabulary is minimally adequate to convey the student's intended ideas about technology use, corresponding to a Band 5.0.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 4.5

The essay displays a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, though attempts at complex structures frequently result in grammatical errors. Examples of faulty structures include 'It is due to easy access and parental negligence' and 'Children, when spend most of their time on smartphone just for entertainment purpose. As a result they perform worse...'. There are frequent errors in verb tense, article usage, preposition selection, and sentence fragments (e.g., missing main verbs or dangling clauses). These errors cause some difficulty for the reader and impede smooth comprehension, placing the grammatical performance firmly at a Band 4.5.

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