Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · IELTS Complete Catalyst · 2026-08-27
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
The ease of international travel and the spread of various kinds of mass media all over the world have made it more possible than ever for people to know how other people live in other countries.
Do the advantages of this development outweigh the disadvantages?
You should use your own ideas, knowledge and experience and support your arguments with examples and relevant evidence. Write at least 250 words.
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Since the development in the field of media and transport, various aspects about the convenience and the danger of this service have been a major part of discussion. Today the media has grown to the peak of mountains. It has been absorbed in our daily life like the water is absorbed by plants. Life without media is now impossible to imagine and this provides the basis of fears about it. Just a century ago the people living in one part of world were unfamiliar to the people in the other part of the world. They only knew something about others when they either visit the far place or someone else told them about the other people. So, it was simply a mystery for people how people on the other corner of world live? Now due to revolution in both media and transportation it becomes easier for people to travel around and discover the different cultures. People can easily travel to remote places. Now they can easily travel across oceans. If they cannot travel by themselves they have a choice to visualize the place just by clicking. Through mobile phones people can easily enjoy different places. Back then a century ago this thing was unimaginable. The fast and advanced media had made it easy for people to learn about different people and various cultures. Despite having unnumerable benefits of advancement, certain drawbacks are also present but these drawbacks are not of much strength as we compare with the benefits. From the discussion it is concluded that the development in media and transportation has proved to be very beneficial.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.5 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.0 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.5 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5
The response addresses the prompt by discussing the impact of media and travel on cultural awareness. However, the development of ideas is limited. While you state that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, you do not provide specific examples or evidence to support this claim. The essay remains at a general, descriptive level rather than an analytical one. To reach a higher band, you need to provide concrete examples of how this knowledge affects society (e.g., increased tolerance or potential cultural erosion) and explain the 'why' behind your position more thoroughly. The conclusion is present but lacks a summary of the main arguments.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.0
The essay is organized into a single block of text, which significantly hinders coherence. Paragraphing is essential in IELTS writing to separate the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. While there is a basic logical flow, the transition between ideas is often mechanical or repetitive, such as the frequent use of 'Now' and 'they can easily'. The lack of clear paragraph breaks makes the progression of your argument difficult to follow. You should use cohesive devices more effectively to link sentences and ensure that each paragraph focuses on a single, well-developed idea.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.5
Your vocabulary is generally adequate for the task, but it lacks the precision and variety required for a higher band. Phrases like 'grown to the peak of mountains' are non-idiomatic and awkward. You rely on simple, repetitive vocabulary such as 'easy', 'travel', and 'people'. To improve, you should incorporate more academic collocations and topic-specific terminology related to globalization, cultural exchange, and mass media. While your meaning is clear, the lack of sophisticated or less common lexical items limits your score in this criterion.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5
The essay contains a mix of simple and some complex sentence structures, but there are frequent grammatical errors. For instance, 'the people living in one part of world were unfamiliar to the people in the other part' lacks articles, and 'these drawbacks are not of much strength as we compare with the benefits' is awkward phrasing. There are also issues with subject-verb agreement and tense consistency. While these errors do not completely impede communication, they are frequent enough to lower the score. You should focus on proofreading for basic errors and practicing more complex sentence constructions.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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