Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-11-10

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

The best way to provide enough homes in large cities is to build tall apartment blocks.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

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

Student answer (Band 5.5)

The best way to provide accomodations is to create skyscrapper in large cities. Although, this can be a possible solution to the accomodation problems, in my view this will not be a good idea to build tall apartment blocks. Natural disasters such as earthquack, soil limitations to build taller building can lead to serious problems. We can focus on making wider not taller and ensuring civil engineering rules.

First and foremost, the very basic approach to fix the accomodation problems would be to build houses as large as possible. This can help to provide flats for growing number of people as more rooms are available to live. This has two serios problems: soil capacity to build large apartments and the natural calamities such as earthquake. the former actually limits the the number of floor we cam make and the latter can severly damage and collapse the city. For example, in Japan, earthquake had been killed thousands of people. Government is now ensuring the apartments capacity to withstand earthquake by following engineering processes.

Secondly, instead of build taller apartments, we can construct building by taking wider are so that we can ensure soil criteria not goes beyond limits. Also, we can reduce the room size by considering the growing number of people. However, if we can measure the ratio of number of people in large cities to the city total area, the number will be a large value. Therefore, the required total area to construct buildings will fall short in future.

In conclusion, making larger height buildings a possible solution for provide enough homes. But this can bring undesired problems. On the other hand, making apartments in a wider area considering the engineering fact will reduce the incidents related to natural phenomena.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You take a position against relying on tall apartment blocks and give relevant reasons, including earthquake risk and limits on building foundations. The Japan example also supports your concern about safety. However, the response only partly answers the comparison implied by “the best way”: the alternative of building wider is proposed, but its feasibility is not explained, and the point that city land may be insufficient seems to weaken your own alternative without being resolved. Some claims, such as reducing room size, are introduced but not developed or linked clearly to providing enough homes. To strengthen the response, explain how your preferred approach would work in dense cities and compare its benefits and limitations directly with high-rise construction.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response has a recognisable structure, with an introduction, two body paragraphs and a conclusion. Sequencing phrases such as “First and foremost,” “Secondly” and “In conclusion” help signal the stages of your argument. However, progression within paragraphs is sometimes difficult to follow: the first body paragraph moves from building houses, to soil capacity, to earthquakes, and then to government engineering measures without clearly showing how each point supports your position. The contrast between building wider and the later observation that land will fall short is also left unresolved. Some linking is mechanical, and references such as “the former” and “the latter” require the reader to work out which ideas they refer to. Use clearer topic sentences and connect each example explicitly to your main claim.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You use some topic-relevant vocabulary, including “natural disasters,” “soil capacity,” “engineering processes” and “withstand earthquake,” which helps communicate the subject. There are also attempts at more specific terms, such as “civil engineering rules” and “calamities.” However, the range is limited and several spelling, word-form and collocation errors make the writing less precise, for example “accomodations,” “skyscrapper,” “soil limitations,” and “making apartments in a wider area.” Repetition of “build,” “apartments” and “problems” also restricts variety. Aim to learn accurate forms and natural combinations, such as “accommodation,” “high-rise buildings,” “land constraints” and “construct low-rise housing over a wider area.” This would make your argument clearer and more appropriate to the topic.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and more complex sentences, including a concession in “Although this can be a possible solution…” and a conditional structure beginning “if we can measure…”. However, complex sentences are often faulty, and errors occur frequently enough to make some relationships difficult to follow. Examples include “the number of floor we cam make,” “earthquake had been killed thousands of people,” and “the required total area … will fall short.” There are also problems with articles, plurals, agreement and sentence boundaries, as in “the natural calamities” and the lowercase “the former” after a full stop. Practise building accurate sentences around one main idea, checking subject–verb agreement, tense, articles and punctuation before adding subordinate clauses.

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