Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-10-04

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)

In cities, building tall appartment blocks is the best way to provide enough homes for growing population. I agree with this statement and because high rise buildings can accommodate more people in a limited area.

Today, the rate of population is growing very rapidly. Large cities are largely occupied of industries, malls and factories which brings more number of employment that also raise the residence issue. This is particularly the reason that we see numerous floors appartments in big cities to fulfill the need of residency. Tall appartments also cover the large number of people's accommodation which encourge more number of people immigration towards city for better opportunites that are available in big cities. For instance, huge number of students who study in big cities live in the hostels or appartments.

In my opinion, large appartments are the most effective way to fullfil the housing demand in the big cities. These appartments also help to save limited urban land so that land can be utilized for other more useful purposes such as industrialization intead of building homes. Subsequently appartments helps to differentiate the urban area with industrial area where govenment can facilitate more easily to both areas separately according to need. These appartments create an environment of a community which is a rare concept of cities. However, appartments are more safer and also save the time and effort of home searching in particular area.

Conclusion of this essay is that building tall apartment blocks helps to sort the issue of growing population by provide enough accommodation facilities in big cities.

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response5.5
Coherence and Cohesion5.5
Lexical Resource5.0
Grammatical Range and Accuracy5.5
Overall5.5

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The response addresses the prompt by expressing a clear position in favor of tall apartment blocks, supporting the view with arguments related to land preservation and population density. However, the development remains limited and under-developed. For instance, the mention of students living in hostels or apartments is stated without sufficient extension. While all parts of the prompt are touched upon, the ideas are repetitive and lack deep elaboration, preventing the response from achieving a higher level of task fulfillment.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The text demonstrates some basic organization, separating the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion, but there is a lack of clear overall progression. Cohesive devices are sometimes mechanical or overused, such as repetitive referencing like 'these apartments' and 'big cities' across successive sentences. Paragraphing is attempted, but the internal logical flow between sentences within paragraphs feels disjointed, leading to a choppy reading experience that restricts the response from moving to a more advanced descriptor.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is limited and minimally adequate for the task. There are noticeable errors in word choice, spelling, and word forms throughout the text, such as 'appartment' (apartment), 'residence issue' (housing issue), and 'more safer' (safer). Less common vocabulary is attempted, but inaccuracies such as 'differentiate the urban area with industrial area' cause some difficulty for the reader and prevent the lexical range from appearing natural or sufficiently flexible.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

The response shows a limited range of structures, with frequent simple sentences and attempts at complex structures that are often faulty, such as 'I agree with this statement and because high rise buildings can accommodate...' There are frequent errors in articles, prepositions, and plurals, such as 'growing population', 'rate of population', and 'govenment can facilitate more easily'. These grammatical inaccuracies occur throughout the text and frequently cause difficulty for the reader.

See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.

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