Band 4.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 4.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-09-15
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
Doctors tell us that we can get all the vitamins we need from having a healthy diet. Despite this advice, some people continue to spend large sums of money on vitamin pills.
Why do you think some people spend a lot of money on vitamin pills?
How could people be persuaded to improve their diet instead of buying vitamin pills?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Student answer (Band 4.5)
Nowadays, there is an increase in trend of consumption of artificial vitamin pills. while doctors advices people to eat a balanced meal to get the required nutrition whereas some people spends a lot of money on supplements to fulfill the requirment of vitamins in their bodies. In my opinion, artificial supplements provides health benefits to the people but for long-term well being it is necessary to consume heatlthy natural foods.
Proponents, believe that due to busy schedules it is hard to meet daily dietary requirment through food. Long working hours of office and hectic routines have made it difficult to have a balanced people. Most people rely on processed foods for their daily nutrition. Thats why, to overcome the deficiencies they have to take artificial vitamin pills.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 4.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.0 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 4.0 |
| Overall | 4.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 4.0
The response is severely under-length, containing only 127 words compared to the minimum requirement of 250 words. This significantly impacts task achievement as the ideas cannot be fully developed. Furthermore, while the student partially attempts to explain why some people spend money on vitamin pills by mentioning busy schedules and lack of balanced meals, the second part of the prompt—how people could be persuaded to improve their diet instead—is entirely neglected. Phrases like 'Proponents, believe that due to busy schedules' show some awareness of the task topic, but the severe lack of length and failure to address all prompt requirements restrict the score to a Band 4.0.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.0
The text is divided into two short paragraphs, but the overall organization is basic. The student attempts to use transitional phrases and link ideas, such as 'whereas', 'Thats why', and 'In my opinion', but some cohesive devices are used inaccurately or mechanically, like the abrupt comma splice in 'Proponents, believe'. Paragraphing is visibly underdeveloped due to the overall short length of the text, and there is no clear progression of argument addressing both questions in the prompt. Referencing and logical sequencing require significant improvement to achieve a higher band. Overall, the structural coherence is weak, placing it at a Band 5.0.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.0
The student demonstrates a limited and basic range of vocabulary that is minimally adequate for the task. There are several noticeable word choice and spelling errors throughout the response, such as 'advices' instead of 'advice', 'requirment' instead of 'requirement', and 'heatlthy' instead of 'healthy'. While the student attempts some topic-related vocabulary like 'artificial vitamin pills', 'nutrition', and 'dietary', the frequent spelling mistakes and simple lexical choices cause some distraction for the reader and prevent the vocabulary from reaching a higher level. Therefore, a Band 5.0 is appropriate.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 4.0
The student attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, such as 'while doctors advices people to eat a balanced meal... whereas some people spends a lot of money...'. However, this sentence exhibits severe grammatical inaccuracies and poor structural control, including subject-verb agreement errors ('doctors advices', 'people spends', 'supplements provides') and punctuation issues. Errors are frequent throughout the short text, and although communication is not completely obscured, the high density of basic grammatical slips limits the score to a Band 4.0.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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