Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 13 · 2026-10-01

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Living in a country where you have to speak a foreign language can cause serious social problems, as well as practical problems.

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)

There is a own going debate that if we live in a foreign country we have to speak the language of the specific country and it will cause social as well as practical problems. I will totally agree with this statement because living in a foreign country can sometimes be very hard.

The main reason for this is that if we live in foreign country we have to speak foreign language and most of the time it is very difficult to speak a foreign language. Firstly, if we planned to move abroad we should learn the language of that country. For instance, if some people wants to go to Malaysia they should firstly learn the language to survive in that country. After this, they still have to face serious social problems. Furthermore, they cannot easily communicate with Malaysian people also some people can also face racism in a foreign country. For example, my brother moved to Saudi Arabia and he had severe pain in his teeth but he was unable to tell the dentist the actual problem because he was not proficient in Arabic. Some people also faces cultural differences in foreign country.

Another significant reason is that a person also have to face a lot of practical problems. If students wants to get higher education he will face sufficient hurdles due to the language. A person will face problems when he wants to get employed because a company will always give priority to locals rather than foreign employers.

To conclude, I completely believe that living in foreign country can cause serious social as well as practical problems because we have to speak a foreign language.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

The response addresses all parts of the task by taking a clear position on whether living in a foreign country and speaking a foreign language causes social and practical problems. Relevant ideas are presented, such as communication barriers, racism, and employment hurdles. However, some ideas are under-developed or inadequately supported. For instance, the example about the brother in Saudi Arabia facing a dental problem illustrates a practical communication issue, but the explanation regarding Malaysian culture and racism remains generalised and lacks sufficient elaboration. To reach a higher level, the writer needs to extend and fully develop all main points with more thorough and specific explanations or examples.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response exhibits a coherent overall arrangement with a clear stance stated in the introduction and restated in the conclusion. Paragraphing is used to separate different points, moving from social problems to practical issues. However, cohesion is sometimes faulty or mechanical, with repetitive transitional phrases like 'Another significant reason is that' and 'Furthermore'. Referencing is also occasionally unclear, such as pronoun use that lacks precise antecedent tracking. To progress further, the writer should employ a wider range of cohesive devices more flexibly and ensure smoother transitions between sentences and paragraphs without relying on formulaic connectors.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully communicating everyday ideas related to living abroad, employment, and education. There are noticeable attempts to use less common vocabulary, such as 'proficient', 'cultural differences', and 'higher education', but these are accompanied by word choice and collocation errors, such as 'own going debate' instead of 'ongoing debate'. Spelling and word-form errors occur, such as 'faces' instead of 'face' in plural contexts, though they do not impede overall communication. To achieve a higher score, the writer should incorporate a wider variety of precise lexical items and demonstrate greater control over word choice and collocations.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The writing demonstrates a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, incorporating conditional structures and relative clauses. There are some errors in grammar and punctuation, such as article omissions ('if we live in foreign country'), subject-verb agreement issues ('a person also have'), and punctuation slips. However, these errors rarely impede communication and do not obscure the writer's meaning. To move up to the next band, the writer must increase the frequency of error-free sentences while maintaining complex structures, ensuring better control over articles, prepositions within grammatical patterns, and verb forms.

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