Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Cambridge IELTS 11 · 2026-09-22

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Some people claim that not enough of the waste from homes is recycled. They say that the only way to increase recycling is for governments to make it a legal requirement.

To what extent do you think laws are needed to make people recycle more of their waste?

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

Student answer (Band 6.0)

In today's globalized world, increasing pollution is a significant problem and one of the primary reason is households waste. There is an ongoing debate over whether governments should make recycling compulsory because its the only feasible option. Despite the fact that strict laws could show subtantial improvements, I firmly concur with the notion that other measures, such as increasing awareness and providing convenient recycling facilities is a much more pragmatic approach towards waste reduction.

Social Media has long been driving force towards raising awareness in many communities. Therefore, online campaigns backed up by strong marketing might prove to show salient outcomes. One of the ways is to have compelling reasons of why recycling is imperative, which should then be repeatedly communicated to consumers. For Instance, these adds could display that recycling ensures clean street and overall reduces toxic waste from the industries which could otherwise have detrimental effects on health.

Proponents in favor of the idea also say that governments initiatives to provide convenient recycling facilities to the general public could also play an immense role in clean envoirnment. Governments could install recycling bins in every street corner or atleast in every sector and to promote recycling they could give incentives to the people who recycle frequently. For Instance, gift tokens could be given to volunteers who could help in managing recycling waste and keeping streets clean.

In a nutshell, while strict laws could be significant to mitigate street waste, I firmly believe that enforcing laws on people have many reprecursions. Therefore, a much more feasible option is to increase awareness and providing better facilities to reduce waste and increased recycling.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.0

The student addresses all parts of the prompt, exploring both sides of the issue—the potential of legal requirements versus alternative measures like raising awareness and providing facilities. A clear position is established in the introduction and maintained throughout the essay. The main ideas, such as utilizing social media campaigns and installing accessible recycling infrastructure with incentives, are relevant and extended, although the supporting examples could be slightly more fully developed. For instance, mentioning that ads could 'display that recycling ensures clean street' is a relevant point, but it remains somewhat generalized. Overall, the response fulfills the task requirements effectively, earning a solid Band 6.5 to 7.0 range, sitting comfortably at Band 6.5 for the slight under-development of supporting details.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The essay displays a logical overall progression with a clear introduction, body paragraphs addressing distinct points (awareness and facilities), and a concluding summary. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate ideas. Cohesive devices are employed, such as 'Therefore', 'One of the ways', and 'In a nutshell', though some referencing and transitions feel slightly mechanical or repetitive (e.g., starting multiple sentences or clauses similarly). The logical flow is generally maintained, but minor awkwardness in linking ideas prevents it from reaching a higher band. Overall, the structural progression is clear, making the text easy to follow and justifying a Band 6.5.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

The student demonstrates an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'globalized world', 'pragmatic approach', 'imperative', and 'detrimental effects'. However, there are several lexical and spelling inaccuracies throughout the text, including 'reason' instead of 'reasons', 'its' instead of 'it is', 'subtantial' instead of 'substantial', 'adds' instead of 'ads', 'envoirnment' instead of 'environment', and 'reprecursions' instead of 'repercussions'. While these errors do not impede overall communication, their frequency prevents the lexical score from rising into the Band 7 range, keeping it firmly at Band 6.0.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

The writer uses a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, such as concessive clauses ('Despite the fact that strict laws could show substantial improvements...') and relative clauses ('...which could otherwise have detrimental effects...'). However, there are notable grammatical and agreement errors, such as 'one of the primary reason is households waste' (should be 'reasons' and 'household waste') and subject-verb agreement issues in 'increasing awareness and providing convenient recycling facilities is' (compound subject taking a plural verb 'are'). Punctuation and article usage also show occasional errors. Because these errors occur with some frequency alongside complex structures, the writing aligns well with the Band 6 descriptor.

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

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