Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-10-23

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In some cultures, children are often told that they can achieve anything if they try hard enough. What are the advantages and disadvantages of giving children this message?

Student answer (Band 5.5)

In many cultures such as Hinduism, Sikkhism and Christians all have a same teaching but in different languages that nothing is impossible if you work hard you can achieve anything without any doubt.

There are many advantages and disadvantages of giving this message such as many student take this teaching as a mental pressure which affects them mentally and many students take this as a motivation for the upcoming hurdles in life.

Major advantages of this teaching is students can feel a sense of motivational push in their life for the problems and hurdles. This teaching can work as seed in their lives as if they will understand this at a early age then they will be capable of achieving everything without any negative and disturbing thoughts and in future they will teach this message to their children which will also enhance the lives of upcoming generation with a positive and motivational attitude.

There are many disadvantages of giving this message to children as this affects the overall well being and morale of the child by having a negative impact on their overall development. Many students feel this message as a pressure on their mind and if they do not succeed they take life causing decision and due to this the suicide cases are also growing at a ver high speed.

According to me students should feel this message as motivational push not as a mental pressure and they will realise in the future that this was the teaching that affected their life and the goal.

AI examiner evaluation

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

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You address both advantages and disadvantages and give a personal view, so the response is relevant to the question. The motivational benefit is explained through children facing future challenges, and you also identify pressure and possible harm when children do not succeed. However, these points remain broad: the claim that the message can lead to suicide is serious but is not supported with explanation or a clear link, while the advantage about passing the teaching to future generations is only briefly developed. Your position that children should treat the message as motivation rather than pressure appears mainly at the end. Develop each side with a specific example and make your overall view clearer throughout.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response has a recognisable structure: an introduction, separate paragraphs for advantages and disadvantages, and a concluding opinion. This helps the reader follow the main contrast. However, progression within paragraphs is sometimes unclear, and several ideas are joined in long sentences rather than developed in a logical sequence. For example, the advantages paragraph moves from motivation to early understanding and then to teaching future generations without explaining the links between them. The introduction also repeats the idea of the message before the body paragraphs. Use clearer topic sentences, divide complex points into shorter steps, and use referencing and linking phrases to show how each example supports the main claim.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You use relevant vocabulary for the topic, including “motivation,” “hurdles,” “mental pressure,” and “overall development,” and the reader can generally understand your intended meaning. However, the range is limited and some wording is repetitive, particularly repeated references to “teaching,” “message,” and “students.” Several choices are imprecise or unnatural, such as “a sense of motivational push,” “take life causing decision,” and “at a ver high speed.” Spelling and word-form slips, including “Sikkhism” and “ver,” also reduce accuracy. Build a more precise range for discussing resilience, expectations, and emotional wellbeing, and check collocations and spelling during revision.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt both simple and complex sentences, including conditional structures such as “if they will understand this at a early age then they will be capable…” and clauses beginning with “as.” However, complex sentences are often difficult to control, and errors in agreement, articles, sentence boundaries, and clause construction occur frequently enough to affect clarity. For example, “Major advantages … is” has a subject–verb agreement error, while the opening sentence combines several ideas without clear grammatical boundaries. “Many students feel this message as a pressure” also shows an inaccurate grammatical pattern. Practise building shorter, complete sentences first, then add subordinate clauses with accurate agreement, articles, and punctuation.

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