Band 5.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.0 · Cambridge IELTS 16 · 2026-09-16

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Plastic bags, plastic bottles and plastic packaging are bad for the environment.

What damage does plastic do to the environment?

What can be done by governments and individuals to solve this problem?

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

 

Student answer (Band 5.0)

Undoubt, plastic bags , plastic bottles and plastic packiging are bad for the enviorment. In my country people use plastic thing which cause pollution. I will discusss reason and some challanges to overcome. I discuss both advantage and advantage. There is a lot of disadvantage but advantage are less. To begin with advantage some people believe that plastic bags , plastic bottles and plastic packaging are good for the enviorment beacause it is easy and cheap. Some people buy vegetabels shopkeepers use plastic bags because it is easy available in the market. Turning to other side of argument, to be more precise. Firstly the main advantage is that plastics things spread many diseases. It causes air pollution in my country. It damages the lung and cause breathing problem and cause severe cancer. Cancer means the uncontrolled division cell. It usually attacked easily on old peoples and animals. Another issue is that plastic things cause air pollution. In my country people use much plastics things such as they drink water in plastic bottles and eat foods in plastic packaging. In my country people burn plastic bottles ,bags which damages the enviorment and cause many serious disorders. I think government and individuals to solve this problem. Government and individuals spread awarness about this situation on social media and news channels. These things can decreasing the plastics items. In the year 2026 government banned plastics things in my country and government says that people use cloth bags instead of plastic bags. I think clothes bags are better because these things not spread pollutoin.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.0

The response addresses all parts of the task by discussing the environmental damage caused by plastics, as well as potential solutions involving governments and individuals. However, the development of ideas is hampered by confusion in the introduction and body paragraphs, where the student mistakenly claims to discuss advantages and disadvantages despite the prompt asking about damage and solutions. For example, the writer states, 'I discuss both advantage and advantage. There is a lot of disadvantage but advantage are less.' This creates some irrelevance and confusion regarding the core prompt. Despite these structural misunderstandings, the core requirements of addressing the two direct questions are met. Ideas such as air pollution, health issues, and government bans in 2026 are presented, though they remain somewhat basic and under-developed. Because the content partially drifts into an irrelevant debate about advantages and disadvantages before returning to the main task, this performance aligns with the Band 5 descriptors.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.0

The essay displays some overall organization with attempts to use basic cohesive devices such as 'To begin with', 'Turning to other side of argument', and 'Firstly'. However, cohesion is frequently mechanical, inaccurate, or confusing. For instance, the transition 'Turning to other side of argument, to be more precise' is misused and interrupts the logical progression. Paragraphing is attempted, but the grouping of ideas is erratic; the advantages and disadvantages are jumbled together awkwardly in a single block of text before moving to solutions. Referencing is sometimes unclear, and the mechanical repetition of phrases like 'In my country' creates a stilted flow. There is a lack of clear overall progression between the ideas, leading to a score of 4.5, which rounds to 5.0 based on standard half-band increments representing a performance that sits between Band 4 and Band 5.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is basic and repetitive, with frequent spelling and word-choice errors that occasionally strain the reader. Examples of spelling errors include 'Undoubt' instead of 'Undoubtedly', 'packiging' instead of 'packaging', 'enviorment' instead of 'environment', 'discusss' instead of 'discuss', 'vegantabels' instead of 'vegetables', and 'awarness' instead of 'awareness'. The student attempts some less common vocabulary, such as 'uncontrolled division cell' and 'severe cancer', but these are executed with inaccuracies in collocation and grammar. The range of vocabulary is minimally adequate to convey basic ideas about pollution and health, but frequent lexical lapses place this response firmly in the Band 4.5 to 5.0 range.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 4.0

The writer uses a very limited range of grammatical structures, relying heavily on simple sentences and basic subject-verb patterns. Attempts at complex sentences are frequently faulty, such as 'Some people buy vegetabels shopkeepers use plastic bags because it is easy available in the market' (run-on sentence with missing prepositions) and 'Government and individuals spread awarness about this situation on social media and news channels. These things can decreasing the plastics items.' Grammatical errors are very frequent throughout the text, including tense inconsistencies, missing plural markers ('old peoples', 'plastics things'), and incorrect verb forms ('can decreasing'). While simple sentences are occasionally accurate, errors occur in almost every sentence and frequently cause difficulty for the reader, matching the Band 4 descriptors.

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