Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 12 · 2026-09-22
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
Today more and more tourists are visiting places where conditions are difficult, such as the Sahara desert or the Antarctic.
What are the benefits and disadvantages for tourists who visit such places?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Student answer (Band 6.5)
benefit: expanding knowledge/ experience
disadv: could harm their health /death/ mount everest
Tourism is becoming popular nowadays. More and more people like to visit challenging places to visit once in their lifetime. This trend has both sides and tourists have both advantages and disadvantages of tourism.
The main benefit of visit difficult places is that people can challenge their capabilities and gain valuable experience along the way. For example, whenever individuals visited places such as Sahara dessert or Amazon Forests, they came with new discoveries of the available resources, tribes etc. Moreover, these tourist places add valuable experiences in their life which they can remember and share with next generations. As a result, visiting challenging places lead to new discoveries in the world and provide experiences to remember forever.
On the other side, there could be disadvantages of this trend. Visting places which are more challenging for human body may lead to death because it is possible that human body could not bear the temperature of particular place. For example, Mount Everest is highest peak in the world and thousands of climbers climb it every year. Unfortunately, hundreds of human bodies are buried under the snow due to the low oxygen level, avalanche or extreme cold weather. As a result, challenging yourself in diffuclt places or weather could lead to loss of lives.
In Conclusion, exploring new places may be fun and valuable memory for people whereas it could be dangerous for them. Hence, people should be aware about the conditions of tourist places beforhand and they should be mentally and physically prepared for it.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 7.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 7.0 |
| Lexical Resource | 6.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 6.0 |
| Overall | 6.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 7.0
The response addresses all parts of the task by discussing both the benefits and disadvantages of tourists visiting difficult locations such as the Sahara desert and Mount Everest. The position is clear throughout the text, and the main ideas are extended and supported with relevant examples, such as exploring resources and tribes in the Amazon and the fatal risks of climbing Mount Everest. While some ideas could be slightly more elaborated to reach the highest bands, the content successfully covers the prompt requirements and fulfills the task appropriately, aligning well with the Band 7 descriptors.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 7.0
The essay displays clear logical organisation and progression throughout. Each paragraph has a distinct focus, moving from an introduction to body paragraphs handling benefits and disadvantages respectively, and finishing with a logical conclusion. Cohesive devices are used adequately, such as 'Moreover', 'As a result', and 'On the other side', though some transitions feel slightly mechanical. Paragraphing is used sufficiently and appropriately, which ensures that the overall arrangement remains coherent and easy to follow, making a Band 6.5 or 7.0 appropriate.
Lexical Resource — Band 6.0
The student demonstrates an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'capabilities', 'discoveries', 'avalanche', and 'preparations'. There are some instances of inaccurate word choice or minor lexical errors, such as 'Visting' instead of 'Visiting' and 'beoforhand' (spelling slip), as well as phrasing like 'benefit of visit difficult places'. However, these vocabulary errors do not impede communication, and the overall lexical resource is sufficient for a Band 6.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0
The response incorporates a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, demonstrating some control over grammar with complex structures like 'Whenever individuals visited places such as Sahara dessert or Amazon Forests, they came with new discoveries...'. However, there are noticeable grammatical errors and awkward phrasing sprinkled throughout the text, such as 'visiting challenging places lead to' (subject-verb agreement), 'Sahara dessert' (spelling/capitalisation), and 'be aware about' (preposition error). These errors do not impede communication, placing the response solidly in the Band 6 category.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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