Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 12 · 2026-10-02

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 5.5)

Nowdays, numerous tourits are exploring to sites where situations are challenging, such as the Sahara desert and Antarctic. Although such places have many benefits like, give knowledge about that area and they get an apportunities to enjoy and spend time with thier loved ones but they also have some drawbacks, these places can be expensive to visit and sometime thier enviornment may not be good which i will explain this in upcoming paragraphs.

One major benefit is that, poeple can expierence different from thier own regeion's life.For instance, they can visit Sahara desert to enjoy heat waves, landscape and Antactic to see distnict wildlife. These kind of places helps people to enhance their knowledge and also they can spend time with thier family member and friends. Furthermore, traveling to such places give indivisual to break from thier busy scedule and they reduce their stress as well. In additiom, when tourists visit a country, they spend money there, which helps local people and businesses earn more income.

However, travelling to these places can be dangerous becuase their weather is sometime too cold and too hot which impacts on person's health and can be the reason of accident whwen is thier snowtime. Apart from this, such places are very costly to visit because they have to pay for accomodation, transport , restaurants as well.

In conclusion, by visting to places like Sahara and Antarctic poeple can get new experience and learn alot about them but these locations can be dangerous, costly and can create health issues. Therefore, people should enjoy to visting them but also they have to pay the attention to thier enviornment.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

The response addresses all parts of the task by discussing both the benefits and disadvantages of visiting challenging tourist destinations like the Sahara Desert and the Antarctic. The position is clear throughout, and relevant ideas are presented, such as gaining knowledge, experiencing a break from routine, economic benefits for locals, and the risks of extreme weather and high costs. However, some ideas remain under-developed or briefly stated without sufficient elaboration. For instance, the point regarding local businesses earning income is introduced in the second paragraph but not expanded upon. Similarly, the health impacts and safety hazards mentioned in the third paragraph could benefit from further explanation or concrete examples. To reach a higher level, the writer needs to fully extend and support all main ideas with more thorough explanations and specific illustrations rather than relying on general statements.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.5

The response demonstrates a coherent overall arrangement with a clear, logical progression of ideas from the introduction to the body paragraphs and the conclusion. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate distinct points, with the introduction outlining the scope, the second paragraph focusing on benefits, the third on disadvantages, and the final paragraph summarising the discussion. Cohesive devices are employed to connect sentences and ideas, such as 'One major benefit', 'Furthermore', and 'However'. However, bridging the gap to a higher band requires more fluid and varied cohesive links, as some referencing is slightly mechanical or repetitive, and transitional phrases could be used more flexibly to enhance the overall flow between complex ideas.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is adequate for the task, allowing the writer to communicate main ideas about extreme tourism, weather conditions, and financial costs. The writer attempts some less common vocabulary, such as 'challenging', 'distinct wildlife', and 'accommodation', but there are noticeable errors in word choice, word form, and spelling throughout the text. Examples include spelling errors like 'tourits', 'apportunities', 'thier', 'enviornment', 'poeple', 'expierence', 'regeion', 'indivisual', 'scedule', 'additiom', 'becuase', 'whwen', and 'visting'. Additionally, awkward phrasing such as 'enjoy heat waves' and 'give indivisual to break' indicates limitations in lexical control and collocation. These errors do not completely impede communication, but they restrict the score, and lifting this criterion requires a wider, more precise range of vocabulary with accurate spelling and natural collocations.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, including conditional and relative clauses, such as 'Although such places have many benefits... but they also have some drawbacks' and 'when tourists visit a country, they spend money there'. However, the range of structures is limited, and attempts at complex sentences frequently feature grammatical inaccuracies. There are frequent errors in verb forms, article usage, singular/plural agreement, and punctuation, such as 'tourists are exploring to sites', 'give knowledge', 'these kind of places helps', 'impacts on person's health', and unnecessary comma splices like 'life.For instance' and 'transport , restaurants'. While communication is rarely impeded, these recurring errors place the writing firmly in this band. Achieving a higher score requires a wider variety of complex structures with greater grammatical control and significantly fewer errors.

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