Though we learn many valuable things from our teachers, friends, colleagues and relatives, parents are still our best teachers in our life. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?
Sample Response
It is obvious that parents play a huge role in children's lives. Generally, most childrenmost of the children start their lives with their parents and thus learnlearning basic things from them. It is our father and mother who teach us how to communicate with others, how to speak and how to behave. I believe that parents influence the future of children in so many ways.
First of all, we not only receive physical traits from our parents but also acquirebut also we get their habits and manners. Sometimes, we do not even realise that we are copying the behaviours of our parents. For example, my mother has brought me up to value timevalue the time. She told me to arrive at school on timeget on time to school and to submit mythe homework in a timely manner. She also encouraged me to prepare in advance. She set a good example for meshowed a good example to me. She prepared everything beforehand and she was never latehas never been late to her work or any social events. She was praised by families and friends for being punctual and I wanted to be like her. Examples set by parents shape the way their children are.
In addition, parents are the ones with whomparents are the one whom children spendthe children spent most of their time with. Numerous studies have proven that the young age, between the ages of three to five, when children start learning is an important period. At anthe early age, children tend to learn and memorise what their parents dowhat parents do and they accept it as the right thing to do in their lives as well. For instance, the first words of athe toddler who lives with parentshas to live with the parents who usually swear will be the abusive words. Children who live with parents who smokeThe children who have to live the smoking parents are more likely to smoke during adolescenceat teenage.
To conclude, the parents are the driving force in their children's livesdriving force and steer the children's lives. Parents are the most responsible persons of what a child would grow up to be.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The essay maintains a clear favourable view of parental influence and develops it through relevant examples of punctuality and early imitation. Its main limitation is frequent grammatical and collocational inaccuracy, which makes some points awkward despite remaining understandable, while the claim that parents are the best teachers could be addressed more directly. Prioritise sharper comparison with other influences and careful sentence-level editing.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The response presents a consistent position and develops two relevant reasons with examples, though it focuses more on parental influence than on why parents are the best teachers.
Compare parents explicitly with teachers, friends, or colleagues to demonstrate why parental teaching is more influential.
Coherence and Cohesion
The essay follows a logical introduction-body-conclusion structure, and each body paragraph develops a distinct aspect of parental influence.
Condense repetitive details in the punctuality example and make the main point of the early-childhood paragraph more direct.
Lexical Resource
There is adequate range for discussing upbringing, behaviour, and influence, but frequent inaccurate collocations reduce precision.
Use natural phrases such as “value time,” “arrive at school on time,” “grow up with parents who smoke,” and “smoke as teenagers.”
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The response uses both simple and complex structures, but frequent errors in agreement, tense, articles, prepositions, and clause formation reduce control.
Focus on complete verb structures and agreement, especially in sentences describing what children learn and who they spend time with.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Though we learn many valuable things from our teachers, friends, colleagues and relatives, parents are still our best teachers in our life. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.