Once children start school, teachers have more influence on their intellectual and social development than parents. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
Sample Response
I definitely agree with the statement that once children start schoolget admission to school, teachers have a greater impact on them than their parents domore impact on them than even their parents. In the following paragraphs, I intend to present my argumentsput forth my arguments in support of my view.
To begin with, children spend focused learning time with teachersquality time with teachers. Although they spend more time with parents at home, this timeat home this time is not as productive as the limited timethe small amount of time spent with teachers. We all know that parents are busy with work most of the timebusy with their work most of the time and even when their children are aroundeven if children are around, they hardly pay any attention to them. Teachers, on the other hand, are at school to support the studentsare in school for the students. They spend their time eitherAll the time they are either teaching the students or guiding them in extra-curricular activities. They keep children focused on their studiesfocussed on study and as a result have a greater intellectual impactmore intellectual impact on them.
What is more, teachers are role models for students. They are scholars in action. They not only influence intellectually but socially. Students inadvertently imitatefollow their teachers’ behavior too. They observe how the teacher walks, talks, and tackles difficult situations. At home, they have parents to guide them socially, but it is seen that in nuclear families, parents hardly find time for this. Whatever social skills children learn are from TV or other activities they do at home.
Teachers also guide students in choosing their future careersguide students for their future careers. Students follow teachers more than parents because they feel that teachers are more aware of the world around them and they have a greater ability to guide thembetter capability of guiding them. So, they depend on teachers more than parents.
To put it in a nutshell, I pen down saying that, once schooling startsonce the schooling starts, teachers and parents both have an influenceteachers and parents both have influence but teachers influence children more.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response maintains a clear position and offers a logical set of reasons for teachers’ stronger influence, with generally understandable progression throughout. Its main limitation is that several claims about parents are sweeping and the supporting analysis remains fairly general, while some phrasing is unnatural. The highest priority is to develop each argument with more balanced, specific reasoning or examples and express comparisons in more precise, idiomatic language.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
A clear agreement position is supported by several relevant reasons, though development is general and sometimes overgeneralized.
Support each reason with a specific, balanced example that explains exactly how teachers’ influence exceeds that of parents.
Coherence and Cohesion
The response follows a logical paragraph structure, but some transitions are mechanical and the career paragraph is underdeveloped.
Give each body paragraph a fully developed central idea and use referencing to connect sentences more smoothly.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is adequate and sometimes varied, but several collocations such as ‘get admission to school’ and ‘guide students for their future careers’ are unnatural.
Use more precise, idiomatic collocations for schooling, parental involvement, and career guidance.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A mix of simple and complex sentences communicates meaning clearly despite recurring punctuation and construction errors.
Review clause boundaries, comma use, and comparative sentence structures to improve grammatical control.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Once children start school, teachers have more influence on their intellectual and social development than parents. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.