Task 2 · Opinion (agree or disagree) · Family
Whether parents or schools answer for bad behaviour
An agree-or-disagree essay on who is accountable for how children behave, where the band 9 answer separates who caused the problem from who can actually fix it.
The question
You should spend about 40 minutes on this task. Write about the following topic. Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience. Write at least 250 words.
When children behave badly, some people believe that their parents rather than their schools should be held responsible. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
A 250-word discursive essay — the half of the paper that carries two thirds of the marks. This prompt is original, written in the standard format for teaching purposes — it is not taken from any past paper.
What separates the three answers
All three agree that parents matter more. Only the band 9 notices that assigning blame correctly and putting the remedy in the right hands are two different tasks, and that this question quietly confuses them.
The three answers
Band 6.5
265 words (the task asks for at least 250)The answer works. It addresses the task, the reader follows it, and the meaning survives — but ideas stay general, linking is mechanical, wording repeats, and small errors are visible throughout.
The answer
It is often seen that some children are behaving very badly in the school1 and in the public places. Some people are thinking that the parents should be blamed for this and not the school. I agree with this opinion mostly, but I think the schools have also some responsibility.2
Firstly, the parents are the first teachers of the child. The child is spending the maximum time at home, especially in the early years, and he is learning everything from his parents. If the parents are not giving proper attention and they are always busy in their work, the child will not learn the good manners3. Moreover, if the parents themself are rude with the other people4, the child will copy them. So the basic values are coming from the family and not from the school.
Secondly, the school also has a role. The teachers are spending many hours with the students and they can correct the bad behaviour. But the teachers have thirty or forty students in one class, so it is very difficult for them to give the individual attention to everybody. Also the teachers are getting the students only for the few hours in a day, and after that the child is going back to the home. So we can not blame the school completely.5
In conclusion, I mostly agree that the parents are responsible for the bad behaviour of their children, because the child is learning the first lessons at home, but the school should also try to help the parents in this matter, so both of them should work together.
What an examiner notices
1. Grammatical range and accuracy
“It is often seen that some children are behaving very badly in the school”
A general truth in the present continuous, plus an article before an institution used generically. The tense choice then runs through the whole essay.
2. Task response
“I agree with this opinion mostly, but I think the schools have also some responsibility.”
The qualification is never quantified, and the conclusion widens it further instead of resolving it, so 'to what extent' goes unanswered.
3. Lexical resource
“the child will not learn the good manners”
Every noun in the essay has one adjective permanently attached to it. 'Behaviour' is always 'bad', 'manners' always 'good', 'attention' always 'proper'.
4. Grammatical range and accuracy
“if the parents themself are rude with the other people”
The reflexive is singular where the subject is plural, and 'rude with' takes the wrong preposition.
5. Coherence and cohesion
“So we can not blame the school completely.”
A three-sentence paragraph closed by a conclusion that its own content does not support. Nothing in it has argued for partial blame, only for difficulty.
One honest caveat
Band labels here describe what each piece of writing demonstrates against the four published assessment areas, paraphrased in plain language. They are teaching illustrations produced for this site, not official material, and no sample has been marked by a test provider. Real scripts are marked whole; two answers with the same label can still look quite different from each other, and nothing on this page can promise anyone a particular result.
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