Academic Task 2 · 291 words
Projects and examinations: combine different evidence
Give both assessment methods fair treatment before supporting a transparent combination of them.
Study the method: Discussion essays: cover both views and your opinion →
Develop the topic: Education essays: develop ideas, test their limits and use topic vocabulary →
Band 7 goal: Balanced discussion
Develop and connect relevant ideas or select and compare the most useful details. This is a study route, not an examiner score assigned to the answer. How IELTS Writing is assessed.
The question
Some teachers think students should be assessed mainly through long-term projects. Others think final examinations provide a fairer assessment. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.
The sample answer
Teachers disagree about whether long-term projects or final examinations provide a fairer basis for assessment. Projects reveal planning, research and revision over time, while examinations show what an individual can produce under common conditions. In my view, neither should dominate every subject: a transparent combination gives a broader and more defensible picture of learning.
A substantial project can test skills that do not appear in a short examination. Students must divide a complex task, locate information, respond to feedback and improve an early draft. In design or science, they may also document failed approaches and explain why the final solution changed. This process resembles many tasks outside school. However, fairness becomes difficult when students have unequal access to equipment, quiet study space or outside help. Group work can also hide individual contributions unless teachers require progress records, staged submissions and personal reflection.
Examinations place students in the same time period with limited external assistance, which can make individual comparison clearer. They are useful for checking whether foundational knowledge is available without extensive support. Yet a single sitting is vulnerable to illness, anxiety or an unusually narrow set of questions. Time pressure may reward rapid recall more than careful investigation, and it cannot show how well a learner revises work after feedback. Common conditions therefore improve one kind of fairness but do not make an examination a complete measure of ability.
In conclusion, projects should assess sustained application and examinations should verify essential individual understanding. Teachers can publish the weighting and criteria in advance, use staged project evidence and avoid allowing one final paper to erase strong work across a term. Combining independent forms of evidence is fairer than assuming that either long-term freedom or identical test conditions answer every assessment question.
Vocabulary in context
Each phrase appears in the answer above. Learn how it works, not just a replacement word.
- common conditions
- The same main rules, time and environment applied to all participants.
The phrase supports comparability but does not imply that every learner's circumstances are identical.
- staged submissions
- Parts of work handed in at planned points before the final version.
Use the phrase to show progress and authorship across a long project.
- foundational knowledge
- Core understanding needed before more advanced work can be performed.
Name the subject-specific foundation instead of using the phrase as a vague defence of testing.
Now make it your own
Design an assessment split for a practical science course. State what the project measures, what the examination checks and one fairness safeguard for each.
For a smaller practice step, use the explanation, knowledge check and self-review exercise in Develop one idea into a paragraph.
The practice link opens the original question, not a copy of this answer.
Open the writing workspaceMore examples of this question type
Explain both viewpoints fairly and give your own judgement when the question asks for it.