Health · Two-part direct question · Band 7
Should Schools Teach Mental Health?
The question, a model answer written to the band 7 descriptors, why it scores that band against the 4 official criteria, topic vocabulary, and a common mistake to avoid.
Two-part direct question
Should schools be required to teach students about mental health, and who is best positioned to deliver this education, teachers, specialist counsellors, or parents? Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience. Write at least 250 words.
Model answer (band 7)
Written to the band 7 descriptors, not by a real examiner. Read it for structure and language, then write your own in your own words. Examiners can tell a memorised essay from an original one.
Mental health education has long been absent from most school curricula despite the fact that many serious conditions first emerge during adolescence, and I believe schools should be required to teach it, delivered primarily by trained specialist counsellors rather than classroom teachers or parents alone.
The case for mandatory mental health education is strong. Many students experience their first symptoms of anxiety or depression during their teenage years, yet without basic education they often lack the vocabulary to recognise what they are experiencing or know where to seek help, which can delay treatment for years. Schools are uniquely positioned to reach every young person regardless of family background, unlike reliance on parents alone, which assumes a level of awareness and comfort discussing mental health that not every household has.
As for who should deliver it, specialist counsellors are better equipped than regular classroom teachers, who typically lack clinical training and may inadvertently give inaccurate or oversimplified information on a sensitive subject. A trained counsellor can also model what seeking professional help actually looks like, making the lesson itself a small, low-stakes introduction to the process rather than purely theoretical content. Parents remain important, particularly for reinforcing lessons at home and providing ongoing emotional support, but expecting every parent to independently deliver accurate mental health education is unrealistic given how unevenly accurate knowledge of mental health is distributed across different households and communities.
In conclusion, mental health education should be made a required, examined part of the school curriculum, ideally delivered by specialist counsellors working alongside, rather than instead of, supportive parents and classroom teachers.
Why this answer scores band 7
Mapped to the 4 official IELTS Writing criteria.
- Task Response: answers both parts explicitly (should it be taught, who should teach it) with distinct, well-reasoned paragraphs for each.
- Coherence and Cohesion: logical sequencing from the case for mandatory teaching to the question of who delivers it, closing with a conclusion that unifies both answers.
- Lexical Resource: accurate, sensitive vocabulary appropriate to the topic ('clinical training', 'emotional support', 'low-stakes introduction') used naturally.
- Grammatical Range and Accuracy: a wide variety of sentence structures, including concessive clauses, used with high accuracy throughout.
Useful vocabulary & collocations
Phrases used in the model answer that lift Lexical Resource naturally.
Common mistake on this type of question
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