CELPIP Writing Task 2 is Responding to Survey Questions. You get 26 minutes, you choose one of two options, and you explain your reasoning in roughly 150 to 200 words. It is not an email, so it needs no Dear Sir or Madam, no closing phrase, and no signature.
Typical prompts involve community facilities, company policy, school arrangements, transport, housing, or public services — two options that both sound reasonable, and you have to commit.
Does picking the “right” side help?
No. The official criteria assess the quality of your response, not whether the rater agrees with you. Option A and Option B can both earn a high level.
So in the test, choose the side for which concrete reasons and examples come to you fastest — not the side you guess is more socially acceptable. If your honest position is A but B is easier to develop, write B.
Plan the position, then the reasons
Before writing, fix your position in one sentence, then list two or three reasons that are actually different from one another. A good reason can keep answering “why?” and “what happens as a result?”
Take a prompt asking whether a plot of land should become a larger car park or a community garden. Writing that the garden is better, healthier, and greener looks like three reasons but is really one. Split them properly: resident health, community interaction, and long-term value of the land — then add a specific scenario to each.
More ideas is not better. Two fully developed reasons are usually more persuasive than five reasons with one sentence each.
Open by committing
State your position immediately. Summarise the issue briefly in your own words and then be explicit: Although both proposals have benefits, I strongly support…
Avoid a long background introduction, and never endorse both options in the opening — a blurred position damages Task Fulfillment. You can paraphrase what the prompt gave you, but copying large chunks of it demonstrates nothing about your English.
One reason per paragraph
Give each body paragraph a topic sentence, an explanation of why that reason matters, and then an example, a consequence, or a comparison.
Suppose you support letting employees work from home. Say it reduces commuting time; explain that the recovered hours go into work or family care; then show it — an employee living far from the office saves an hour every day. That gives raters far more to assess than Remote work is convenient because it is very convenient.
Compare, but stay on your side
Comparison strengthens persuasion, but you do not owe the other option equal time. Your job is to support your choice. One or two sentences pointing out a limitation of the alternative — higher cost, fewer beneficiaries, longer implementation — and then straight back to your position.
Do not attack the other side, and do not invent a third option to escape the choice. Proposing something outside the two options can read as not completing the task.
Close without opening something new
One or two sentences that restate the core reason and the choice are enough. A good ending can point out that your option not only solves the immediate problem but produces some longer-term effect. What it must not do is introduce a brand-new main idea in the final line.
Language: accurate and natural
Use because, therefore, as a result, in contrast, and for example where the logic genuinely calls for them — but do not mechanically open every paragraph with Firstly, Secondly, Thirdly.
Conditional clauses, relative clauses, and varied sentence length do show grammatical range, but only when you can keep them accurate. A rare word used wrongly reduces precision; a common word used naturally is more reliable.
The recurring mistakes
- No clear choice, or a choice that shifts halfway through.
- Reasons that repeat one another in different words.
- Listing opinions without explaining any of them.
- Spending many words restating the background.
- Writing the survey response as an email.
- Landing clearly outside 150 to 200 words.
- Adding irrelevant content purely to fill a template.
When you check, ask three questions before you look at grammar: can a reader see my choice in the first two sentences? does every reason have specific support? does the whole response stay on one position?
How to practise
Pick one two-option question from ordinary life each day. Spend four minutes on an outline — position, reason 1, reason 2, details — then write against the clock.
Afterwards, do not only run a grammar tool over your sentences. Judge whether the reasons were genuinely different, whether the examples supported the claims, and whether the tone suited a public survey. Task 2 is not an academic essay; it is a short, organised, persuasive answer written for a general reader under time pressure.
FAQs
Is one option safer than the other? No. Both can score at the top. Choose the one you can develop.
Do I need a greeting or signature? No — Task 2 is not an email.
How many reasons? Two or three that are genuinely different, each with real support.
Next, read how Task 2 is scored and the CELPIP Writing format overview.