IELTS Speaking Test - Sample 4
Part 1 - Introduction
- How are you?
- I am good, how about you?
- May I see your proof of identification?
- Yeah sure
Family:
Q. Do you have a large family or a small family?
A. In fact, I have a large family. Both my parents are alive. My father is engaged in agriculture. My mother is a housewife. I have two elder sisters, who are working. The eldest one is married and stays with her family. The younger one is working in a restaurant as an accountant. I also have a younger brother and 3 younger sisters, who is studying in school.
Q. Can you tell me something about them?
A. Yeah sure. My father is a farmer. He is a devoted worker and possesses a great and exemplary personality. People think that he has a very controlled personality but we know that he is very kind. I am proud to have such a great father. He is my idle in my life.
My mother is an angel and she is the most kindhearted woman I have ever seen in my life. She is a very hard-working mother and my best friend. I adore her very much.
My older sister is an accountant, and I went to work with her a couple of times. She is around 28 years old and a very good friend and mentor to me.
The rest of my sister are still young, and very sweet. They help my mother often to finish her household chores. I love them very much. In our house, I am their best friend and I often help them completing her home works.
Q. How much time do you manage to spend with members of your family?
A. Whenever I am at home, I try to spend a few hours with my family. Since I have a lot to study these days, they let me alone most of the time. I usually have food together with my family. We spend some time watching television together, especially in the evenings. We also sing together.
Since I stay away from home, it is only during holidays that I can be with my family. Whenever I am at home I make it a point, to be with the members of my family. We sometimes go for a trip or eat out often. I really love being with them. I always cherish the memories of childhood, when I was always at home.
I have a very close relationship with my younger sister and my brother. We often go out together to watch movies or to do shopping. We sometimes play computer games together. On an average, I spend 5-7 hours with my family members in a typical day.
Q. What sorts of things do you like to do together?
A. There are a lot of things that we do together. One of the important things that we do as a group is to cook, especially during the weekends, when I have a lot of free time. We also do our gardening together, watering, manuring and weeding the plants. Another important activity that we do is to pray in the evenings. Apart from that, we shop together and go to the movie together.
Q. Did/Do you get on well with your family? Why?
A. Yes, obviously I go well with my family. They are the most precious things I have in my life. They care for me a lot, they help me on my difficult times and my whole existence is surrounded them. Whoever I am and whoever I become in future would be because of my family members’ love, care, and affections.
I have a strong bonding and friendly relationship with my family. They share their thought and everyday experience with me. They always try to support me no matter what and all those mutual understanding makes us a small, happy family.
Part 2 - Cue Card
Topic:
Describe a teacher who has influenced you in your education.
You should say:
- where you met him/her.
- what subject he/she taught.
- what was special about him/her
[ You will have to talk about the topic for 1 to 2 minutes. You have one minute to think about what you are going to say. You can make some notes to help you if you wish. ]
Possible Answer:
I consider myself a lucky person to have a few very good teachers throughout my college years. Among them, I'd like to talk about Mr. Pham who was an extraordinary teacher, a really good coach, and the one who has a great influence in my education.
I met Mr. Pham when I was in my third year in college and he was our English teacher. Initially, we thought that he would be a moody teacher and we would have to be very polite in front of him. This impression came mostly because of his serious face and tidy dress-up, but soon we found that he is a very friendly person and teaches us very well. He never made things complicated and tried over and over again to explain something to us. He had a unique way of teaching. Seems like he would start an interesting story and later we would find that he would relate the English to the story. Thus, everything we learned from him was interesting and that's why we remember most of the lesson he taught us. I'd say he has a great influence in my education.
Later on, he helps me with IELTS was the most interesting subject. My English speaking is getting better and then better, and that is mainly because of Mr. Pham who had a major role in making the subject interesting to me. Before I learned English from Mr. Pham, my impression on English was not good and I considered English to be a very difficult and uninteresting subject. But his teaching and influences changed my way of thinking about English and later on English became one of my favorite subjects.
Part 3 - Follow up Questions
Discussion topics:
Developments in education...
Q. How has education changed in your country in the last 10 years?
A. I live in a developing country where the education sector went through numerous changes including the government’s more fund allocation in education, more women enrollment in higher studies, changes in academic syllabus etc.
During the last 10 years, the most significant change that has happened in the education sector in my country is the people’s mentality regarding the necessity of education. Only 20-30 years back many parents showed little interest in sending their kids to school. But that has radically changed in my country and nowadays almost every parent sends their children to school. This is a giant leap in my opinion in terms of the advancement of our education. The government allocated a share portion of its budget to ensure the school infrastructure, study materials and salary of the teachers and that has been proven effective to build a solid ground to make an education nation. Only in the last 5 years, our literacy rate has almost doubled and I give a major credit to the government for ensuring free education in primary level, special scholarship and monetary rewards to women students.
I am not 100% sure about the exact statistics but my best guess would be that more than 200-300 colleges and universities have been established in the last few years. We had only 4-5 engineering university back in 2000 but we have more than 30 such educational institutions now. More importance has been given to vocational education and thus a large number of underprivileged populations have come under the vocational education system.
In a nutshell, that was a massive change and I have witnessed some of those changes in my own eyes including how public exams’ quality have been improved, how the schools are emphasizing on English and Mathematics as academic subjects and so on and on.
Q. What changes do you foresee in the next 50 years?
A. If you ask me about the type of changes that might occur in the education sector in my country in next 50 years, I would need to rely on my own past experience and predictions mostly. My best guess is that the education would be more practical than theoretical in future. Women’s participation and performance in education would excel to a great extent. More women would be in research and higher education than their male counterpart.
The education would be expensive and private education institutes would be more demanding than the public and state-owned ones. More foreign students would come to study here and the number of higher education institutes would increase by many-fold than the current number.
The digitalization and computer-based education system would replace many traditional education systems and the online education would be a very popular form during that time.
Curriculum and subject offered in the college and education level would see a dramatic increase and technology would be the most important and demanding subject in this era.
Not sure if I will be alive or not to see the changes but I hope many positive changes within the next 50 years in my country including 100% literacy rate, more engineering, and research-based education system, some of our universities are raking in the world’s best university list and we are renowned as a country of a very excellent place for education.
A national education system...
Q. How do the expectations of today’s school leavers compare with those of the previous generation?
A. Well, the school-leavers nowadays are expected to study further and get involved in a part-time job to gain practical experience. The job market is pretty competitive compared to the previous time. Getting a good job requires talent, some practical experience, good grades in school and many other criteria. The competitions in public service or Government jobs are even higher. In the past decades there were very few school graduates in my country and hence securing a job both in the public and private sector was not that tough.
The requirement is education is higher than the past. Twelve class degree is not enough to get a decent job. Recruiters are looking for candidates with prior job experiences and at least Bachelor degree. Thus the school leavers nowadays have no other option but to continue their studies. Getting a part-time job besides the study is a dream for many.
I heard from my grandfather that there were only few bachelor degree holders in his whole village while there must be more than 100 bachelor degree holders in a single community these days.
Those who leave school without completing the course have no other option but to either look after their family business or manage a job where physical labor is the only skill he/she has.
The population in my country has almost doubled in the last decade and that is pretty obvious that the completion the school leavers nowadays face is tremendous. Among the school leavers, many decide their major in college or university while other prefers vocational education. This facility was very narrow in my grandfather’s generation as I know. So I would say there is a whole lot of difference between current and past generations in terms of their opportunity; action and plan after leaving school.
Q. What role do you think extracurricular activities play in education?
A. Extracurricular activities sharpen the minds of students and enhance their creativity. Activities that require physical movements keep their body fit and thus the importance of extracurricular activities are immense. It is often experienced that kids who have the interest in sports and games outperform the others in many fields. Extracurricular activities like singing, debating, painting can be very handy in terms of career enhancement. Students who have extracurricular activities possess better leadership and social activities. Finally from my experience, I can say that such students have better knowledge about the world than students who are solely focused on academic lessons.
Different styles/ methods of teaching and learning...
Q. What method of learning works best for you?
A. I prefer to work in a pair of the complex topics and subjects. The group discussion, in particular, works best for me. When I study in a group I can discuss my views and learn opinions of others. Thus the discussion is always helpful and I can better perform in the exam and remember the details for a long.
Q. How beneficial do you think it is to group students according to their level of ability?
A. It’s always beneficial for students to make a group for study and discussion. If the group comprises students of similar caliber and talent levels, they are proven to be more helpful. Similar abilities of students in a group can be advantageous from mainly two points of views. They are more frank to participate in the discussion and they have a good understanding amongst themselves. Secondly, they understand each other better and can advise in an effective way.
If a group is formed with different levels of students, there is a chance that a really talented student would get bored with the silly discussions by the others while a dull student among really talented group mates would not dare to opine whenever s/he likes.
Part 3: Detailed Discussion:
Q. How has education changed in your country in the last 10 years?
Answer: The truth is that ten years ago the educational system wasn't the same as it is now and many aspects have changes in our education system. In the past years, teachers used conventional methods to transfer information and knowledge to their students and the only means they utilized was blackboards.
Furthermore, as far as I'm concerned, schoolmasters paid more attention to their student's weaknesses, problems and needs and the bonds between them were stronger than nowadays. Moving to the present, the existing ties between teachers and children have become more impersonal and unfortunately many teachers willingly keep a distance from students in the classroom. In addition, technological advances play a vital role in teaching and the methods used before are now obsolete.
To conclude, in my opinion, I prefer the educational system as it was 10 years ago than it is now because this isn't only the internet that makes someone literate, but teachers and strong bonding between a teacher and a student do.
Q. What changes do you foresee in the next 50 years?
Answer: It seems to me that in the forthcoming future the changes will be tremendous. First of all, it won't be necessary for teachers to be present in the classroom as everything is going to be accomplished by the usage of technology. For example, students will become knowledgeable about different matters from the comfort of their home and they will correspond with their tutors rather than having personal relationships. Of course, it still happens these days to a certain extent, but in the next 50 years, I believe that this will be the way of teaching exclusively. Going further, I think that apart from some basic and necessary subjects such as literature and mathematics, all of the other will be optional and each child will have the opportunity to choose the subject they want to be taught even when at primary school. From my point of view, I cannot say for sure if this is the appropriate course of action, but one thing is clear; if this happens the disadvantages will be inevitable.
Q. How do the expectations of today’s school leavers compare with those of the previous generation?
Answer: When someone completed school in the past, they just hoped to find a job in order to earn a salary and cover their living expenses. Many, in the past, did not even look for jobs and continued their family business. They didn't have as high expectations as present school leavers have these days.
In many cases, nowadays school-leavers don't have realistic expectations and they expect a high position with high income, even without professional experience. Furthermore, these days knowledge isn't the only element required for a good job as skills, experience, passion about work, learning, discipline and adaptability to name but a few, are the prerequisite in order for someone to enter the labor market. That, however, was not the case in the past.
Q. What role do you think extracurricular activities play in education?
Answer: It is commonly believed that extracurricular activities play an important role in education and have many benefits both in personal and professional life. I quite agree with that as those activities enhance someone’s capability and improve the way of thinking. First of all, children with extracurricular activities learn how to collaborate and co-exists with other peers and learn about soft skills and values. In addition, a great opportunity is provided to them to interrelate with others and develop and evolve their interpersonal skills. Hence, these types of activities can create a feeling of contribution, as children are involved in different things and this will lead them to boost their self-esteem. Lastly, all these advantages will help children to build a well-rounded personality and an exceptional character and will benefit the school and teachers by having well-mannered and conscious students.
No comments:
Post a Comment