Speaking. Independent Speaking Task
Hey everyone, hope you're doing well.
So, Speaking! Here we go.
The first speaking task is the Independent Speaking Question.This question asks you express and defend a personal choice from a given category. For example, important people, places, events or activities and etc. It's my favorite question, because you can talk here about everything! Really. Any question (I mean any answer) you can connect to your favorite topics. How to do it - I'll explain a bit later.
For now, let's see how usually questions start:
- What do you think about...
- Talk about...
- Describe your favorite...
- What is your favorite...
By and large, they ask about a person, place, object, event which is familiar to you. And, I'll repeat myself that you have only 15 seconds for preparation and 45 seconds for response. You don't have time to write your answer. Use this time (15 sec) for creating a structure for your response. Let's deep into it.
Answering this type of question you need to describe an object, an event or a person and explain why the event was important, the person is great, the object is interesting, etc. For a high score you want to provide 2-3 reasons in your answer. And, you have to provide details and examples. Here how I'd use my 15 sec of preparation:
The task: What is your favorite [insertanyobjecthere]? Describe it and explain why it is your favorite [yourobject].
My notes:
Object name. Description. Place I discovered it.
Reason 1 - it is interesting, because ... An example.
Reason 2 - it is useful, because ... A detail of how I used it.
Conclusion: Reason 1 + Reason 2 = my favorite object.
This is just a structure for my answer for a Speaking question 1 or 2. Depends on your language speed you can shape the answer. I mean, if you speak quickly - you have an advantage to add a Reason 3, or more details and examples, or make very strong conclusion. If you speak slowly - you can have only 2 reasons, and only 1 example and detail per each reason. You can even skip the conclusion. It's nice to have it, but it won't affect your score if you skip it but well elaborate all reasons and provide examples.
Common mistakes: 1) spending a lot of your time on the reason 1 and skipping the reason 2 and 3; 2) missing structure. You can talk about anything you want, but you must provide reasons and details; 3) skipping examples of real-life experience. It doesn't matter how real it is, but you have to connect the object with your life; 4) missing description. You can name your favorite object as you want. However, if you say something like Mumuka, then you should clarify what it is: a name, a title, amulet, a street, a river, etc.
If you have a heavy accent, I'd suggest to speak slow and clear. Delivery is very important. Do not repeat your self. Do not swallow. The bad thing is that you don't notice when you swallow the sounds or words. Practice with recording yourself. Your accent won't affect your score. However a bad (dirty) speech delivery will.











