Hi, it's Saskia and I'm here
with Chris from IELTS Daily. Hi Saskia! Hi Chris! Are you ready for a part two? A very difficult question in part two. We've already seen you answer a really great question, but today we're going to focus on one particular question. Okay. Are you ready? Yes. Shall we all begin? Let's go! Right, guys. We've got Saskia here with us and on her table she will have a piece of paper just like in the test. On that piece of paper, there is a question. Today's question Saskia, turn it over. You will see the question. Describe the time you saw a child behaving badly in public. You should say where you were, what the child was doing, how other people reacted and explain how you felt about this. You have one minute to prepare your answer. Off you go. In this question, you could think about different children who you may have seen. You may want to invent a student. You may want to invent a situation where you were in a shopping mall or you might have been at a fairground or a fun fair and you saw a child maybe throwing a tantrum or having a hissy fit. These are two good collocations that you might have in the test and this could be a completely invented or fictional situation because this is a really hard question as I'm sure you will agree. This is a real or recent question that's come up in the test. So, it might be something that comes up again in your test. I would really struggle if I had this one in the test. So, let's see how Saskia is going to do. She's got 10 seconds left of her time and I'll tell her when she is ready to go. OK. That's one minute. Saskia. I don't know about you but I think this question is really really hard. What are your thoughts? It is definitely not the easiest question I've seen. Great. So in the test, you've got between one and two minutes to answer this question. Your time starts now! So, a time that I saw a child behaving badly in public was actually last week. I was in the supermarket with my friends and we were in the biscuit aisle and there was this little kid with her mom and she was throwing the biggest tantrum because she wanted, I think, it was a pack of Tim Tams. And her mom was just like, "No, you've got enough" or something to that effect and her mom... she would have been about maybe five years old. Her mum was carrying another child so she was you know, she was busy and all. It was really hectic for her. So you couldn't, she couldn't really handle you know... one child crying and then this other kid that she was carrying Because the thing with children is, when one child starts crying the other one just takes it as a queue to start crying themselves. But, I mean, I just could tell how stressed out this mom was and I couldn't help but feel bad for her. But this kid was really loud so she was just crying and then she was just jumping around and throwing things onto the floor and really having a hissy fit. And everybody in the aisle and just... It was a crowded supermarket. It was like a Sunday afternoon, everyone's really you know busy going about their day and this kid just blowing her top off. But, I mean, obviously I could tell that everybody around us was just feeling really bad for this mom but there's nothing that you can do. You know, the truth is, parents are trying their hardest. And when it comes to five-year-old's, they're just... everyone's stressed out. They're tired , they're sleep deprived and you know sometimes there's nothing you can do but just let a child yell their guts out until you know they've calmed down for a bit. Thanks, Saskia. That was one minute and fifty seconds. Now, you had an incredible amount of language there and I would say that you spoke really really fluently and this is something that all students should be aware of in a test. When it comes to fluency and coherence, people have to speak naturally. Tell me what were your thoughts on how you performed in terms of fluency. I don't think I performed too badly, but I did feel like because this was a harder question it was natural for me to get a little tongue-tied here and there but I think that's natural for everyone under exam conditions. Yeah, I totally agree and I think what was great about your speech was that you realized that you hadn't spoken for over one minute yet and so you started to kind of talk off topic or off tangent and you spoke about the responsibilities of parents and how difficult it must be for parents. Was that a conscious decision? Not entirely, but, I did realize that you know maybe I hadn't been speaking for long enough because I could tell that you know you were still expecting more and that's always a good cue to take from your examiner and read their body language and see how they respond to what you're saying. Yeah. Let's talk a little bit about some of your incredible language. "And we were in the biscuit aisle" Now, the word "aisle" is notoriously difficult for people to pronounce. Why do you think that is? Well, it's got a lot of silent letters that aren't really pronounced when you say it. That's right and the middle S can be really tricky for people. Where else would you find an aisle? An aisle like an island? Not necessarily an island but this word like You mean the word a-i-s-l-e? Yes. Aisle... Aisle in a plane. right? That's the middle of it. The first thing that comes to my mind is the aisle on a plane. So if when you're boarding a plane they might ask you do you want a window or an aisle seat. Exactly. I love the fact that you gave a story and you said "Her mum was like". Now, this idea of the word "like", you probably don't realize that you use it but in this case, "Her mum was like",
what does that mean? It just sort of describes the reaction that her mother was having. Excellent! So, it talks about a reaction or it could be something that somebody says. So, if I say to you and she was like "wow". What does that mean? She said wow. Yeah.
and if I said she was like "Oh my God" what does that mean? It could either mean that she had the reaction "Oh My God" or that she really did specifically say "Oh My God". Exactly! So, this idea of saying "somebody was like" means that they said or they thought something. Really high level quality language which
is really natural when you're telling a story. Let's talk about the word "hectic". What does "hectic" mean? Hectic means stressed out, there's so much going on, overwhelmed. Excellent. And you did use this word "stressed out" Great collocation and I would say great use of language there because you're putting two words together and you said "I could tell how stressed out she was". And what did you mean when you said "I was just"... "I was just like "? That describes my reaction to what was going on. Exactly! It's using this word "like" again.
"I was just like" Now, one of the things that came up time and time again in your full exam video was people using the words "you know", okay? Yes. When in the middle of a speech and I say "you know". What does that kind of imply?
What does it mean? It's a rhetorical question. It sort of engages the person that you are speaking with into what you're saying. Exactly! You said that "She was busy going about her day". What does that mean? It means that she was just you know going about her day as normal. She was... that's a tricky way to explain going about your day without using the phrase "going about" but it means that somebody is running through the motions of their day as they would normally. Yeah. She was doing everything that she would normally do, right? Yes. Good. And you said "when it comes to", what does that mean? With regards to. With regards to. It's a little bit more informal, isn't it? It is. Yeah. and sleep deprived was excellent language and the word "yell",
what does yell mean? To shout out. To shout out. I'm sure that the students will agree that you did a phenomenal job here. I didn't hear any mistakes.
I thought your fluency was natural. I thought that your language was excellent, lots of collocation. Your grammatical range and accuracy was wonderful. You had great complexity of sentences. Overall, four sections of the test: 9, 9, 9, 9. Very good! Thank you. Thanks for joining us today, Saskia. We're gonna come back with another part two cue card video. This was a real and recent question. Make sure that you know how to answer it in the test. Saskia, if you had the real test tomorrow and you had this question, what do you think you would say? Well, because this was you know spur of the moment and impromptu, I'd probably say the same thing. Yeah, really difficult difficult question It was. Thanks for joining us today's session.
