IELTS Speaking Conversation and Tips

what is the most important thing to focus on in order to get a band 8.5 in IELTS speaking let's find out [Music] hello this is Keith from the Keith speaking Academy I'm very excited today um excited to share with you an interview with a student uh Huda she lives in Damascus the capital of Syria and she's a mum with two children and not only has she managed to balance study with looking after the family but she also has taken the IELTS test traveling all the way to Lebanon because before previously you couldn't take IELTS in Syria um and what's more she managed to get an 8.5 in her speaking absolutely amazing and she's gone on now to become a trainer with IDP in Syria because IELTS is up and running again in Syria now which is great news this is an amazing conversation um I think it's it's going to be a source of great language and inspiration for a lot of students we're going to begin the interview talking about different topics we'll talk about our hometowns about what she does we talk about weekends and movies I'll also give you or highlight some key language that we both use that could help you also when talking about these topics in the second half of the interview we go on to talk about tips and ideas for students of IELTS and also some myths things that are maybe not true Huda as a trainer has come across a lot of questions that students ask and confusions about IELTS so we we discuss them and get things straight and clear for everybody in the interview I hope you enjoy this um as I said I think it's going to be a great source of language and an inspiration for all students around the world let me introduce you to Huda hello Huda Hi how are you hello Keith how are you I'm very well today thanks I'm really really good um great it's lovely to see you here and to be with you here and have this opportunity to chat um let's I mean let's start for students listening tell me a little bit about you who you are where you're from okay so my name is Sarah and um originally from Palestine but I'm based in Damascus which is the capital city of Syria and I've been living here for more than 30 years and Damascus is one of the oldest cities in the world and it's very famous for its history and Heritage and tourists used to flock here uh to visit a traditional or old markets or what we call silks and they used to buy some souvenirs and trinkets and I think it's a lovely city it's a somewhat small city right but the people living here are very warm and welcoming and they very they are very well known for their hospitality that's very very interesting and I I also live in a touristic City here um are you what's it like living in a city with lots of tourists do you enjoy that well I don't mind I don't mind having tourists in my country I feel like um you know I feel pleased every time I watch uh tourists in my city because I feel that my city is really interesting and as I mentioned it's very rich in history so yeah I feel really happy when I see tourists in the streets and I sometimes go and talk to them especially if they wanna some help with English you know right I feel like is when I see tourists yeah that's nice and tell us a bit about what you do at the moment well currently I'm giving face-to-face sessions and training IELTS because recently I've become an ice trainer by IDP in Syria so I'm helping other students to to prepare for us and get their desired score so IELTS in Syria for a while it wasn't happening but it's happening again is it now it took place last year in August and yeah we are glad that it's five because in the past students choose to struggle with taking eyes and they had to travel to another country and the nearest country is Lebanon so they used to go there in order to take ions and I myself did that last year before ice was available here in Damascus wow so it was it was a really hard thing to travel to another city and you have to book a hotel room you have to pay for transport it's really a stressful experience Yeah Austin arm and a leg I imagine yeah absolutely great well that's great news that um IDP are active in Syria and IELTS is back that's really really good um and great for you so you are now a trainer for IELTS with IDP um do you enjoy teaching oh yeah absolutely I love teaching I'm so passionate about teaching and you know I've been I was like on and off teaching for the past few years um I first started as a part-time English teacher at Damascus University and then I worked with the universe United Nations relief and works agency I worked also as a part-time teacher and after taking eyes I felt like um I've become really involved into arts and you can say I've come booked so I I enjoy reading about IELTS and knowing more about this test and I felt that I've got something that can help other students to get their desires for because I've got a high score in writing I once got an eight in writing and now I got 8.5 in speaking and I feel that thank you I feel that most students struggle with these two skills in in particular so I think that it's time to help others because I got a lot of help during my Arts preparation so I believe it's time to pay back and to help other people also right to do your bits and to pay back that that's that's great very very good to see um well congratulations I mean your IELTS score is fantastic 8.5 in speaking I agree that speaking and writing because they're the active skills that they're very difficult for students they're very challenging to produce language um notice at the beginning of the conversation Huda says I am based in Damascus which is great because if you don't live in your the town where you were born or where you grew up but you're living somewhere else you can say I live in Damascus or I am based in Damascus she says tourists flock here flock as a noun means a group of sheep or a group of birds you can imagine the tourists moving together like a group of animals right to flock as a verb is to move like a group of animals I don't mean that tourists are animals but it's idiomatic right it's a group of people moving somewhere so tourists flock here means lots of tourists come here she also says they buy souvenirs and trinkets souvenirs is a nice word it's some kind of gift to remind you of a place you visited and a trinket is a lovely word it's a kind of adornment or a small decoration normally something small like a fridge Magnet or a key ring or a bottle opener maybe something you can use around the home or decorate the house lovely word trinket trinket she also says it's um a place that is well known sorry the people are well known for their Hospitality so well known for meaning famous for Hospitality as a noun meaning that they are very welcoming and warm um also it's rich in history a city that is rich in history to be rich in good preposition rich in history it means it has a lot of History right basically and finally she says that I was teaching on and off on and off a bit like flicking a light switch on and off means I was teaching a bit and then I had to stop then I was teaching more kind of a part-time but sometimes having to stop teaching so I was teaching on and off for several years great language let's move on okay let's talk about weekends first of all um so what do you do on the weekends well during the weekends I tend to sleep in because uh during weekdays I usually get up early in the morning because I have to prepare my son for school and during the weekends I think I I like to spend more time in bed just to relax and chill out after a long week of getting up early so I usually start my morning with a cup of coffee and then I start doing some housework right so that's how I spend most of my weekends of course I scroll through my social media account and I spend a relatively um so much time on Facebook right that's interesting and when you were younger like as a child did you spend your weekends in the same way oh no no no no no uh when I was a child I used to go out with my family in order to visit some relatives sometimes we would go out and have a lunch outside or in a restaurant so yeah I believe that when you when I was a child I used to enjoy weekends more than now because you know I as you are getting older your responsibilities are getting more and more and so yeah I think when I was a child life was much easier than now so yeah I think that's true I think my daughter enjoys the weekends more than me possibly yes although you know she has the the the stress of studying at school during the week um but yeah she sleeps in a lot and I get dragged out of bed by my wife to go and work in the garden together foreign let's talk a bit about movies um how often do you go and watch films well that's quite often to be honest but um I I remember last time I went to the cinema was a long time ago I can't actually remember but I I tend to enjoy watching movies at home because you can control you can pose and replay any part of the movie and so yeah I enjoy watching movies at home with my husband so we usually make a big bowl of popcorn and so we just sit and watch enjoy watching the movie together and just last week I think we watched a movie uh murder mystery too oh lovely yeah it's a comedy movie we enjoyed it a lot yeah that's very interesting because a few weeks ago well um for me I um yeah I I love watching movies I I watch probably a film every week I imagine um we I tend to watch movies with my daughter because my wife's not really into movies um she prefers watching the the series and she watches these old traditional Chinese series on on her phone um but I often have a movie night with my daughter and we watch different films and interestingly enough we watched murder mystery 2 a few weeks ago um thought it was hilarious it's a very very uh interesting film quite intricate but it was fun it was nice and probably like you we we tend to watch films at home rather than going to the cinema um I think it's just more convenient and enjoyable just chilling out on the sofa and watching something and you can you know have your popcorn or your chocolate or whatever you you fancy um this quite nice thing to do yeah sure and what uh I mean generally speaking what kind of movies um are popular in your country that's the question I think it depends on the person themselves like some people might like comedy movies While others might like uh crime and they feel that they are really into Prime movies and they like watching such kinds of movies so yeah I think I think for now or nowadays people prefer to watch comedy movies they just want to laugh and chill out you know because they are very stressed um for me personally I prefer to watch comedy movies and romantic movies you know it's interesting you mentioned murder mystery too um a lot of people think now that Hollywood is taking over the world kind of the in the film industry and local film Industries in countries are being destroyed you agree with that oh my God there's a curveball for you what a great question well I think it's an example of a part three oh this is possible yeah probably this is where the questions are getting progressively harder that's right yes if you're on your toes [Music] well let me ask you this question what do you think that's a good strategy by the way students don't do this in the exam but yes very good strategy what do I think um I think to a large extent it's true I think the the European films um tend to be very pragmatic and down to earth and about everyday life and and that's what makes them very intimate and very um attractive I think to European audiences but I think the dominance of kind of the Marvel films and the American Blockbuster films has had a really big impact on local Industries and so they're they're struggling to produce these films because they can't make enough money um making local films so I think it's a shame that said I was thinking about this actually and I realized now on Netflix you do get a lot of um foreign language films so it's easy to see Swedish films and German films and Italian films and I've been watching those films because I love um films in their native language and so there is a Resurgence of kind of local films from local countries um becoming because they're almost trending or becoming popular maybe um because of languages that's what I would that's what I think oh yeah I totally agree with you when we talk about weekends uh Huda says I tend to sleep in so instead of saying I often sleep in she says I tend to sleep in which is really nice you can say I tend to I typically do something notice her pronunciation is brilliant right she's using weak forms like Tu I tend to sleep in she's connecting a lot she says I get up early pearly gets up early she says a cup of coffee puff coffee cup of coffee really nice her use of different grammar is really good when she talks in the past she says I used to go out with my family sometimes we would go out and have lunch outside used to and would um to describe past activities or past habits it's really really nice we went on to talk about movies um and she said you can pause and replay any part of the movie now this is not super complex vocabulary but it's what I call topic specific vocabulary and it shows the examiner you can talk confidently on this topic pause replay any part of the movie it's nice when I was describing one of the movies we talked about murder mystery 2. I said it was hilarious it was intricate it was nice hilarious just means very very funny intricate means complicated like an intricate plot a complicated plot so notice I'm mixing complex vocabulary with simple vocabulary right it was hilarious it was intricate it was nice you don't always have to be super complicated get a nice balance okay and a lovely phrase that Huda said was some people might like comedies While others might be into crime movies some people that are da While others so she's not only developing her answer by focusing on different groups of people she's using this really nice template structure right to do so finally at the end I throw her a curveball or I give her a curveball a curveball I think comes from baseball I'm not 100 sure because I'm not American but maybe Americans watching if there are really let me know a curveball is when I think from baseball when you throw the ball and it spins so it gives an unexpected turn so when something is unexpected it can be a curveball often a question is a curveball right an unexpected question so I ask her an unexpected question about the film industry and that I was a curveball for her right it's like what not I wasn't expecting that excellent let's move on let's talk about preparing for IELTS then I mean beginning with you what were the challenges that you faced when preparing for IELTS well I had so many challenges to be honest um one of them is that I I used to be a stay-at-home mom mother of two right so how old are your children um the older son is 10 years old and my younger son is four right so I had to I had to find some time to prepare and it was really hard to find some time to prepare so what I used to do was I used to put them to sleep and then sit and prepare for eyes and sometimes I used to prepare for us at midnight sometimes after then after that midnight so so there's that the family context which is is really difficult to balance family and study I know and when it comes to studying um how did you how did you organize yourself in your study how did you practice yeah I I used to practice listening and reading during the day because I think it was easier to practice listening and reading than speaking and writing so I used to get uh them finished uh first thing in the morning and then um in the evenings I used to practice some speaking with my speaking partner and she was also a stay at home mom and she has also took it so we both used to put our kids to bed and start talking and we actually have become friends yeah we have known each other now for more than two years and we we still talk on on a very regular basis now let's talk about tips and strategies then to help students um with IELTS we can look at the whole of IELTS or maybe focus on speaking first um what what tips would you give to students who are preparing now well I I will go through the old Parts all the street bars and eyes okay you know in part one it's the first impression that the examiner has about you so I think First Impressions count so try to impress The Examiner by your language at the beginning but keep it short and simple as you always say like don't speak too much just two or three sentences for each question I think is more than enough and I remember during my speaking test uh The Examiner asked me why so when the examiner asks you why this means that your answer is or was relatively short or you didn't State the reason so try to State the reason and give examples whenever it's possible in part one so yeah that's my first tip for part one very very nice I like that very much I like the the why because that's a really good point that they're pushing for extra information if they ask you why um so yeah students don't get nervous if the examiner starts asking why it's just it's very natural it's fine great what about part two then that's a big challenge for I know for many students yeah you know it was it was even a challenge for me when I started to practice the speaking because I found it really hard to speak for two minutes Non-Stop and you've got only one minute to prepare which is the very short time so you have to be quick you have to think on your feet and you have to come up with a really good story so I believe that is storytelling technique is a very good technique and I personally use it because it allows you to use almost all the tenses in English you can start with the past and move to the present I talk about about the future so yeah storytelling technique I believe is really good in part two and you know in part two I believe that it's the real show up if I can say so so you've got full to two minutes to speak and the examiner won't stop you until the time is up so it's your opportunity to show off the language you have yeah absolutely great do you remember what you talked about yeah sure I do um the question I got asked was describe an area in your house that you feel relaxed and I remember I talked about my balcony yeah I can remember it quite vividly yeah you know I think part two is always describing a person an object or a thing a place an activity or an event so try to be prepared to talk about all of these absolutely those are great categories lovely and then moving on to part three what about your tips for part three well firstly I think is your last chance to show off of the show of the language you have and to extend your ideas your answers you know I think part three is more General and you have to keep it more abstract and it's not similar or I think part one isn't similar to part three part one is all about yourself it's all about you you've got some personal questions about your likes and dislikes but in part three you have to think uh in a more abstract way as I mentioned and you have to think about other people it's not about you anymore it's about other people and your Society or your culture your country or other countries so in part three I think uh the opinion reason example is a very good method to follow and try to connect your sentences with some connectors use time posting and try to give examples whenever it's possible yeah nice so you're developing your answers um yeah opinion reason example opinion examples reasons yeah those are all good things to to include there very very nice part three is is quite challenging I know a lot of students say to me that they feel they get interrupted a lot by The Examiner that there's the questions are so like rapid fire um did you have that feeling oh yeah absolutely yeah yeah I felt that when I first took eyes last year and I got time seven I I remember yeah I felt like the questions were like going uh one question after another one question after another and I didn't have time to think about them and I got some really hard tough questions that I felt like oh my goodness what question is that so yeah yeah you know part three takes almost four or five minutes and I remember once an ex-ex examiner told me a really good advice about part three he said uh try to think about part three questions the same way you think when you want to write an essay so when you want to write an essay you have to explain extend your idea you have sometimes to compare or contrast so yeah try to think uh in part three questions like the same way you think when you're when a runner overnight yeah yeah that's nice that's very very good advice actually to help you almost you don't have time to plan but almost think about the structure and developing a little bit um as you speak yeah very very good I mean I there are kind of a lot of myths around um IELTS and it's not that interrupting is a myth it happens but it's not necessarily a bad thing so if the examiner is going fast question after question it's not a bad thing I think sometimes it's a good thing because it shows that they're pushing you and pushing you um so that I think that that's fine in a moment Huda and myself will be talking more about myths in IELTS so common confusions that many students have about IELTS first I wanted to take a moment to give you an update about my Flagship online course gold course um if you want to develop your speaking skills so you can face The Examiner with confidence and Ace the IELTS speaking test this might be for you the cause is getting better and better so now not only do you have um the videos of over a hundred model answers strategy master classes and also practice videos but also straight after the two live lessons I do each month in the Facebook group I now run um a zoom call for all the students together you jump on the call and we talk about the live lesson topic students get a chance to speak to each other on that topic practicing their English meeting students from other areas in the world and at the end a bit of feedback from me that's exciting but it gets better because now every week Friday Saturday Sunday and Monday we have breakout room sessions and these last for an hour and this is just you and two other students in a small room in a small room in a virtual room where you can get to practice um IELTS questions and answers together and you get to switch and meet different students it's very exciting students have said a lot of different things about it very excited about their practice um they've told me it's a great opportunity to practice it's the best way to boost confidence as the medium is English it was a great experience we were able to talk about the topic and I was able to know other people it's really a big compliment to the course in helping you practice and build confidence it gets even better there are also now many stories in the course which are a fun and relaxing way to review the vocabulary from the course so listen if you're thinking about doing an online course to develop your speaking skills for the IELTS speaking test go and check it out you might be interested just go to www.keyathspeakingacademy.com follow the link to the courses and you'll see it there the gold course right now let's get back to Hula and those myths you have been in this field for more than 20 years quite right yeah I've been yes yeah yeah so I think you've got a lot of questions about maths that should we do this or shouldn't we do this what should we do so what do you think that the most common myth that students believe in when it comes to Art speaking I think one of the biggest myths and confusions is that they should try to speak with the most complex grammar and the most complex vocabulary all the time um and I understand where that myth comes from and I think it's a mistake because I know even you know I and we have talked about showing off is time to show off and you do need to show off your language but I think the confusion is is that when you try and use over complex vocabulary and grammar first of all you're going to make mistakes if you don't know it really really well and secondly it doesn't sound natural because if you listen to you and me chatting we're not using over complex vocabulary all the time right every now and again they'll be a strange idiom or an unusual vocabulary but most of the time it's quite simple English you know most English conversations use 2 000 words full stop right now of course you need to show that you have and are able to use some complex vocabulary I mean for you to get an 8 8.5 you must be showing that but not all the time and I think students feel they've got to be like Superman right super IELTS man or super IELTS woman using this extremely complex vocabulary all the time it's not true chill out right learn it for sure and develop your English to such a high level that you can use it but you don't have to use it right yeah sure I couldn't agree more yeah so yeah idioms I I got questions about idioms and using idioms so it's okay to use one or two idioms but don't choose idioms in each and every sentence because that will sound natural as you said yeah I agree I agree with that idioms is another confusion for students um I think I think idioms are great and they're very useful and it's gonna help your Communication in in English um but use them sparingly you know I think not every sentence for sure um not even every answer necessarily but you know to to show some that you've got some and you can use them well because I think idioms as well are difficult because they're easy they're easy they're relatively easy to understand but to use correctly it's not is not easy um because of the nature they're idiomatic that is it's abstract right so I think again students often learn the from a book and think right I can use that in my test but they've never used it ever before and and if you make a mistake with an idiom oh it's better to try and get the idiom right rather than make a mistake or maybe don't use it yeah sure I I thought um math that most students believe which is uh the bullet points like should I talk about all the bullet points in part two or is it is it gonna lower my score if I didn't include all the bullet points so what do you think I just want to hear from you you don't have to talk about all the bullet points okay they are there as a guide and a very useful guide because if you look at them they do help you develop your answer um very very well but you are not penalized if you miss out a bullet point um you don't have to talk about all of them not at all the idea is they're there as a like a platform you know like when somebody dives into the water they use the platform to to jump into the conversation that there is a guide um and you know that's it yeah that's the quick answer yeah I think yes as you mentioned bullet points are are just a guide and if you feel like you're gonna get closed during your speech just follow them yeah what about the examiner yeah some people believe that especially here in my country they believe that if the examiner wasn't a native speaker that would lower your score that can't be true right that can't be true um I I I disagree entirely the the examiners are trained um and examiners must have um at least in my day they must have a band nine to become an examiner because if if an examiner because sometimes students ask me will examiners understand the idioms you're teaching I'm saying but they must be a band 9 because if you've got an examiner at a band seven how can they evaluate somebody higher than them they can't so examiners must be at the top level right um and they aren't trained quite rigorously and very effectively to give objective scores of based on the band descriptors um so no all examiners are okay all examiners are are equal in their evaluation and their objectivity of course we are all humans and there will be some variation as humans in how we react and how we speak so some examiners will smile other examiners will not smile and will be quite brief and Kurt um so examiners are different as humans but in their evaluation technique they're all trained the same way brilliant well as as we um I think as we're winding up is there anything else around advice maybe you would give students um you should practice practice makes perfect as we say and uh don't look for that test if you're not fully prepared yeah just be equally prepared and then you can you can go and look for the test because a lot of students uh tell me that oh I got only two weeks to take IELTS and I am at that sixth level I want to get band seven or eight which sounds really impossible today isn't a walk in the park you know it's not an easy test and it takes a lot of preparation a lot of hard work in order to get high score in nights yeah that's great very very good advice so don't book your test until you're ready very very good excellent well thank you so much um it's been really good talking to you I'm so pleased to have this opportunity I'm so pleased that IELTS is taking off in Syria again um and that you know you're involved in that and as you say giving back and doing your your teaching and training there I wish you lots of luck with that I'm sure you will be a great trainer um if students want to contact you directly um how can they do that well they can get my number from the IDP office here in Damascus or they can find me on Facebook I've got a Facebook group called ice with Buddha so they can just click join and they can send me a private message if they have any questions or any inquiries about us preparation fantastic so for students from Syria you can get in touch with Huda through the Facebook page I'll put the link down in the description of the video so you can see that and also to IDP in in Syria so you can uh find out more if you want lovely thank you Keith and it was a really pleasure talking to you and it's an honor for me that I'm I'm talking to you right now yeah thank you so much likewise all the best to take care and we'll be in touch okay bye-bye bye-bye bye so there we have it I hope that you enjoyed this video um listening to the ideas the strategies and some of the language that Huda and myself are using it's great to see that IELTS is up and running again in Syria I hope that this video is an inspiration for students all over the world especially people who are balancing looking after their family with their studies um you can do it look at Huda you can get the score that you need and change your life make your dreams come true and move forward great um if you've enjoyed this do remember to subscribe um turn on notifications to find out about upcoming videos I normally have a video every Saturday recorded on YouTube giving you more tips and ideas for IELTS and for developing your speaking skills to become that confident speaker of English listen take care my friend keep studying keep practicing and I'll see you in the next video all the best now bye-bye [Music]

Channel: English Speaking Success

Views: 122,420

Keywords: ielts speaking, ielts speaking success, ielts keith, keith speaking academy, ielts preparation, ielts exam preparation, ielts tips, how to prepare for ielts, ielts speaking preparation, ielts speaking section, ielts preparation at home, prepare for IELTS, prepare for ielts speaking, prepare for ielts at home, prepare for ielts exam, IELTS Speaking band, ielts speaking band 8, ielts speaking band 8.5 sample

Id: qdRIu-OTs3I

Length: 41min 16sec (2476 seconds)

Published: Sat May 13 2023