cue cards for IELTS hi there my name is Ben Worthington in this video we're going to look
at three cue cards and for each cue card I'll give you a specific technique that you can
use for when you answer the cue card in your IELTS exam and in a minute I'll tell you something
quite funny so let's jump into the first cue card by the way these are recent cue cards
they've been seen on real IELTS speaking exams by students who sat at the exam in the last
couple of months first cue card it's going to ask me about the weather okay it says describe
the kind of weather you like what kind of weather it is what you usually do during this
weather how this weather affects your mood and why you like this type of weather first
of all as you probably know from my previous videos that we attack this cue card very methodically
we organize our talk like we organize our essays we say we can say I'm going to talk
about a weather that I really like the weather I really like is sunshine blah blah blah okay
so we follow through each point and we talk about each point as it appears on the card
and we work through every single point we do not forget any of them we do not jump past
any of them we work through every one of them to make sure we're going to get full points
at the task response now in this specific card about the weather actually I'll tell
you two tips the first one is we can say yes I really like sun I really like the sun I
really like sunny weather okay but we can upgrade this just like we do with our writing
we can upgrade it from words that are very common that we learned at the beginning of
our English language journey words like like and happy we can upgrade this to: I absolutely
adore the sunshine okay I exaggerated a little bit there but just to demonstrate my point
so I like the sunshine versus I absolutely love it when it's sunny it makes me feel so
much happier I feel more positive I feel so much more energetic and I just want to go
out there and do some sport yeah that sounds so much better than: I'm really happy when
it's sunny get out so what I'm saying here is that emphasize and try and just upgrade
it and be conscious of the vocabulary that you’re using now the tip that I want to
give you is that if we get a topic like this about the weather okay it's a good opportunity
to put in a list and if it's a topic such as the weather we’re quite familiar with
the different types of weather so we can say well to be honest I really dislike it when
it's gray when it's windy when there's hail and snow but I absolutely love the sunshine
it makes me feel so much better I like it when it's light and breezy not too hot but
ideal for doing activities okay and then it just sounds a million times better than: I'm
happy when it's sunny yeah I've gone into detail and I've used two lists there the weather
that I dislike and the weather that I like and also as I said before I was more emphatic
about it now later in the cue card it says why you like this type of weather and here
it's another opportunity for me to put in a list first of all I'm going to tilt it to
why do I like this type of weather I'm going to tilt it to a topic that I really like that
I feel quite strongly about or that I enjoy talking about and I'll do this because my
vocabulary in that area is stronger I have to be careful when I'm using this technique
to not go off-topic but it says why do you like this type of weather well I love this
type of weather because it allows me to do sports and when it's sunny I can play rugby
I can play tennis I can go mountaineering I can go climbing and I can do my favorite
activity as well which is swimming in the sea you see all that vocabulary I squeezed
in there: climbing mountaineering rugby tennis I don't know which ones I said but I can tilt
it I can steer the conversation towards something that's passionate that I'm passionate about
and I'm much more likely to open up and share and show the examiner like my extensive vocabulary
but just be careful do not go off-topic do not get carried away remember that you're
still in an IELTS speaking exam okay let's move on to cue card number 2 and yeah I'll
tell you the funny story as well in a second so in this cue card it's asking me about an
interesting place in my country it says it's less known to -- somewhere that's less known
to tourists I have to explain why I like it why it's interesting and why not many people
know about it now what I'm going to do in this one is I'm going to talk about a cemetery
yeah and let’s talk about a cemetery and I'm going to say it's really popular because
people -- and I say it's really popular people are just dying to get in there okay sorry
if you smile if you got that joke click like if you didn't get that joke you need to improve
your IELTS listening skills your vocabulary anyway so here this cue card is talking about
an interesting place now the technique that I want to share in this one okay is going
into details okay here we're going to like describe things it's similar to what I said
before but we're not going to go sort of like a list and so formulaic we're going to go
to like more details and try and use more adjectives okay so I'm going to talk about
maybe the mountains behind the beach in Spain yeah I would have to actually tell the examiner
that I would say something like I can't talk about my home country England because I haven't
lived there For 10 years however I'd like to talk about Spain and the location is the
mountain area just behind the beach and here it's really a beautiful area because there's
moss on the side of the wall on the side of the cliffs and there's lots of variety there
we've got a cliff side we've got the cliffs we've got the mountainous area we've got the
hills we've just got so much variety there it's really an eye-popping landscape it's
really enchanting okay so we're just going to go into the little details there and we're
going to talk about like the different contrasts and this just helps ourselves extend the amount
of time that we can talk about it if I'm going to like minute details and of course we're
going to be giving examples now third cue card okay the formula here is that we're going
to say the point we're going to look at the cue card we're going to give a reason and
then we're going to say for example and this is a great way like before if we especially
struggle if we’re speaking for two minutes which I know is very very common so we say
the point then we give an example so the next cue card here is talk about something that
you've learned outside of school or college please say what it is when and where did you
learn it and how it was helpful to you so once again we've got the opportunity to steer
the conversation towards something that we're quite passionate about something that we quite
enjoy and I recommend doing this because you're going to speak more confidently your vocabulary
is going to be better and it's going to appear much more natural which will -- all these
aspects will help you boost your score so in this case I'm going to talk about something
that I learned it was by -- I can't remember I think I read it on a blog so I'm going to
talk about just a phrase that I learned which was: what would you do if you only got paid
for results now this phrase was very important for me because it caused me to evaluate my
teaching techniques so when I started teaching like anybody when we start doing a job sometimes
they're a little bit unsure but I took this comment what would you do if you only got
paid for results and I tried to imagine myself like getting zero money if the students didn't
pass the end-of-year exam okay so here it's just an example that we give afterwards so
what is it it's a quote that I learned from a blog online it's a very important quote
it helped me and it guided me in my career okay when and where did you learn it well
I learned it at the beginning of my career like I said and at the final part how was
it helpful for you this is where I'm going to give my example I'm going to say well it
was very helpful because it steered me or it guided me towards a results-orientated
attitude which is not very common in teaching and we kind of share the burden the student
and myself we kind of share the burden in getting through the exam for example if the
student fails I fail and this seriousness really forced me to rethink and to utilize
every single minute of that hour of that teaching hour the student had paid for so that's what
I wanted to say about the final cue card we can use examples in the second cue card talked
about using details and in the first cue card I talked about using lists and trying to squeeze
our list in there and all throughout the speaking example try and steer it to something that
you feel more passionate about as I said a few times before you've got more vocabulary
in that area you're going to speak more confidently in that area and it's going to flow because
you've probably spoken about it a million times before so if you want to learn more
techniques like this and if you want to end your IELTS frustration have a look at the
IELTS course in the description in that course we go into more detail we've got more techniques
you can try all these different techniques and the mock speaking exam is included in
the course you try them all see which one works best for you get some feedback and start
your improvement and if you're frustrated the course is perfect this course melts IELTS
frustration like ice in an Australian desert okay my name is Ben Worthington thank you
for watching have a great day and all the best with your IELTS preparation take care