IELTS Speaking: prepare by writing your answers

Although this is a speaking test, a good way to prepare and practise is by writing your answers down. Here's a quick example:

Describe a recent journey.

I’m going to talk about a recent journey to London. It was a couple of weekends ago, and I decided to visit the capital with some friends. I had never been before, so I wanted to go there to do some sightseeing.  I don’t have a car, but my friend does, so he volunteered to drive. He had done the trip a few times before, so he knew the way. Maybe it was a bad idea to travel by car because the traffic between Manchester and London was terrible. We spent a lot of time sitting in traffic jams, which were due to roadworks and minor accidents, and it took us the best part of an afternoon to get there...

Note:
The description above is easy to understand, but it contains enough 'less common vocabulary' (underlined) to impress the examiner.

Comments

[ilusha]

Simon,
I've received my results.
Listening-7
Reading-7
Writing-7
Speaking-6.5
Overall-7777777:)))
Thank you for your support and ebook!!!
Ilkin from Baku:)

[Vineeta]

That was very helpful sir. I will practice my speaking by writing a lot everyday from now on.

[Anamika]

Hi Simon,
I am completely agree with you.Recently,I started doing it and found very useful way to practice.I have one query related to cambridge-9, Test-1,Reading passage 3(quest-39).The correct answer given, is dry-land tortoise.Is it considered as two words?I am really very confuse about it. Thanks

[Ananth]

Dear Simon

I came across your site around a month back and went through all your tips and tricks. I was delighted with my results
L-9.0
R-8.0
W-7.0
S-8.5
Overall 8.0

Thanks for all your help

[thangngovan]

Hi Simon and everyone. Is it problem when saying in part 2, we only see the paper and not look at the examiner? Who has experience could give me some advices please?

[Kamran]

Hi Simon,

I was wondering why you do not have a car, as I know that you can afford it? What do you do with your money?

[afsaneh]

hi simon ,your site is wonderfull and helpful,I'm going to participate in ielts exam on 15jun,I dont need high score,score 6 would be enough for me.I worry about speaking and my main problem is I dont have long idea about topics,I mean it's very hard for me to expand my answer and I often have pause to find something to say and if I want to speak about topic even in my language i can't speak for more than 1 minute.....

[shafva]

Thank you simon. I have never used the last sentence in the talk you described and few others too in your speaking topic.

SPEAKING: Describe a recent journey

I am going to talk about my journey to Manchester. Actually I went there to attend simons ielts course on one saturday. I decided to take a train after searching for a number of train tickets online. I was kind of scared as it was my first time to travel alone for more than 3 hours after coming to UK. Well..The train departed on time and I was sitting on my own, near a window seat looking at the sceneries outside as the train started to move. After a few stops, i got a company. There was another passenger sitting besides me, travelling to a stop before manchester. I happened to start talking to her. She was basically a tourist who was traveling to see her friend. We started to share about what we both like about this country. And she told me a couple of places to visit which i dint know and in that way we were exchanging some useful informations. As we were talking , we saw few windmills which was very interesting to watch. Then we crossed a couple of farm lands with sheeps and cows. After a while we started to chat about our own whereabouts. She told me she was from Dubai. It was quite an interesting conversation as i had visited Dubai myself. By the end of our journey we exchanged each others numbers and email addresses to be in touch in the future. And then i left to attend my course . On my way i felt nice thinking that my journey dint go boring and had a nice time.

[jinan]

hi Simon ,your site gave me confident to speak for the first time in my whole life to the examiner and she gave me 6 and i proud of my self because i have a look just on your speaking practice and i remember it in the test and i added some of my ideas.so thank you very much for your amazing website

[Rahman]

Hi Afsaneh,

I think you think too much of speaking, as I'm afraid you think of answering section 2 with such smart answers to impress the examiner. My advice is to use part of given questions in paraphrasing. This gives you more time to thinking as well as takes time within two minutes. For example, when you are asked what is your favorite movie , you can begin with this sentence that" my favourite movie would be" then change the world favourite with keen, to be into and .... . Given that no one even native speakers do not speak 2 minutes in non-stop without any break or hesitation or even you will not be asked to do so.
Cheers,

[caro]

Thank u simon op fin,
Kamran,just look on to the grammer,some questions
Ar befeting...

[Shahrzad]

Hello everybody, my exam will be in June, I am looking foreword for a serious speaking partner, my time zone is +2, my Skype Id hanan.mostafa2011

[Bayram]

Hi dear Simon
Thank you so much for this excellent work ..
I have a question about today's lesson ..
In your description above , you have written "he had DONE THE TRIP a few times before" .
the expression "to do a trip" seemed unusual to me .. because dictionaries say trip collocates with "make" or "go on"
"to make a trip" or "to go on a trip"
Can we use "do a trip" as a synonym for "make a trip" ?

thanks in advance

[Kamran]

Hi Simon,

I was wondering why you didn't use GPS while asking your friend as a company. And Simon it is too weird you have never been in London. Isn't it???

[Soha]

Kamran,

you should respect other peopl'e private life.It is none of your business to ask Simon such silly questions !! all of the questions are hypothitical qustions not real life ones..Focus on your own business!!

[Thao Nguyen]

Great thanks to Simon!
Your advices are really helpful to me.

Wish u all the best to give us more awesome stuffs!

Thao from Vietnam

[shabana]

I wanna knowthat if we speak less than ,2 min. In ielts speaking

so how much band could we loose for it although part 1 and 2 goes gud

[Simon]

FROM SIMON:

I'm afraid I no longer have time to answer everyone's questions individually. However, I do still read them all, and I try to use them as the basis for future lessons.

[shabana]

How much band could I loose if I stop before 2 min. Although part 1 and 3 goes good

[cd]

Hi shabana, I took the test on 25th May and in all of the parts the examiner interrupted me (it's not a bad sign). In part 2 I think that the examiner let me speak less than 2 minutes. You have to speak from 1 minute to 2 minutes. So, don't worry,especially if you have done well in the other 2 parts. Good luck!! :)

[shabana]

I. Give my test on 25th may too,,thanx for giving me good suggestion.,

[Martin]

This is exactly what I ask my students to do as part of their homework and regular practice.

For those who actually write their answers regularly, they tend to improve much faster than those who don't... this is a fact.

[ziaul huda]

I am going to talk about a journey to Banglore, which is known as city of garden. It was mid of the last month, I decided to take a trip with my family to see the beauty of nature. I was really fascinated by surrounding atmosphere and environmentally friendly policies introduced by the local authoiroties. By car It was 6 hours jurney from my town. So, I decided to drive early morning at 5 AM in order to avoid congestion. I think it was a sensible decision taken by me to start driving early in the morning time. I reached there in nearly five and half hour witout stuckking in traffic jam.

[Former Examiner]

I should say, even though writing down can help your prepare for the speaking in part 2, never ever use a memorised speech as the examiners easily recognise this and if they suspect you have done it, will not score you in part 2 and will challenge you more in part 3.

[Par]

Last month I had a presentation in a congress in Athens. So, I took a trip to Greece, which unexpectedly turned out to be one of the most memorable trips I have ever had. Since there is no direct flight between Iran and Greece, and after searching hundreds of flights I figured out that I could not afford buying a ticket from international airlines, I took a flight from Tehran to Istanbul and after a 2-day stop in Istanbul I went to Athens by bus. I am not a big fan of long bus-rides in general. But, this time, even though the trip took around 18 hours, I did not feel that exhausted at the end. Maybe because I could save a lot of my budget in that way. Besides, it was my first experience of crossing the border by bus and as a Middle Eastern passport checks are always fun! The officers could not believe their eyes seeing my passport photo. Anyway, the most exciting part of my recent journey was that instead of staying in hostels I couch surfed with locals. I found some local hosts through an online traveling community. As a result, I had the wonderful opportunity to see the real life of Greeks.

[Rajev Acharya]

Looking for serious IELTS speaking partner, if any body intersetd contact me on my SKYPE for speaking.. My Skype ID is rajevacharya. Cheers

[Faryal]

Hii simon how are u....i was wonder when i saw ur web site,,,but why u are teling us new topics are u ok..?

[margaret sophy]

how can i get your speaking, reading, and writing e-book.

[rinu]

well, it is all about a journey. i went to a tour with my old college friends after getting my first salary. we took an Innova car as a part of journey. our group was the special group consist of 5 members and it had a name during my college life and it was 5 cobras. along with the driver we started our journey with a great cheers with beer bottle. apart from this we traveled to munnar, a beautiful and cool place in the world where the roads were extreme curve and narrowed. we have got a good experience while moving through an hilly area because i never experience mountains and vales that shocked us when they are near to us. infact, i thought of falling of mountain when we are near to the mountain and falling to Vally when it was unexcited. on the way i stopped to watch the water falls and it was a good sight to watch the flow of river. again, we moved through the forest and find a lot of animals which was not seen in the cities. i like this journey because i arranged the journey with my first salary and it gave me pride among my friends. in addition to this, the journey with my friends were really wonderful and enjoyed with a lot of entertainment. we took a lot of snaps and videos. you know, it reminds me same day when i am going through the videos and the snaps i took.

[Saima]

Hy....h r u? ....em doing ielts....but still could not undarstand the rule of ielts plz properly guide me.....