IELTS Speaking: pauses and hesitations

A student asked me for advice about avoiding pauses and hesitations in the speaking test. So here are some tips:

• First, don't worry too much about this. It's normal, even for native speakers, to pause or hesitate to some extent. The more you worry, the more likely you are to hesitate.
• Don't "overthink". If you're thinking about grammar, linking or using "difficult" words, you're more likely to hesitate. Just focus on answering the question with the first idea that comes into your head.
• Slow down. Many candidates speak too quickly; hesitation or repetition occurs because their brains can't work fast enough to keep up.

But here's the main piece of advice: practise!

Make yourself a collection of IELTS speaking questions (from this site or from the Cambridge books), and practise answering them without hesitating.

And don't just practise this once. Go through your list of questions many times (every day if necessary), and you'll find that you gradually improve, both in terms of the quality of your answers and in terms of fluency and lack of hesitation. Maybe you could even record yourself, perhaps once a week, so that you can analyse your own performance.

Comments

[priya]

@
good evening dear simon and everyone.
i'm glad to be the member of this blog.i found that my language is being improved day by day.however i've difficulty with speaking because there's no one whom i can do speaking with.here is my contact number 8264718147..please.whatspp me..it'd be better to improve our speaking skills all together.
thanks.

[borhen cherif]

Thank you Simon !

[lxmi]

hi priya
i am lxmi
are you interested in speaking with me

[Nhan]

Hi Priya, I just sent you a text. Please reply and we can arrange to start learning together.

[Ujala Shujat]

I find this advice very useful. Many times, I speak so fast that I say 'Moreover' when I have no additional point to say!

[scavo]

Great advice!!!!