hi there my name's Natasha in this video we're going to review an is speaking test together let's watch now in this first part I'd like to ask you some questions about yourself so let's talk about reading did you have a favorite book when you were a child yes um mly historical uh genre I really love to read this kind of book mainly um my dad motivate me um a lot to read historical book how much reading do you do for your work or studies um every month I have a Target to finish at least two
books and when I study in the University at least I read three to four books in a week as I was a postgraduate student and they require me to have a lot of academic reference to support my assignment or paper work what kinds of books do you read for pleasure um I love to read National Geographic as they often um release on the monthly basis and they always um a lot of great story fascinating around the world um explaining what sort of phenomenon like what happened recently with covid-19 in pandemic so that was a solid
start Tim was able to answer the questions and expand his answers with relevant examples and information this is a very important skill for out speaking there are some grammar errors however for example when talking about studying at University in the past Tim says when I study in the University at least I read three to four books in a week as I was a post-graduate student and they require me to have a lot of academic reference to support my assignment or paperwork so he gets the B verb correct I was a postgraduate student but he uses
the simple present verb for study read and require rather than past simple studied read and required the questions are designed to see if you can use a range of grammar including different verb tenses so getting these right is really important I should mention if you're looking for live classes that cover skills like grammar and pronunciation in addition to advanced classes that go through each part of the a speaking test in detail sign up for free at E2 test prep.com let's keep watching do you prefer to read a newspaper or a magazine online or to buy
a copy yeah well I think so uh when I was kid I uh read a lot of textbook um however as time goes by with a lot of advancement in technology I can access um e newspaper easily even on my mobile phone as well and there tend to be cheaper as I just need to pay a subscription like 10 bucks monthly and I can have multiple resource in just one click just quickly notice how the question presents a choice do you prefer X or Y but Tim starts by saying yeah I think so he doesn't
State a preference here so it's a little bit unclear what he means a better way to start would be by saying which one he prefers for example I find reading newspapers online much more convenient he does a good job of explaining his reasons though he says he can access them easily on his phone and that they're cheaper and he ends ends with a great phrase in just one click this is a very natural use of an idiomatic phrase let's keep watching now let's talk about paying bills uh what kinds of bills do you have to
pay o I like this questions um since I graduated from University I feel I'm responsible for all bills in my life apart from rental and groceries I also have to pay um my car bill including Rao where previously my parents helped me to cover it but now it's like 100% um become my own responsibility Tim structures this answer well he explains that since graduation he's taken on responsibility for his bills he gives examples rental and groceries and he says he has to pay his car bill car bill is not very prec but he clarifies his
meaning saying including REO now I just want to talk about this word for a second rejo is a slang word in Australia short for registration a slang word is a very informal word that's used by a particular group of people and the thing about slang is that people from outside that group may not understand it so it's a good idea not to use too much slang in your outs test and definitely don't use slang from one country if you think people from another country may not understand it Tim does use a nice idiomatic phrase here
previously my parents helped me cover it this means that in the past his parents helped him to pay his bill but by using idiomatic expressions like cover it instead of common vocabulary like pay for it Tim is more likely to score a higher band score for lexical resource let's continue with the test how do you usually pay your bills in cash or by another method most of the time I use my bank account to transfer or firea bpay as I can easily track them um every month on my bank statement for my future reference as
well is there anything you could do to make your bills cheaper um yes I believe so since I'm currently working as a accountant I believe every company they have um you know a marketing um budget that often customer can maximize this in their own way for example when I'm doing a grocery shopping in calls or woolies I often to buy a gift card online that of uh off me five to 10% discount in that way I can reduce my grocery uh bills which is my second biggest expense the first part of this answer is a
little bit confusing Tim says companies have a marketing budget that customers can maximize the meaning is not very clear here perhaps we can guess that he means companies have promotional offers or something like that remember that to score a six in lexical resource your meaning needs to be clear but to score an eight you need to convey precise meaning but luckily Tim gives an example to explain what he means he mentioned mentions shopping in some Australian supermarkets Kohls and woolies and says he buys a gift card that offers a discount the last sentence is great
he uses a signal phrase in that way to introduce the result and explains why it's important using a great comparative phrase my second biggest expense so by giving the example Tim has explained what he means more clearly let's move on now let's talk about sleep how many hours do you usually sleep at night um normally I sleep eight hours however these days I have so much activities apart from work and um sport activities so I only can sleep for about 5 to 7 hours however I feel it's enough cuz it's all about the quality of
sleeping rather than the time that time length of sleeping do you sometimes sleep during the day uh when I was primary school I always took a nap for at least one or two hours however this changed when um I grew up um because I feel it's kind of waste of time I can use my time to do something more productive during the day let's talk about Tim's pronunciation for a moment you can probably hear that sometimes times Tim mispronounces words for example here he says Howers with an H sound at the beginning whereas the correct
pronunciation is to start with a ow vowel sound ours have a listen uh when I was primary school I always took a nap for at least one or two hours minor mispronunciations like this don't stop us from understanding Tim's meaning though so he could still score well on pronunciation one thing Tim does quite well is use stress he places the stress on the correct syllables of the words and he stresses the most important words in the sentence listen to his final sentence again I can use my time to do something more productive during the day
because he stresses the correct syllables of the words and correct words in the sentence his speech has quite a natural Rhythm and this helps him to be understood more easily let's see how Tim finishes part one what do you do if you can't get to sleep at night um no most of the time I read a book and watch on Netflix or just simply browsing on the phone because um that's the moment I can help sort of um my me time I just spend between five to 15 minutes and magically all this method can help
me sleep easily there are a couple of great uses of vocabulary in this answer he says I can have my me time me time is an idiomatic expression that he uses very naturally and accurately here it means time that you spend by yourself doing something that you enjoy that makes you feel calm or relaxed which is a great way to describe reading a book or watching Netflix I love how you use uses the word magically to explain how doing these activities helps them to sleep easily I think Tim could score well for lexical resource but
sometimes there are grammar issues which means his score for grammatical range and accuracy might not be as good for example he says all this method but he's talking about several different activities so he needs to use a plural here all these methods Tim can practice avoiding mistakes like this to really improve his score for this Criterion so that was speaking part one Tim's pronunciation is fairly clear and he's used some effective idiomatic and less common vocabulary he generally answers the questions with relevant ideas explanations and examples and overall his fluency has been good despite some
hesitation although Tim made grammar errors so far they haven't stopped us from understanding his meaning however however to get a better score for grammatical range and accuracy I'd advise Tim to revise the use of verb tenses prepositions and plurals before we move on to part two don't forget to click the Subscribe button that way you won't miss any of our new videos covering everything else related all right I'm going to give you a topic now and I'd like you to talk about it for one to two minutes before you talk you'll have one minute to
think about what you're going to say and you can make some notes if you wish do you understand yes thank you so here is your topic and you can use pencil and paper for your notes so I'd like you to describe a time when you enjoyed visiting a member of your family in their home so I just want to pause here to show you the task card it says describe a time when you enjoyed visiting a member of your family in their home it tells you to say who you visited and where they lived why
you made this visit and what happened during this visit and to explain what you enjoyed about this visit let's see how Tim responds all right so remember you have one to two minutes for this so don't worry if I stop you I'll tell you when the time is up so can you start speaking now please all right I would like to share an experience um when visiting family members in my home uh I was born in Jakarta however my family migrated to Singapore a long time ago so I often visit them at least once or
twice a year especially after covid-19 pandemic my parents normally came to austa to see me in here however now they're getting older and they're afraid of um firus um also I um tend to um be proactive when uh planning this trip by asking them in advance um what's their availability and how's their work looks like as my dad's um still actively working although he's almost 70 years old and when I came to my hometown normally they always bring me to visit a relatives and our grandparents so Tim started very well there was a moment where
his fluency decreased and you might have seen that he was struggling a bit to think of what to say but he managed to recover quite quickly and was able to start speaking more fluently again and this is really key something may go wrong in your speaking test you may suddenly forget an important word or you may not know how to answer a question the important thing is not to let that one small mistake ruin your whole test did you see Tim look back at the task card to prompt him with what to talk about next
this is a great strategy and it's also why I always advise students to make notes about the prompts on the card even if they feel very confident you never know when you may suddenly lose focus and your notes can help you get back on track back let's see how he finishes his answer and it happened most of the time during a festive season like Christmas or uh Chinese New Year also um I sometimes contribute to their church activities by doing a volunteer job like uh even a simple job like cleaning the church and packing the
um food and prepare all the amenities for for the church member um I really enjoy to uh have a this kind of social activities as my parents also introduced me to most of their relatives and um friends broadly about what I'm doing and um where I am right now although I don't get so much opportunity to stay longer in my hometown now I do want to pause here and draw your attention to the task card again the task card said describe a time when you enjoyed visiting a member of your family in their home so
it's asking you to talk about one specific event however here Tim speaks more generally about what usually happens when he goes to visit his parents in Singapore now this is not wrong you won't lose any marks because you talk about something a little bit different to what's on the task card but I think in this case Tim made the task a bit harder for himself the part two task card is always about one specific thing one event or experience or one thing you like or enjoy so in your answer try to talk specifically about one
experience it will help you to focus your ideas and explain them clearly let's keep watching thank you thank you do you visit your parents often um at least twice a year this final response here was perfect Tim's answer is brief but relevant he doesn't try to explain his answer he just answers confidently with a strong downwards intonation at the end to show he has finished his statement if you answer the final question in part two in this way your examiner will be very happy because it will help them to move on to part three quickly
let's see see how that goes all right so we've been talking about a time when you enjoyed visiting a member of your family in their home and I'd like to ask you one or two more general questions related to this so let's consider first of all family occasions when do families celebrate together in your country um we celebrate both Christmas and Chinese New Year so this um two public events um are the most important for our family um and I'm so exciting that I'm going to celebrate with them in the next couple of weeks um
soon in in Chinese New Year we call this 2024 as a dragon year how often do all the generations in a family come together in your country um um sorry would you mind explain further the question sure so um all the different Generations in a family like uh grandparents and parents and children how often do they all get together in your country so here Tim didn't quite understand the question so he asked Andy to clarify it and then she was able to rephrase it and give him some examples of what different Generations means this is
great if you're not sure what the question is asking you it's a really good idea to ask the examiner to repeat or explain it let's listen to that rephrase question again and see how Tim answers it sure so um all the different Generations in a family like uh grandparents and parents and children how often do they all get together in your country uh I will say at least once a year and also depending um what sort of tradition or religion they're adopting in um in their family members for instance in my family members um Chinese
New Y year is one of the most important event when my grandma um still was alive she always organized this moment at least three months before the event and I was always the only grandchildren who help her to cook and order the food even went to the fish market um and however after she passed away I feel this tradition is not much um um is no longer practiced by uh younger family especially um with um probably they have a lot of uh new activity or they to beas Tim once again does a really good job
of answering the question and then extending his response here notice how Tim immediately answers at least once a year and then qualifies his answer this is an excellent strategy start general get specific so if you struggle to know what to say in part three try that answer generally then relate the question to one specific example from your own life let's keep watching so you're seeing a change in the culture are you from from before to now yes definitely with uh more and more people nowadays are suffering um from cause of living pressures especially after covid-19
pandemics where everyone Tred to um focus to get more money um as according to ABC news also um younger generation born in the year 90 are struggling financially more than the previous generation I think because of this reason um we tend to spend more time to work rather than um have a Quality quality time with family or friends here I think Tim could have used a signal phrase at the beginning of his answer to show why he's talking about money issues for example he could have said yes definitely I think one factor is that more
and more people nowadays are suffering from cost of living pressures by adding that phrase I think one factor is that he could show that he's giving a reason for his opinion so we would know why he's talking about financial pressures and we would be able to follow his answer more easily also the way Tim introduces his information from the news is quite formal according to ABC News Australia this is something you might write in an essay but it's less common to say it in a conversation it would be more natural to say something less formal
like I saw in the news recently that let's now watch the end of the speaking test let's think about everyday life in families do you think it's a good thing for parents to help their children with their schoolwork um I believe so I think uh home education is the best education as um children can have a motivation from their parents and also can gain an Insight of what is the purpose of doing something um like I mentioned for I love reading historical book because of my dad he influenced me a lot when I was kids
how important is it for families to eat together at least one once a day um I think that's a great idea for them to gathering in the same dining table every night however um I feel as the child grow older they often to have a their own business with their friends they back home too late as a result they don't have much time to uh see their mom and dad to have a dinner together all right well thank you that's the end of the speaking test you're welcome so that's the end of this I speaking
test although Tim had some good ideas in these last two answers and he still managed to extend his ideas a bit his fluency and his grammatical accuracy have decreased there are quite a few small grammar mistakes so these two answers are a bit harder to follow but this isn't uncommon in part three for a lot of students remember that part 3 is designed to test whether you can use more complex language to analyze and explain ideas and opinions it's a good idea to fix any basic grammar issues you have so that in part three you
can really focus on using more advanced grammar such as if Clauses passive verbs and complex sentences overall Tim has a very solid foundation of English to work with including some excellent vocabulary and good pronunciation my advice advice would be to spend some time revising and practicing grammar because this will help them to speak more accurately and more confidently remember if you're looking to practice your speaking skills you can sign up for free at E2 test prep.com we have live classes that cover skills like grammar and pronunciation in addition to more advanced classes that go through
each part of the a speaking test in much more detail we also have plenty of bonus practice questions in our course materials check it out today and that's it for this video if you liked it be sure to click the like button and subscribe for more alz videos thanks for watching and good luck with your Al preparation
