In IELTS Speaking Part 2, candidates receive a cue card from the examiner and are asked to talk about the topic for 1-2 minutes. There are a huge number of topics and questions, and they are constantly changing. You never know what questions you will have to answer. This is one of the most popular reasons test-takers mention when saying why this part of the speaking test is so difficult.
There is good news too. The cue cards can be used as prompts. There are several types of cue cards you can get on the day of the exam, and each of them needs different functions of the language.
Most often candidates have to speculate about the following:
- event or events in the past
- habit or habits
- a person
- an object
- a place
- a cultural event or item.
In this blog post, we will look at each of them and decide what language candidates might need to complete the task.
READ ABOUT: How to organize your response in IELTS Speaking Part 2?
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Event or events in the past
Candidates receive such a task quite often. Here are some examples:
- Describe an experience or situation that made you happy.
- Describe an important event in your life.
- Describe a special occasion when you had a really enjoyable meal.
- Describe a memorable journey you have made.
- Describe an exciting experience in your life.
- Describe a journey by car/plane/train/ boat that you remember well.
- Describe a holiday you went on when you were a child.
- Describe an occasion when you spent some time with a child.
- Describe a bad service you received.
- Describe a very difficult task that you succeeded in doing as part of your work or studies.
- Describe a good decision you made.
- Describe a school which you went to.
- Describe a day when you thought the weather was perfect.
As you plan your speech, decide what tenses you are going to use. Candidates often make a mistake, and start using present tenses instead of past in this type of questions. Make sure you use narrative tenses: Past Simple, Past Continuous, Past Perfect where necessary.
Another thing you have to remember is to provide context for your story. To make it logical, provide additional information. The examiner, like any other person who sees you for the first time in life, doesn’t know anything about you. Imagine, you are telling this story to your new acquaintance or a friend. This will help you to relax and give more interesting details.
It is recommended that you cover the items in your cue card, but the examiner will pay more attention to your language rather than bullet points in the card. There is no such criterion as Task Achievement in IELTS Speaking, i.e. your vocabulary, grammar, intonation, examples you provide showcase your English ability.
Habit or habits
This type of question might look very easy, but it is tricky as well. Take a look at the examples:
- Describe something healthy you enjoy doing.
- Describe a sport or game you enjoy playing.
- Describe something you do that helps you to relax.
- Describe something you do to help you study or work.
- Describe an activity you enjoy doing on the weekends.
- Describe your favorite way of travel.
- Describe something you usually do at the beginning of the day.
Habits are things that we usually do. Unlike past events or future intentions, there are not so many structures we can use to describe them. Usually, candidates are supposed to talk in Present Simple, but as it often happens, some use Present Progressive. Make sure you use the proper tense.
It’s also a good idea to talk about the time when you started your habit at the beginning.
To extend your ideas, provide examples and details: where, when, how, and with whom you usually do the things. If you run out of ideas, it’s always good to talk about 2 or 3 habits you have and speculate about each of them.
READ ABOUT: 6 best ways of getting vocabulary for IELTS
A person
The first thing you might think of when you receive such a task is what adjectives to use. However, it’s not enough to itemize all possible adjectives, but your list is going to be quite long to speak for 120 seconds. Here are some sample tasks:
- Describe a friend that you really like to spend time with.
- Describe someone in your family who you admire.
- Describe your best friend.
- Describe a child that you know very well.
- Describe someone you know who has started a business.
- Describe a person who has encouraged you recently.
- Describe a writer you would like to meet.
- Describe a film actor from your country who is very popular.
- Describe a teacher who has influenced you in your education.
- Describe an elderly person in your family you enjoy talking to.
The main tip for answering this question is not only using a wide range of adjectives but also supporting your ideas with good examples. This means, provide examples from your own life or the life of the person you are talking about every time you use an adjective. For example, you could say ‘My best friend is very shy’. However, saying ‘My best friend is very shy. I remember once we went to a party, and there was a girl he liked a lot. However, he was only sitting and watching us having fun, and never asked her to dance with him that evening’ will take more time.
Object
Many test-takers find this question particularly hard. The main problem is that they lack the vocabulary for describing different kinds of things such as:
- Describe a piece of electronic equipment that is important to you.
- Describe your favourite photograph.
- Describe something you own which is very important to you.
- Describe a gift that you gave to someone recently.
- Describe a present that you received as a child.
- Describe a present that someone gave to you which you liked a lot.
- Describe a plant/tree grown in your country.
- Describe a souvenir you bought.
- Describe an item you lost that was found.
- Describe an item you bought but haven’t used much.
- Describe something you have always wanted to buy.
- Describe one of the things you have which you couldn’t live without.
There are at list two-three things you can do to solve the problem:
- learn specific vocabulary and practise describing different objects during your IELTS preparation;
- personalize, i.e. speculate about the meaning of this object to your or the society rather than describe its physical appearance or other characteristics;
- compare and contrast it with another object.
Place
This task is very similar to the previous one in terms of using a wide range of vocabulary. It might also require you to speculate about some aspects of the past or future. Let’s have a look at examples:
- Describe a place in another part of the world that you would love to visit in the future.
- Describe a school which you went to.
- Describe an interesting historic place.
- Describe your favourite shop.
- Describe your ideal house.
- Describe a city you visited and consider beautiful.
- Describe a house/apartment that someone you know lives in.
- Describe a place of entertainment (e.g. theatre, cinema, sports centre) that you would like to have where you live.
You can easily cope with this task if you learn vocabulary for describing such places as towns/ cities/ buildings before you start your exam preparation.
READ ABOUT: IELTS language for describing maps
Cultural event or item
This task is hard but interesting at the same time. That’s because you often have to talk about the culture of your country or things you’ve done or experiences you’ve had. For example:
- Describe an important tradition in your family.
- Describe a TV programme that has made a strong impression on you.
- Describe a film you have enjoyed so much.
- Describe a book that you have recently read.
- Describe an important event in the history of your country.
- Describe a meal at a special event.
- Describe a TV advert you have never forgotten.
If you are to talk about things from your own culture, the main problem that you may face is not knowing the English language equivalents for the names of some items. If this happens to you, say the name in your own language, and give a definition in English so that the examiner can understand what you are talking about.
Remember, this task tests your ability to use English vocabulary and grammar in different contexts. The best thing you can do is to master them before you start your IELTS preparation journey and practise a lot.
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