When you have to prepare your students for the IELTS exam, you’re up for a task that is far from easy, especially when it comes to the Speaking section.

In this tutorial we intend to help you navigate the daunting task of teaching your exam candidates what the Speaking exam is like and how to do their best at it.

In volume 2 of teaching IELTS Speaking you will learn:

* Some useful IELTS Speaking examination: Part 1 Tips

* We’ll take a look at sample activities you could do to with your test candidates for IELTS Speaking Part 1

* Learn which aspects you need to encourage your students to do, to make sure that they’re successful with their IELTS Speaking exam!

IELTS Speaking examination: Part 1 Tips

The purpose of Part 1 questions is to hear the exam taker answer questions on a few simple topics to find out whether they can sustain conversation about themselves and everyday situations.

This part is typically perceived as the easiest one, as talking about personal topics is usually easier than talking about more abstract topics.

Prepare your test taker to hear questions on the following topics:

* Description of place of origin

* Daily routine

* Work and employment

* Background education and childhood

* Family structure

* Public transportation in your home country

* Forms of building in your home country

* Typical occupations in your home country

* Typical landscapes and weather in your home country

* Plants and animals

* Your personal likes and dislikes

* Preferences in terms of reading material/films/music/games/entertainment/art/internet/pets/shopping

* Hobbies, interests and pastimes

* Celebrations, holidays and festivals

* Languages and linguistic proficiency

* Newspapers, media and TV

* Etc., as this is not an exhaustive list

Remind your student that the questions in Section 1 of the Speaking exam will be clustered around one or two of these topics.

Thus, they may get 10-12 questions about Work and employment, and 6-8 questions about Hobbies, interests and pastimes.

Structure your activities around these topics, build vocabulary based on them, and enlarge their lexical resource as much as possible.

Remember to practise consistently and encourage building a solid vocabulary base for each of these topics.

ACTIVITIES

Here are some of the sample activities you could do to with your test candidates for IELTS Speaking Part 1.

Complete the topic boxes below by thinking of three more ideas for each box.

Types of celebration 

Chinese New Year, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Forms of transport 

car, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Types of building 

skyscraper, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Weather 

thunderstorm, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Hobbies / interests 

paper folding, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Reading material 

magazines, ________________, ________________, ________________.

Types of scenery 

rivers, ________________, ________________, ________________.

In order to improve their range of vocabulary in this section, students can make vocabulary collections like this

Birthdays an enjoyable celebration / giving presents

Mountains peaceful / range / tall / snow-covered / climb / steep

Trains fast / track / station / convenient/driver/speed

You could also encourage your students to expand their descriptive abilities for this section b...