Speaking - Long Turn Tips
Essential strategies and common pitfalls to help you ace your Cambridge English exam.
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What to do
The interlocutor gives you a card with a question and some ideas on it and you have to speak on your own.
After you finish, your partner has to comment and the interlocutor then asks you both a question on the same topic. The interlocutor follows the same procedure with your partner and then leads a discussion with both of you.
Now, in this part of the test you’re each going to talk on your own for about two minutes. You need to listen while your partner is speaking because you’ll be asked to comment afterwards
As previously stated, you can allow yourselves up to 10 seconds before you start speaking. It might also be useful to read the question out loud to get yourself going.
Remember that you don’t have to agree with your partner’s opinions, but you should reach a decision together.
Do not try to squeeze in everything you know about a topic in 2 minutes. It’s vital to focus on the structure of your response. Namely, you need to include an introduction, main arguments and a conclusion – just like you would in an essay.
If you don’t know anything about a topic in the Speaking paper, do not talk about anything else. You need to show your language skills, not your knowledge about a specific subject.