Part 1 – General Introductory Questions (4-5 minutes) The purpose of this part is to give you a chance to relax and talk about familiar topics. You will have to talk about three topics. The first topic will always be about where you live or your job/studies and then there will be two other topics. The usual topics may cover areas such as study, work, your home, hobbies, food, TV etc..
Do not be tempted to memorise sentences as the examiner can usually spot this as your answer is rehearsed and may not exactly fit the question. It is best to simply answer each question, giving a reason for your answer. For example:
“What’s your favourite food?” “I really love Mexican food, especially tacos because I like my food to be spicy”
This is good because you don’t speak for too long on the question, although you give some reasoning for your response. In part one, your responses are not expected to be very long and the examiner has a lot of everyday questions to ask you.
Typical Questions Let’s talk about where you live.
What do you like about your house?
Is there anything you don’t like about your house?
Where would you like to live in the future? Why?
Let’s talk about animals now.
What’s your favourite animal? Why?
Which animals are popular in your country as pets?
Would you like to have a dog as a pet? Why/Why not?
Now let’s talk about exercise.
What physical exercise do you do?
Do you think you do enough exercise? Why / Why not?