IELTS Speaking Part 3: 'politeness' topic

Two weeks ago I showed you a part 2 question about a situation in which you were polite. Let's have a look at some related questions for part 3 of the test:

In your country’s culture, how do you show that you are being polite?

We really value politeness and good manners in the UK, and there are many types of polite behaviour. One of the first things we learn as children is to say "please" and "thank you". As adults, I think we are careful not to be too direct in the language we use. For example, we would never say "Bring me the bill" in a restaurant because this kind of direct instruction would sound rude. It would be much more polite to say "Could we have the bill, please?".

Are we less polite with members of our families than with people we don’t know?

I suppose it's normal to be a bit more relaxed about politeness with family members. Most people tend to speak in a more informal way at home; in the UK, we still say "please" and "thanks", but it's fine to use colloquial language and things like nicknames that you would never use with someone you didn't know.

Comments

[musharaf]

Thank you very much for help.its very helpful.

[Ghyath]

Dear Simon;
I want to ask if the candidate does not understand the question in part 3 speaking,and answer in a good way but something irrelevant to the question.Does the examiner explain the question again, or leave him to complete the answer? dos it affect the score?

And if someone does not uderstand the question and ask the examiner to repeat it, does its score would be affected?
Thank you

[Ghyath]

Dear Simon;
Speaking test for me
where are you from?
is your city has changed since you were a child?
What type of quality do you want to be in your close friends?

expalin an important experience that you have learned;when ,where, what,and who it affects you?
part 3
Why some people want to do dangerous things?
how these activities affect the government?
shoud they ban them?
How other activities like computer games affect the people?
Thanks

[Simon]

Hi Ghyath,

It's better to ask the examiner to repeat or explain the question because you'll lose marks for talking about something that is irrelevant. You can ask the examiner to repeat or explain in part 3, but not in parts 1 and 2.

Thanks for sharing.

[tariq]

Dear Simon,
Thanks for as usual very helpful advice.I have a problem with my spelling which I think is cause of low ielts score.Kind give me some advice how can I improve spellig in short time?
thanks

[Victor]

Hi Simon, first of all thank you for all these samples. Please tell us what would score higher: long speech with a few mistakes, or short one but 100% well done?

I ask bc my vocabulary range is indeed very good, but it takes me a bit extra time to find the right words, so whenever I sound fluent and coherent, I also sound slow. What could I do to remedy this very soon? Thank you!!

[Victor]

Everyone aiming at 7+ on the Speaking part, please add me vachavc on skype. Thanks and fruitful study (y)

[Victor]

Hello again Simon, and sorry if it seems too lengthy but just felt I needed to clarify this: I can indeed write coherent essays with very good vocabulary fast and almost on the spot, with very little further correction. By comparing them with other 'model' essays online, I reckon mine get 7.5+.

Question: why then is my Speaking so below par (of about 6.5 to 7.5) in comparison? How could I speed up (in 3 weeks at most) its improvement to level it up with the rest of the bands? Thanks so much in advance.

[Simon]

Hi Victor,

I'd say that quality is more important than quantity.

The only way to speed up your speaking is by doing more speaking. 'Thinking' won't help you - you need to do lots of speaking aloud. Maybe try recording yourself.

[Pond]

Simon,
In Part 2, do I need to respond to all prompts in the card?
Some said that if answers to all the prompts are not provided, the examiner will score me down to 5. But, a book said that the promts are just suggested topics to talk about, not required to talk about all to get band 7.
Thanks. :)

[Simon]

Hi Pond,

There isn't a strict rule like "you will get band 5 if you don't answer all parts of the task". However, you SHOULD try to answer all parts - you're more likely to get a better score if you do.