IELTS Sample Session 04

IELTS Sample Session 04

Part One Examiner: Hello, how are you today? Could you please tell me your name, and where you come

from? Candidate: My name is Mary Jane, and I’m from Chicago, Illinois. Examiner: OK, Mary. Do you work or are you a student? Candidate: Lately, I’ve just been working. I took the last semester off. Examiner: What kind of work do you do? Candidate: I’m a secretary at a law firm here, in Chicago. Examiner: How many hours a week do you work? Candidate: Too many. I think I work almost 40 hours a week. Probably between 30 and 40. Examiner: What is your ideal job? Candidate: My ideal job would be a clothes buyer for a large company like Macy’s or JCPenny. Examiner: OK. Let’s talk about your name. What is the meaning of your name? Candidate: I don’t think my name has much of a meaning. I was named after my grandmother,

but I think the name Mary might mean something about bitter. Examiner: How common is it for people’s names to have meaning in your language? Candidate: Actually, in English, names don’t really have meaning, not in English at least. My

name, I think, means “bitter” in Hebrew, but I’m not sure. In English, it’s just a name.

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Examiner: Does your name affect your personality? Candidate: I don’t think so. I don’t really feel like a “Mary,” but I also don’t feel like any other

name. My name is just a name. Examiner: Would you ever change you name? Candidate: No, I don’t think I’d ever change my name. It’s fine. Examiner: OK, now I’d like to ask you a few questions about your language. What different

languages are spoken in your country? Candidate: There are tons of languages spoken in America. The most common ones are English

and Spanish. But, there are also lots of places where people speak Chinese, Korean, Thai, Russian, German, French, Portuguese. The list goes on and on.

Examiner: How does the pronunciation on America’s national news differ from your own? Candidate: I think I don’t have much of an accent. I traveled a lot as a child, so I grew up in

many different places. I think my English is about the same as the news. Examiner: What problems do people from different areas in your country have communicating? Candidate: Hmm, I think everybody can understand the standard “news” English, but sometimes

people’s accents get in the way of expressing themselves. Sometimes I can’t understand people from the deep south, or Texas, or even Louisiana. Most people that live in the big cities can understand each other pretty well, the accents aren’t terribly different. But then again, sometimes on the subway, I can’t understand what the people next to me are saying. I recognize it’s English, but the grammar is different and the pronunciation is vastly different.

Examiner: How do you think your language will change in the future? Candidate: I think people’s English will get farther and farther from what it already is. Maybe in

50 years, people won’t be able to communicate at all with some other people who speak English. I think the majority will still speak close to the standard, though.


Part Two Examiner: OK, next I’m going to give you a card with a topic that I want you to talk about. You

will have one minute to prepare what you are going to say, and then one to two minutes to speak. You can also make some notes on this paper if you want. Alright?

Candidate: OK. Examiner: Here’s your card. Candidate: Thanks…(pause)…A restaurant that I enjoy eating in is actually a restaurant that I

used to work in. It is a chain of restaurants, so you can go to different cities, and each one has the same menu and the same decorations. The one I go to is only a few minutes from my house. Maybe a ten minute drive. It’s in a little strip mall that’s in an “L” shape and the restaurant is in the middle. It’s called Outfront. I used to work as a waitress at a different one, but this one near my house has the same menu and has the same atmosphere and decorations. On the menu there are lots of different kinds of steaks, and ribs, and chicken. There’s also a variety of salads and other fried foods. They have some fish and shrimp dishes also. Hmm, there is also an assortment of pastas and a couple of soups. They have lots of different things. I usually get the buffalo wings and some cheese fries. Sometimes I’ll get a steak and a salad. There’s also beer on tap. Maybe only a few domestic and one Australian beer are on tap. Oh, the restaurant has an Australian theme, so most of the menu items and all the decorations come straight from Australia or, in the case of the menu, are puns on “Australian” things. The even tried to get the waiters to talk with an Australian accent, but I told them I didn’t know how. On the walls, they have things that are stereotypical Australian things, like pictures of kangaroos and aborigines and boomerangs. If you’ve seen the movie, “Crocodile Dundee,” then you know what I’m talking about. I like to eat there because it just feels comfortable since I already spent so much time working there, and I’m already so familiar with everything on the menu. Maybe I’ve even tried everything on the menu already. I did work there for more than a year.

Examiner: OK, good. Is it a very popular restaurant? Candidate: Hmm, I think so. If they have one in lots of different cities, then it must be fairly

popular.


Part Three Examiner: Now, we’ve just been talking about your favorite restaurant, which you coincidently

said you worked at. Next I’m going to ask you a few more questions related to this topic. Let’s talk more about the food service industry. What types of restaurants are popular in America?

Candidate: Well, I think fast food restaurants are easily the most popular. There’s so many of

them everywhere. I even doubt there are any cities that don’t have at least one fast food restaurant. I think, another popular type of restaurant in America is the steak house. There are so many different types of steak houses. If there can be that many, they must be popular.

Examiner: So, you mentioned fast food restaurants. What types of people generally work at fast

food restaurants in your country? Candidate: Hmm, fast food restaurants generally don’t pay very well, and aren’t picky about who

they hire. I think that mostly poor people and college students work in fast food restaurants. You don’t need any experience to work at one, and college students don’t normally have lots of experience, so it is a good job to start out at.

Examiner: How does working at a restaurant compare with other jobs in your country? Candidate: I think, most restaurant jobs don’t pay very well, but if you work as a bartender or a

server at an expensive restaurant, you can make some really high tips. If the food is more expensive, the tip will be higher. But, working at a restaurant isn’t very glamorous, and I wouldn’t say it was a career. More of a job.

Examiner: What do you mean it isn’t a career, more of a job? Candidate: Well, a career is a job you work at forever, and a job is more like temporary work you

do just to pay the bills. Examiner: I see. What can someone learn about a country from eating its food? Candidate: I don’t think a country’s food is that revealing of…of it’s nature? What I mean is, if

you travel to a country and everything that gets served to you is spicy, that doesn’t mean much more to me than the people like to eat spicy food. Does it mean those people like a spicy lifestyle, or that it’s hot in that country? Not necessarily. It probably just means they like spicy food.

Examiner: OK, finally let’s talk about health. Do you think you eat healthy food? Candidate: Well, I try to eat healthy food, but I do splurge sometimes and eat lots of desserts and

fast food. It’s just faster! But really, I try to eat mostly salads and other fresh


vegetables and fruits. Occasionally I eat a meal of just cake or cookies or ice cream, but that’s rare. Also, I try to avoid the fast food restaurants, unless I’m in a hurry.

Examiner: What types of food do you think are not healthy? Candidate: I think fast food is generally unhealthy. Also fried food doesn’t strike me as healthy

either. Foods with high cholesterol and fat are probably not healthy either. Examiner: OK, what impact do you think fast food restaurants have on society’s health? Candidate: I think the impact is not a good one. Look at Americans, for example. Our country is

in love with fast food, and we are also one of, if not, the fattest countries in the world. We have started having a real problem with childhood obesity. It’s not that uncommon to see some really fat young kids. That’s just not right. Children should be out playing and exercising, but they are so fat now that they don’t. I think this is related to the popularity of fast food.

Examiner: What are some ways to improve health with food? Candidate: I think, if people ate more fruits and vegetables, not fried vegetables, that people

would be healthier. If people didn’t eat such oily and greasy foods, maybe they wouldn’t be as fat either. I heard there’s a kind of good cholesterol that people should eat more of too. The good cholesterol is not only good for you, but it also reduces the amount of bad cholesterol in your body. So, this is doubly good for people to eat. Also, I think if we ate more natural foods, not foods that have been treated and hormonally changed, we would be healthier too.


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IELTS Sample Session 04