Part 2: describing a person who helped you
You can plan a talk about a person in one minute and keep it going until the examiner stops you.
Part 2 begins with a card in your hand, paper and a pencil for notes, and one minute to prepare. Then you talk on your own for up to two minutes, and the examiner stops you when the time is up.
What you write in that minute has to carry the whole talk. The card here asks about someone from your work or studies who helped you. We plan it together first, then you record your own.
Warm-up
Which notes?
Three students made notes for a card about someone who helped them. Which notes will help most once they start talking?
Which notes are most useful?
How it works
Now I'm going to give you a topic and I'd like you to talk about it for one to two minutes. Before you talk, you'll have one minute to think about what you're going to say. You can make some notes if you wish.
Describe a person you have worked or studied with who helped you.
You should say:
- who this person is
- how you know them
- what they helped you with
and explain how their help made a difference to you.
You keep the card and your notes while you talk. When you finish, the examiner may ask one or two short questions.
One minute of notes
- 1Choose fast
Take the first person you can say a lot about, even if someone else would sound more impressive. Deciding should take seconds.
- 2One line for each prompt
Two to four words for each point on the card. Write facts you can talk about, such as sat next to me or first project.
- 3Put a story in the middle
For what they helped you with, note one real moment: what went wrong, what the person did, what they said.
- 4Note the ending
The explain line is the most personal part of the card. Write what changed for you, and what you do now because of it.
Two minutes of talk
- 25 sec: Who they are, how you know them
- 60 sec: What they helped with: one story
- 35 sec: The difference it made
Total: 120 sec
When your notes run out
Go back to the story and add what the person said, what you did next, or how you felt at the time. A story can grow for as long as you need it to. Keep talking until the examiner stops you: a talk that ends early gives them less of your English to assess.
Watch me do one
Say I work for a software company. The first person I think of is Grace, the senior developer who trained me. I take her straight away.
Prompt one, who she is: Grace, senior developer. Prompt two, how I know her: desk next to mine, first job, 3 years.
Prompt three is the middle of the talk, so it needs a story: first big task, panicked, she split it into small steps.
The explain line gets the most thought: not afraid of big tasks now, train new staff her way.
I still have a few seconds, so I add one detail I can quote: her rule, stuck for an hour, ask.
That's five short lines. Each one will become three or four sentences when I talk.
A model answer
Describe a person you have worked or studied with who helped you.
I'd like to talk about Grace, who's a senior developer at the software company where I work. I've known her for about three years now. When I joined, I was given the desk next to hers, and she was asked to look after me for my first few months. The thing she helped me with most was my first big task. It was a new booking page for one of our clients, and honestly, I panicked. I'd only ever worked on small projects at university, and I didn't know where to start. I spent two days reading the old code and getting nowhere. Grace noticed, but she didn't fix it for me. She sat down with me and split the whole task into about ten small steps. Then she said something I still remember: "If you're stuck for more than an hour, ask. Nobody minds." That made a real difference. I finished the page a bit late, but it worked, and the client was happy with it. More importantly, I stopped being afraid of big tasks, because I knew how to break them up. And now, actually, I'm the one doing the training. Two new developers have joined this year, and I've used Grace's method with both of them. So I suppose her help has reached people she's never even met.
- GrammarThe present perfect with for: she is still a colleague.
- CoherenceTells the examiner the talk has moved on to the third prompt.
- TaskOne real moment, with detail, carries the middle of the talk.
- TaskHer own words make the story specific and easy to picture.
- CoherenceMoves to the explain line and marks it as the main point.
- GrammarThe present perfect for events in a time that is not over yet: this year.
- VocabularyA personal, natural ending that answers how it made a difference.
Coloured text shows what the examiner is looking for.
Practice with Elita6 questions
Four quick questions on the plan and the talk, then two recordings: your full talk, and one follow-up question.
Which prompt?
Read this sentence from a talk. Which point on the card does it answer?
We sat next to each other for my first six months, and we've kept in touch since I moved teams.
A tense to fix
These four sentences open a talk. One has a tense mistake. Choose it.
Which sentence contains the error?
Out of notes
You have been talking for about seventy seconds, and you have used all your notes.
What is the best thing to do?
The explain line
Which of these works best as the answer to explain how their help made a difference to you?
Choose the best ending.
Record: your two minutes
Take one minute to make notes on paper, then talk. Stop when you reach two minutes.
Describe a person you have worked or studied with who helped you. You should say: who this person is, how you know them, what they helped you with, and explain how their help made a difference to you.
Record your answer (120s maximum)
0:00 / 2:00
Set up your learning path at the top of this lesson to get band-specific feedback.
Record: a follow-up question
When your talk ends, the examiner may ask one or two short questions. Answer this one in a sentence or two.
Do you still see this person?
Record your answer (30s maximum)
0:00 / 0:30
Set up your learning path at the top of this lesson to get band-specific feedback.
Words to keep
Take care of a person, such as a new colleague, and make sure they are all right. She was asked to look after me for my first few months.
Make no progress. I spent two days on the task and got nowhere.
Divide it into parts. She split the task into ten small steps.
Be unable to go on with something. If you're stuck for more than an hour, ask for help.
Stay in contact. We've kept in touch since I moved teams.
Have a clear effect, usually a good one. Her advice made a real difference to my first year.
Before you go
Choose a person in seconds, and write one short line for each point on the card.
Build the middle of the talk around one story, with what the person did or said.
Save time for the explain line, and say what changed for you.
When your notes run out, go back to the story and add detail. Keep talking until the examiner stops you.
Next: Then comes a Task 2 essay about working from home, where you decide whether its advantages are greater than its disadvantages.