Speaking and Oral Interaction: Manage the Exchange
What is assessed
Oral tasks measure fluency, accuracy, pronunciation, range and - crucially - interactive competence: can you keep a conversation going, respond to what was actually said, and develop a topic beyond one sentence? Typical formats are a short monologue on a prompt, a picture or document description, and a discussion or role-play with the examiner or another candidate.
Concepts to master
Functions: describing, comparing, speculating, giving opinions with reasons, agreeing and disagreeing politely, making and responding to suggestions. Interaction strategies: turn-taking, asking for clarification (could you repeat that?), paraphrasing when a word is missing (the thing you use to...), and repairing your own errors. Pronunciation features that carry meaning: word stress, sentence stress on the key information, and intonation for questions and polite disagreement. Discourse markers (well, the thing is, on the other hand) buy thinking time naturally.
Traps
One-word answers that close the exchange. Delivering a memorised monologue regardless of the question. Ignoring the examiner's follow-up and returning to your prepared topic. Long silences instead of a repair phrase. Answering the question but never extending or inviting a response.
Rule of thumb
Extend every answer with the ARE pattern: Answer, Reason, Example. I'd rather travel by train - because it's far more relaxed - last summer, for instance, I worked the whole way there.
Worked example: Asked "Do you think cities should ban cars from the centre?", a weak reply is "Yes, I think so." A strong reply gives a position, a reason and a concrete case, then hands the turn back: "Broadly yes, mainly because of air quality - my own street halved its traffic - though deliveries still need access. What's your view?"