Your student will be calm when they know what to expect from the exam

What if your exam candidate is not sure about their answer? – Tell them that there is actually no RIGHT answer. And they could always use hesitating structures such as:

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  • 
    I’m not sure what I think about…
    
  • 
    Let me think…
    
  • 
    I really can’t remember but …
    
  • 
    It depends on…
    
  • 
    I tend to think that…
    
  • 
    On the whole, it seems that…
    

What should your test taker do if they made a mistake? – Remind them to act like a figure skater: get up and go on. Just GO ON. Errors are inevitable. Embrace them. Or correct yourself quickly and go on. But don’t make a point of correcting themselves in every single mistake.

Should your exam candidate say less or more? – MORE is always better. That’s called EXTENT. The more extent there is to an answer, which means if an answer is reasonably long, the better! But remind the student of typical answer lengths for each Speaking section.

Can your student make up when they don’t know? – Yes, absolutely. It’s ok not to tell the truth; no one is going to check that. The candidate should only answer the questions appropriately and develop. However, they should not go off topic, as they will lose points for that. They should give relevant explanations, examples or opinions, depending on the question.

What if your student is very stressed and keeps hesitating? – Remind them to try and fill their “errrrm” thinking pauses with appropriate fillers, such as “Well, I’ve never thought about that…”. etc. or NO sound at all.

The purpose of Part 1 questions is to hear the exam taker answer questions on a few simple topics to find out whether they can sustain conversation about themselves and everyday situations.
This part is typically perceived as the easiest one, as talking about personal topics is usually easier than talking about more abstract topics.
Prepare your test taker to hear questions on the following topics:

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  Description of place of origin
  
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  Daily routine
  
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  Work and employment
  
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  Background education and childhood
  
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  Family structure
  
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  Public transportation in your home country
  
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  Forms of building in your home country
  
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  Typical occupations in your home country
  
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  Typical landscapes and weather in your home country
  
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  Plants and animals
  
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  Your personal likes and dislikes
  
• 
  Preferences in terms of reading material/films/music/games/entertainment/art/internet/pets/shopping
  
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  Hobbies, interests and pastimes
  
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  Celebrations, holidays and festivals
  
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  Languages and linguistic proficiency
  
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  Newspapers, media and TV
  
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  Etc., as this is not an exhaustive list
  

Remind your student that the questions in Section 1 of the Speaking exam will be clustered around one or two of these topics.
Thus, they may get 10-12 questions about Work and employment, and 6-8 questions about Hobbies, interests and pastimes.
Structure your activities around these topics, build vocabulary based on them, and enlarge their lexical resource as much as possible.
Remember to practise consistently and encourage building a solid vocabulary base for each of these topics.