Shadowing Practice: IELTS Speaking Practice Test- Almost Perfect - Learn English Speaking with Video

Let's talk about fashion and style.

How would you describe your style?

Interesting question.

I feel like my style is diverse.

On some days, I just put on a black t-shirt and jeans.

And on some other days, it depends on where I'm going.

I'd like to dress up a little bit, put on some fancy clothes and just go out with it.

What influences your clothing choices?

It depends on my mood and also it depends where I'm going.

So for instance, let's say I'm going to the gym, of course I'm gonna be in like sportswear or

if I'm going to a wedding I have to wear a suit

and tie and if I'm going let's say to a social gathering with my friends,

it's just gonna be like smart casual or casual clothes.

How has your style changed over the years?

A lot actually.

See, when I was a teenager, it was kind of like funky or streetwear,

crazy colors, you know, put on some bracelets, necklaces, crazy hairstyle.

But as you get older, I changed my style a little bit to more elegant, more simple and less crazy colors.

Now let's talk about art and creativity.

What type of art do you prefer?

Actually, it depends because I think art is branched.

So, for instance, art consists of music, theater, cinema, and paintings.

But for me personally, I love art.

And specifically, I love cinema.

Would you like to learn more about art in the future?

Yeah, sure.

I am open for different ideas, different perspectives, especially I'm not interested at the moment in let's say paintings

or modern art but I'm interested in the future to learn more about it.

Now let's talk about relaxation.

How do you relax?

Oh I love relaxing.

There is a lot of ways to relax.

I could just book a massage session

or the most common way

and my favorite way is going to the beach on an

early morning where it's empty no one is there I just grab my stuff go to the beach

and just sit and chill there.

What do you do to manage stress?

Interesting question there's a lot of ways

but the first one I would always use it is just to take deep breath and just slowly exhale

and since I'm a Muslim guy, I read a lot of Quran.

So it helps me calm instantly.

What helps you stay calm when you're very busy?

I think just being busy.

The idea itself, it keeps me calm.

I'm not a very stressed person in general,

but sometimes you get in trouble or in a situation where it makes you just stressed or anxious.

So I try to cope with it and just like remember that it's not the end of the world.

I can just finish the task and be with it.

Describe a time when you help someone solve a problem.

Recently, a friend of mine asked me about what's the best car option to buy

since he was having a lot of issues and problems in his current car.

So I was like, sure, I would give you like a few options.

and the first option was Ford since I own a Ford car and it was a pickup truck.

So I would definitely recommend it for him, this option.

But he told me like I prefer something a little bit smaller and more eco-fuel and efficient.

I said sure and I gave him different options about let's say Toyota is a really good option and Nissan,

they have a variety of options.

I really decided to help him since I have the knowledge about the cars and what's good,

what's bad, what fits his personality because it's really important to have a car that fits your personality

other than the eco-fuel system or the fancy look or the color.

and I really felt happy helping him about the option and he eventually ended up buying a Ford truck.

The reason why he bought this pickup truck because it's a big car

and when you drive a big car in the streets it really helps you

and let's say seeing the view from afar to avoid a car accident or a sudden break

and at the same time people just avoid coming across you

and it's just like you feel like a king driving a big car.

So we've been talking about a friend that you helped solve a problem.

We're going to continue to talk about problem solving.

What qualities make someone good at solving problems?

Ooh, tough one.

To thank you for watching this video, I want to give you a free course that has helped thousands of students improve their IELTS speaking score.

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Thanks very much.

And let's get back to the video.

In my opinion, the age of the person, because the older you get,

the more knowledge and wisdom you get with life experience and interacting with different type of people and personalities and characters.

So in my opinion, I think the age is one of the qualities

or let's say a point where it helps in being qualified in solving a problem.

Why do some people prefer to solve problems alone rather than ask for help?

For me personally, I like to feel that I am an independent person

and try as much as possible to solve a certain problem with my own knowledge

and with my own abilities before I go out and ask someone for help.

For example, once I had a problem about choosing the right major where I wanted to study.

So my parents were actually like trying to suggest for me to study interior design like my brother.

But for me, I was like, no, I prefer to choose something that I love.

So I ended up choosing the media field and mass communication.

Now let's talk about emotional intelligence.

What role does emotional intelligence play in solving problems?

Oh, it's a big role actually.

And it's really important to have the emotional intelligence.

I didn't have it before.

Like when I was younger at my teenage years, also 18, 19.

Because it's a crucial thing to have in helping you solve problems or solving a conflict.

let's say you're having a discussion with a friend of yours.

So if you have the emotional intelligence, you wouldn't change it to become a problem or a big issue between you two.

If you have the emotional intelligence, you would just take it as different perspectives between two friends and discussing and exchanging ideas.

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So it is really important to learn about it if you don't know a lot about the emotional intelligence.

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Some people think that the best way to help other people is to be as empathetic as possible, while other people think that you should be brutally honest with people.

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Which do you think is the best approach?

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Oh, tough one.

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Can you just repeat the question again?

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Some people think that the best way to help others is to be as empathetic as possible, to show empathy, show I understand you.

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Yeah.

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and other people think that the best way is to just tell them the truth, even if it hurts their feelings.

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Okay, it's a tough one, but I think both, they both go hand in hand.

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Let's say being an empath or having empathy towards someone,

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it's really good, especially if they are having a major problem in their life or they are trying to solve it.

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Let's say depression.

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You can't be brutally honest with someone because you might end up pushing him or her to st.

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So in this case, you have to be really empathetic or trying to choose your words wisely.

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But in terms, let's say, someone who is actually rude or not a nice person and someone who is a boy or trying to attack someone,

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You have to be brutally honest and strict with them and tell them you are doing something wrong.

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You can't be like that or you can't act this way.

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So it depends on the context or the situation that this person is in.

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So let me give you some feedback on your performance.

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I'll give you feedback on part one, two and three.

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And then I'll give you feedback on the market criteria on your score.

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Okay.

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Your part one was very impressive because a lot of students, when they first do the test,

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the first few questions, you can tell they're nervous or they are overperforming.

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Your answers were quite elegant because you weren't trying to show off you weren't trying to give crazy big answers, and you weren't really nervous.

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You were giving very natural answers, just like speaking to a friend or a colleague.

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I don't want to use the word simple because the people at home watching might think that simple means basic.

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I don't mean simple in terms of basic.

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I mean simple in terms of elegant and simple in terms of effective. So very, very impressive.

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Your development was spot on.

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You weren't giving too much and you weren't giving too little.

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You would answer the question and then you would give enough information for the examiner to really judge your pronunciation, your grammar, your vocabulary, your fluency.

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And all of that was good.

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I have no real feedback to give you on that.

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No, nothing negative really to say.

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There's some issues with fluency and grammar and vocabulary in it, but we'll come to that in a minute.

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Part two, what I liked about your part two performance was you picked a real scenario

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and you attached it to the cue card.

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So they asked you about a problem you solved.

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It's quite a vague topic.

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The reason why they always give something quite vague is so that people, no matter where they are in the world,

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can attach real scenarios from their own life.

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And that's what you did talking about your friend.

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Talking about a real situation allows you to be a lot more fluent because you're not recalling or thinking too much.

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You're just talking naturally.

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So again, I'll use the word naturally a lot because that, I think, is the most important thing.

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And you did that very, very well.

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However, you did stop at about 1 minute 30.

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And what I did was I just did this.

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If the examiner is good, they will give you some cues to help you speak.

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Because really you need to get to two minutes.

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And the examiner will always stop you.

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Once I reach the two minutes.

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The best piece of advice is just keep talking until they stop you.

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They will stop you because they want to go home.

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So they will stop you.

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It's hard to judge on test day.

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You spoke for one minute 30, nearly exactly.

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On test day, you might be a little bit stressed.

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You don't seem like the type of person that would be stressed, but believe me, even the coolest customers can become stressed.

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And time warps a little bit when we are stressed.

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So you might only speak for 45 seconds and think that you've been speaking for two minutes, and then you stop, and the examiner's like, you're basically saying to the examiner,

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I don't have enough English to complete this. So just keep talking.

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When I did this, you immediately started talking more fluently again.

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So you wouldn't really lose any marks or anything because of that.

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Sometimes when students stop talking and you do this, they are like, uh, and become flustered.

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More stressed.

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Yeah.

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But you made great notes on the page.

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I would encourage you to do that on test day.

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The notes are not there to be read from.

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The notes are there to just help you if you get stuck.

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So if on test day you're like, oh, I have nothing else to say, quick look at the notes, continue on.

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Part three was also good.

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The thing I liked about your part three performance was it seemed as

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if you were approaching it like a challenge or a game.

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You were like, oh, this is actually interesting.

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That's very different from how most students approach it, which is I hate this shit.

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I don't want to be here.

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Why is he asking me these questions?

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I hate this.

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I love challenge.

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Exactly.

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So, what I loved about yours was that you could tell that you find them genuinely interesting.

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Now, not all questions will be interesting like that, but on test day, I have that approach.

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It's a little game, it's a challenge, and you did really develop your answers quite well.

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A lot of the time you show both sides of the argument and everything.

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So let me give you some feedback on your scores and the marking criteria.

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So there's four marking criteria.

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Pronunciation, fluency and coherence, grammar, vocabulary.

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Pronunciation is divided into two.

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The first part of pronunciation is, can I understand what you're saying?

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I can understand 100% of the words that you're saying.

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You do have a slight accent, but that doesn't matter.

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You're not being judged on how British or American you sound.

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That's not what good communication necessarily is.

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What good communication is is can the person who's listening to you understand what you're saying.

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So for that, the examiner will give you at least a seven.

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Then when the examiner is considering should I give him a seven or an eight or a nine, they'll think of these things called higher level pronunciation features.

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What does that mean?

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So one of the things that it means is intonation.

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Sometimes our voices go up.

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Sometimes our voices go down.

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What we do in English is we use that to convey meaning.

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I don't know what it's like in, is Arabic your native language?

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I don't know if they use intonation to show meaning in a different language.

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They do.

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You don't speak with what we would call a monotone, which is basically someone who just speaks with completely flat,

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but you're so cool that you're not going up or down that much.

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So that would be one area of improvement.

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It's not bad.

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That's not bad.

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It's just part of my character.

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It is, yeah.

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But it is important on the test day.

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On test day.

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For general communication, I don't think it is terribly important for you to invest a lot of time in that.

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But if you wanted a band nine, you would have to work on that a little bit.

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The quick way of fixing that is to speak with things very passionately.

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You love talking about fashion.

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Oh, you know, my style used to be there.

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You will naturally improve your intonation by adding more emotion.

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But you seem like you're quite cool and collected.

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So maybe that's part of your character and that isn't going to.

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But again, not everybody needs a band nine

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and it might actually lead to more issues because if you're thinking about being more emotional, it could affect your answers.

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It could may lead to mistakes because you're thinking in an unnatural way.

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So I wouldn't necessarily do that.

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Other thing is connected speech.

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So when we speak in English, I would not say, do you want a coffee?

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I'd say, do you want a coffee?

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You speak more towards the end of saying each word, each syllable individually.

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Because you speak quite slowly, you don't connect the words together as much as a native English speaker would.

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Again, not a criticism.

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For you in your job, I think the most important thing is that you should be understood.

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So again, if you try and learn lots of connected speech and you start talking, like the way I'm talking right now,

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I don't talk to my family and friends like this.

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I'm speaking extremely slowly for me and clearly for the people watching at home.

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If you heard me speaking to my friends, you wouldn't understand anything.

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So I think connected speech is also something that is, It could take years to learn.

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So is it really worth your time to sound more like a native speaker if that is even your goal?

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Your goal, I think, is to speak English and be understood.

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So I wouldn't worry about it too much.

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Because you are not using connected speech and intonation the same way a native English speaker would, I would give you a band eight rather than a band nine.

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So it's a lower band, but you shouldn't think I'm bad at speaking English.

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It's actually because you're so clear.

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Does that make sense?

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It does make sense, yeah, of course.

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But I mean band eight is a great...

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Less than 1% of people get a band nine.

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Oh, okay.

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So don't worry about not getting a band nine.

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I'm fine with that score.

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Let's talk about fluency and coherence.

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Coherence means did you answer the question and did you develop the question enough?

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I don't have any worries about that.

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Whenever you get asked a question, you can tell you're thinking deeply about the question.

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You go, hmm, that's actually an interesting question.

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And that's a good tactic.

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But sometimes you think so deeply about it that you're thinking about the next thing to say.

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You don't have a fluency problem because your English is bad.

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Some people do.

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So I'm sure you know people, your friends or family, that don't speak English to the level

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that you do and they're searching for the correct adjective or the correct tense, you're not doing that at all.

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You are doing what we call searching for ideas.

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Again, I don't think it is a huge issue.

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You're quite a unique candidate in that if we try to make you better, it might make you worse.

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Yeah, I don't understand that.

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If we tell you, don't think, and just speak the first thing that pops into your head.

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That would be my advice for most students.

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But for you, I think that your style of communication actually is improved by thinking deeply about it.

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But on test day, I wouldn't try and think of the absolute best idea.

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I would think of what's the easiest idea for me to talk about.

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And that will improve your fluency a little bit.

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I would say your fluency is at a band eight because of that reason that you do pause quite a lot.

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And if I give you a bad nine, everybody in the comments will be like, he pauses too.

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But the key for people back home is that what it says in the marking criteria is unnatural pausing.

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I've gotten to know you today, so I know that the pausing is not unnatural.

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It's actually who you are.

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But an examiner on test day doesn't know you at all, and they might think, he doesn't know the right adjective.

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He doesn't know the right tense.

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For most people in the world, a band eight is extremely high and is good enough to move to any country in the world.

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Band nine is just showing off.

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I'm humble.

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Grammar, you have enough grammatical structures to talk about anything.

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So some people, if you ask them to talk about the past and compare it to the future,

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they don't know really how to do it or compare two things that you have no issues whatsoever.

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You do make little grammatical errors sometimes.

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So for example, this is a mistake that I actually make, more simple instead of simpler.

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Or you said open for instead of open to, so like a little preposition error.

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But native English speakers make those little slips too.

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I make those little slips.

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So what it says in the marking criteria for band nine is the mistakes

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that you make are slips like that and they're very infrequent.

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I think your grammar is at a band nine.

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Same with your vocabulary.

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Sometimes you could use a word that is a little bit more advanced.

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If I give you the advice of improve the complexity, you might make more mistakes.

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I think you're on the border of a band nine for vocabulary.

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So I think overall you're at a band like 8.5.

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As I said before, band nine is less than 1%.

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But 8.5, I think, is top 2 or 3%.

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Not of speakers in the whole world, but of people who do the IELTS test.

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I think people can learn a lot from your performance because it's so different to what most people do.

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It's unique.

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It is unique.

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It is unique.

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So yeah, thank you very much.

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What You'll Learn from This IELTS Speaking Practice

This video is a goldmine for English speaking practice, especially for IELTS prep. You’ll pick up two key skills: structuring answers with specific examples (like linking clothing choices to occasions) and adapting tone to different topics. Notice how the speaker smoothly shifts from casual (talking about jeans) to reflective (discussing stress management), a critical skill for IELTS fluency. Additionally, the dialogue models natural response expansion—instead of short answers, the speaker adds details (e.g., “early morning beach” vs. “going to the beach”), which boosts your score in the “coherence” criterion.

Listen For These Sounds: Connected Speech in Action

To master shadowspeak (shadowing speech), focus on linking and reductions. The speaker often connects words, like “gonna be” (instead of “going to be”) and “kind of like” (blending “kind of” into “kinda”). Listen for how “I feel like my style” becomes “I feellikemy style” with minimal pauses. Reductions like “it’s just gonna be” (gonna = going to) are common in casual speech, and mimicking these will make your speaking sound more natural. These patterns are key for the shadowing technique, as they train your mouth to move like a native.

Say It Like a Native: Rhythm and Stress

The speaker’s rhythm is relaxed but purposeful—stress falls on key words to emphasize meaning. For example, in “more elegant, more simple,” “elegant” and “simple” are stressed to highlight the shift in style. Practice mirroring this by stressing adjectives and verbs that carry emotion (e.g., “love cinema,” “calm instantly”). Also, notice the pauses after transitions like “So for instance” and “Actually”—these give your speech flow, a must for IELTS. Use the shadowing technique to repeat the dialogue aloud, matching the speaker’s pace and stress to build muscle memory for natural delivery.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result	If the examiner is good, they will give
Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on	we've been talking · you've been speaking
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	is branched · being qualified · would be stressed
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	someone who is · monotone, which is · people who do

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

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