Shadowing Practice: Most Common IELTS Speaking Part 1 Questions and Answers - Learn English Speaking with Video
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How do you answer the most common IELTS Speaking Part 1 questions in 2025?
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Are you ready to find out?
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Hello, it's Keith from the Keith Speaking Academy, here to help you become a more confident speaker of English.
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Today, I'm going to show you how to answer some of the most common IELTS Speaking Part 1 questions this year.
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You may have seen me do some reels and shorts, giving some sample answers at different levels.
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Well, today I'm going to go even deeper.
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I'm going to give you a simple answer and then an even better answer.
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But I'm going to explain why it's better
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and how you can make your answers much better so you can get a higher score in the IELTS speaking test.
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Okay, let's look at the first topic, which is talking about where you live.
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Okay, now remember, in part one, you want to give short answers, but develop a little bit, maybe two to three sentences,
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and you're talking about you, your life, your experience.
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Okay, so let's have a look at the question.
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First, I'll show you a simple answer, and then an even better answer.
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So, do you live in a house or an apartment?
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I live in an apartment.
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It's on the seventh floor and it's in the city centre.
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There's lots of space and also we are close to a park.
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Okay, a nice, simple, correct answer.
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Now let's see an even better answer.
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So, I live in an apartment with my family.
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we actually live on the seventh floor of a high-rise building right in the city centre.
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It's really spacious and there's a great balcony overlooking our local park.
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Okay, so what made this second answer even better?
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First thing is connectors.
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Simple connectors like So, just connecting.
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Secondly, I use what I call emphasis words.
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Words like actually.
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So instead of we live on the seventh floor, we actually live on the seventh floor.
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Right?
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Just emphasizing.
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Right.
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Right in the city center.
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The house is right in the city center.
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That right is emphasizing.
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Thirdly, topic-specific vocabulary.
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The examiner wants to know if you can talk about this topic of houses and where you live with that specialised vocabulary.
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So use one or two words if you can.
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Here, I've got high-rise building, balcony, topic-specific vocabulary.
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Fourth, adjectives.
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They really embellish your answers.
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Words like spacious, having a lot of space.
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Finally, five adverbs.
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Adverbs, again, will just enrichen your communication, right?
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Here I said, it's really spacious.
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Really, right?
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Adverbs like pretty, really, fairly, quite, and so on.
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Okay, that is how we've made our first answer even better.
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Let's move on.
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Okay, the next question is about the city where you live.
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Let's see a simple answer.
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Tell me about the city where you live.
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Well, I live in Manchester, which is a big city.
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There's a lot of traffic.
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And to be honest, I find it too noisy.
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Now, let's see how we can make it even better.
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I live in a pretty big city, Manchester, which is up in the north of England.
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There's an awful lot of traffic and traffic jams, especially in the rush hour.
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For me, it's far too noisy.
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I think I prefer to live in the countryside.
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Okay, so what made this second answer even better?
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Again, first of all, notice the adverbs and adjectives, right?
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I said I live in a pretty big, pretty big, it just gives it a richer sense, right?
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There's an awful lot of traffic, right?
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There's traffic, okay.
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There's a lot of traffic?
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Good.
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There's an awful lot of traffic, even better.
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In addition, we've got, again, topic-specific vocabulary.
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So vocabulary related to the city where I live.
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Words like traffic jam, rush hour.
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Simple, just one or two, but it shows the width, great word, the width of vocabulary I have.
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Finally, I make a comparison.
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But not only a simple comparison, instead of saying it's too noisy, I say it's far too noisy.
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So it's exaggerating or emphasizing the comparison, right?
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It's easy.
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It's far too easy.
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It's far too noisy.
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Really nice.
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Let's move on.
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Okay, let's look next at the topic of personal routine and preferences.
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Very often in part one, you may be asked, do you prefer A or B?
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Okay, so let's have a look at the question about mornings or evenings and a simple answer first.
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Do you prefer mornings or afternoons?
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I prefer the mornings.
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I have more energy and I can get more things done in the mornings.
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I usually feel too tired to do anything in the evenings.
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Nice.
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Let's see how I make it even better.
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Well, I'm definitely an early bird.
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I mean, I've always been an early riser.
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so I usually get up when the sun rises without even setting my alarm clock.
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I just feel much more energetic and productive in the mornings,
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especially compared to the evenings when I feel drained and I just want to disconnect in front of the TV.
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Okay, so what makes the second one an even better answer?
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First of all, again, topic-specific vocabulary.
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Things like an early bird or an early riser.
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Okay.
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Setting my alarm clock.
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Notice when you're learning vocabulary to focus on the collocation, to set your alarm clock.
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Right.
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It's to set the time.
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So when you're using new vocabulary, think about the collocation.
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What are the words that go together?
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Right.
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Setting my alarm clock.
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also here i use very very powerful way of making an answer better
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and it's to use a present perfect tense after the present simple super easy
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but super effective okay using different tenses overall is good right
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but here i say i am an early bird present simple i've always been an early riser Present perfect,
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which means something that I began years ago and continue until today.
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I have always been an early riser.
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It's easy.
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Present simple, then the present perfect.
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This is the state now, and this is from the past to now.
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Okay.
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Well, I'm definitely an early bird.
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I've always been an early riser.
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And notice when you're speaking, we often make the contraction.
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I've been.
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You don't have to, but it's nice.
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Secondly, thirdly, speaking fillers.
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Words like, well, I mean, you know, just.
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So here I said, I mean, I'm definitely an early bird.
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I mean, I've always been an early riser.
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And then I use the word just.
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And just is kind of what we call a hedging word.
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It makes it a bit softer.
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So instead of saying, I feel more energetic, I just feel more energetic.
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I just feel more energetic.
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It doesn't really mean anything, but it's one of these speaking filler words, which is really powerful, right?
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I think I use it later.
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I say, I just want to disconnect.
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I just want to disconnect.
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Finally, notice the adverbs and adjectives.
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Here, adjectives I'm using.
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Energetic, productive, drained, tired, really tired.
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Really nice adjectives.
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Again, they kind of embellish the answer.
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Lovely.
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Let's move on.
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Okay, the next question is about free time, hobbies.
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Let's look at a simple answer.
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What do you do in your free time?
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I try to relax.
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I like walking.
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I go to the park with my dog.
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We walk around.
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Yeah, I like it a lot.
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Very nice.
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Let's make it even better.
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So whenever I get free time, I tend to take my dog for a walk in the local park.
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We'll stroll around for half an hour or so, or until he gets too tired.
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He is getting on a bit.
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Yeah, so that's my favourite way to spend my free time and unwind.
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Okay, so what made it better?
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A lot of the same things.
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One of the first things is very often we say, I usually do this.
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I usually do that.
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You can change that.
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You can say, I tend to.
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I tend to.
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I tend to take my dog for a walk or I typically take my dog for a walk.
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OK, just a nice variation.
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Again, topic specific vocabulary about free time.
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Stroll.
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Unwind to relax.
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OK, nice, easy to use words here.
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One of the techniques I use in this answer is to add extra information.
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When you're speaking, it's different from writing.
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There's less structure.
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So we tend to say something and then add something, then add something and add something.
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And so it becomes a complex sentence as we're adding bits of information.
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Here, I say, we'll stroll around.
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We will, as in habit, we will stroll around for half an hour or so.
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And then I add, or until he gets too tired.
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And then I add more.
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He's getting on a bit.
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He's getting on means he's getting old.
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So it's just simple adding information.
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it actually, in spoken English, this is creating more complex structures, okay?
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Really easy to do.
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Add bits of information.
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Don't worry too much about linking.
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If you can, it's good, but you don't always have to.
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All right, great.
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Let's move on to our final topic.
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Okay, another very, very popular common topic, work or study, okay?
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here's a question and a really nice simple answer.
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What do you do?
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Do you work or are you a student?
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I'm a student.
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I'm studying French at the university.
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I'm in my first year.
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It's an interesting course and the teachers are really good.
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Yeah.
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Okay, now let's level up the answer.
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So I'm an undergraduate student at Manchester University.
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I'm studying French, as a matter of fact.
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I've been on this course for around six months now, and I'm loving it.
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I mean, it's challenging for sure.
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But the teachers, even though they're pretty strict, are really supportive.
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So how have we made this even better?
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We're doing a lot of the tricks that we've talked about so far.
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Let's have a look we're using these speaking fillers
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or what i sometimes call emphasis words like as a matter of fact yeah i can say i'm studying french
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or i'm studying french as a matter of fact just emphasizing i mean i use for sure
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and these are They're all kind of simple speaking fillers.
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They're helping connect.
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They're making it sound like natural spoken English.
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This is where you become more natural and not just robotic, okay?
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I also do this thing with present simple, present perfect.
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Different tenses.
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I'm studying French.
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I've been on this course for six months.
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I have been on this course for six months.
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I'm studying and then you kind of go back in time.
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I started six months ago until now.
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I've been contraction.
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I've been on this course for six months.
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Also, I do something here about adding information.
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Do you remember last time I talked about adding information?
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Here, we do it particularly with a relative clause, right?
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So it's the teachers, comma, are really supportive.
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The teachers are really supportive.
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The bit in commas is the extra information.
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The teachers, even though they're pretty strict, are really supportive.
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Okay.
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It's a more complex way of adding information, but it's easy to do written.
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It's a little more challenging spoken because you need to be more fluent to make it work.
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The teachers, even though they're pretty strict, are really supportive.
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If you say this slowly, you would have to put they at the end.
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But the teachers, even though they're pretty strict, they are really supportive.
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So you can add the they at the end if you feel you're going too slowly.
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The important thing is extra information, extra language for the examiner to see how good you are, how good you really are in English.
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Great.
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So today I've shown you how to make your IELTS speaking part one answers even better
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so you can show the examiner just how good you really are.
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So just to remind you the different things you can do, you can use simple connectors.
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So, well, emphasis words, speaking fillers.
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I mean, as a matter of fact, you can use or think about topic-specific vocabulary.
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Think about adjectives and adverbs.
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Pretty good, fairly good, an awful lot of traffic.
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Think about different tenses, especially the present simple and the present perfect.
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I'm a teacher.
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I've been doing this job for donkey's years.
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Think about adding extra information and also making comparisons.
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All of these, of course, don't do all of them in one answer, but use them and think about them as you're practicing
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and then you'll really be able to show off the language you've got to the IELTS speaking examiner.
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Build your confidence.
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That's it.
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If you want all of this information, kind of a summary, there is a PDF you can download for free from the website.
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If you enjoy the work I do on YouTube, think about becoming a member on YouTube.
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Just for $2 a month, you can get access to, well, emojis, extra badges, lots of extra little videos
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that will give you a bit of a more intimate connection with me
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and more information about learning English and preparing for IELTS speaking.
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So come and join me.
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Join the membership.
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It helps me.
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It supports the work I'm doing on YouTube and I really, really will appreciate it.
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That's it for today.
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Thank you so much for watching.
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Can't wait to see you soon.
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Take care, my friend.
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Bye-bye.
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Why practice speaking with this video?
The video titled "Most Common IELTS Speaking Part 1 Questions and Answers" is a valuable resource for learners looking to improve their English speaking practice. By presenting common questions that may appear in the IELTS speaking test, it provides a context for practical application. Engaging with the specific scenarios allows learners to practice their responses while acquiring vital vocabulary and phrases. Additionally, the video emphasizes the importance of connecting ideas with appropriate language, helping learners communicate more fluidly and effectively.
Furthermore, practicing with this video can help you increase your confidence in speaking English and refine your ability to express yourself clearly. Using the shadowing technique advocated in the video, you can mimic the speaker's intonation, pronunciation, and pacing, enhancing your overall speaking skills. This combination of practice and immediate application makes it an ideal tool for anyone wanting to learn English with YouTube.
Grammar & Expressions in Context
Throughout the video, several key structures are highlighted that can enhance your speaking skills:
- Present Perfect Tense: The speaker often uses this tense, such as in "I've always been an early riser." This structure expresses an action that started in the past and continues to the present, making your speech more dynamic.
- Adverbs and Adjectives: Descriptive words like "spacious" and "far too noisy" are employed to embellish responses. Incorporating these types of vocabulary enriches your expressions and provides a more vivid picture to the listener.
- Connectors and Emphatic Words: Using phrases like "actually," "especially," or "so" helps to connect ideas smoothly and emphasize key points, making your speech more cohesive.
- Topic-Specific Vocabulary: Including specific terms related to common questions, such as "traffic jam" or "high-rise building," demonstrates your ability to discuss relevant subjects with appropriate terminology.
By integrating these grammatical structures into your responses, you can significantly improve the clarity and expressiveness of your spoken English.
Common Pronunciation Traps
When tackling the IELTS Speaking test questions found in this video, English learners should be aware of certain pronunciation challenges:
- Terms like "apartment" and "balcony": These words can be tricky due to their syllable stress. Ensure you stress the correct syllables to make your speaking sound more natural.
- Words with silent letters: For instance, "often" can be pronounced with or without the 't' sound, depending on the accent. Be conscious of how these variations might affect clarity.
- Connecting Words: Phrases containing connectors may require practice to ensure smooth transitions, such as saying "I actually" quickly and fluidly.
Utilizing a shadowing site can be an effective way to practice overcoming these pronunciation traps, allowing you to mimic the speaker’s rhythm and intonation for optimal clarity. Embrace these elements to elevate your English speaking proficiency further!
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | we've made · I've always been · have always been |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | topic, which is · Manchester, which is · words, which is |
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.