TOEFL SPEAKING

Разговорный тест TOEFL®, часть 1

Пример ответа:

I’m in two minds about this. In some cases it can be really beneficial to be with other people when you’re trying to achieve something. For example, when I was trying to lose weight, I formed a group with some friends. We got together to weigh ourselves once a week. We went swimming and running together too. Being with other people motivated and encouraged me to eat less fatty food and do more exercise, so I think that was really beneficial. On the other hand, I once got together with my friends to form a study group before an exam, and to my mind, that was a waste of time. We spent too long chatting about our teachers, rather than focusing on the work. Then my friends spent ages discussing a topic I knew a lot about already. I’d have accomplished a lot more if I’d spent the afternoon reading on my own. So all in all, I think it depends on the activity whether I’d feel more productive doing something alone or with others.

Разговорный тест TOEFL®, часть 2

Транскрипт разговора:

(Male student) Thank goodness the department has made changes to the way they assess group work! I had a nightmare last term with our geology project. I couldn’t bear going through that again!

(Female student) Why, what happened?

(Male student) Well, there were three of us in the group. One guy worked really hard, but he didn’t trust anyone else to do anything. He just wanted to do it all himself.

(Female student) It sounds like you were freeloading.

(Male student) Well, I wasn’t. I offered up plenty of ideas, but he kept saying they were no good. In the end, I stopped trying and left it to him. The other guy was a waste of space. He didn’t pull his weight at all. We barely saw him.

(Female student) Did you get a good grade?

(Male student) A reasonable one, considering how little work I did.  But I’m sure I’d have done better if I’d been given the chance to say what I wanted.

 (Female student) Well, the new system should give you that opportunity.

 (Male student) Yeah, I hope so, though I wish they’d abolish group work altogether.  All this organization and communication is just a waste of time. It’s got nothing to do with geology.

Пример ответа:

The man is not keen on group work. In his experience, group work was frustrating because another group-member wasn’t interested in his ideas and so did the work himself. He denies being a freeloader because he did try, unlike the other team-member, but he admits that he did not deserve the marks he was awarded, because so little of the group work was his own. So it sounds as if the faculty is right in identifying that group marks don’t correctly reflect the amount of work students have done. Another problem is that the man wishes he’d had the opportunity to approach the task in an individual way. The faculty seems to recognize this. That is why they have decided to implement a system whereby students do an individual piece of work based on a group project.
The man and the faculty don’t agree on everything, though. The man doesn’t think that the skills required in group work; that is, group organization and communication, are useful for a student of geology. However, the faculty thinks they are, and that’s why they aren’t abolishing group work altogether.

Разговорный тест TOEFL®, часть 3

Прослушайте лекцию.

Транскрипт:

An example of how you might go about this is, well, I’ll describe a lesson I observed a few weeks ago. The teacher was teaching children about nature… about plants – specifically about how to identify different trees. The first thing she did was to play a game where students had to name as many trees as they could – without writing anything down, just speaking out loud. Then after that little activity, she described the different ways you can identify trees – from the shape of their leaves, their buds, their bark and so on. But you can imagine that the kids who don’t have very good imaginations… they couldn’t really visualize what she was talking about… their minds were starting to wander, they were shuffling in their seats and getting distracted. But that was okay, because next she showed some photos for them to look at on the electronic whiteboard, then passed around some picture books. Students then copied some of the pictures into their exercise books. After that, students got the chance to go out into the school grounds and physically identify some of the trees that were there. So it was quite an effective lesson – very memorable, and the pupils looked very engaged. A week later I asked one of them to describe to me the leaf of an oak tree, and she did so perfectly.

Пример ответа:

The idea behind the VAK theory is that everyone has a preferred way of learning. Visual people learn best through looking at things, auditory learners learn best when they hear something, and kinesthetic learners learn best by doing. The theory suggests that teachers need to include a range of activities in their lessons so that all pupils, whether they are visual, auditory or kinesthetic, get the chance to learn. The professor’s example shows a teacher doing just this. The game, where the students name trees, and the teacher’s opening talk, is designed to suit auditory learners, because at this point, they’re only using their ears. The photos, and the part where the students copy pictures of leaves is visual, although you could say that copying pictures is kinesthetic too. The part where they go outside and look at leaves is kinesthetic. The fact that the student could remember the shape of the oak leaf suggests that applying the VAK theory is a useful way of helping students to learn. However, we can’t assume it was the VAK theory that helped her remember. Perhaps the variety of activities kept her motivated, or maybe she was just a particularly bright student with a good memory

Разговорный тест TOEFL®, часть 4

Пример ответа:

The professor tells us that there was once water on Mars. There was a similar amount of water on the planet as there is on earth now. We know this because of data retrieved by a probe which is in orbit around Mars. The probe was launched in 1996, and has been sending data back to Earth ever since then. It has taken photographs and measured the shape of the land, so that maps can be drawn. From this information, scientists have been able to deduce that there was water there, because the rock formations on Mars are similar to the formation on Earth that were formed by water. Some of those scientists believe that there is water on Mars even now, but there doesn’t seem to be any evidence for this. Some studies have been done on a meteorite which landed on Earth in 2001, but there was no sign of any water there, although that doesn’t mean there isn’t any water on Mars, because Mars and this meteorite are not the same thing. We can also get pictures from astronomical telescopes, but they don’t really help us ascertain whether there is water on Mars or not either, because from this angle, we can only see the poles of Mars, and these are covered in dry ice. So, according to the lecture, we still don’t know whether or not there is currently water on Mars.