PART 2

Talk about a place you went to often as a child.

You should say:

– What this place is?

– Where is it located?

– What can people do there?

– Why you went there as a child and how do you feel about it now.  

You will have one to two minutes to talk about this topic.
You will have one minute to prepare what you are going to say.
You can make notes if you wish. 

Step 1 – read the question carefully paying attention to the important details of the topic sentence. 

Step 2 – place 🡪 5% location (6 seconds), 10% appearance, 10% attendees, 40% activities, 35% experience *2 minutes to speak 120 seconds

STEP 3 – Identify the tense, what should be my focus 🡪 Verb tense past (90%) and present (10%) [present and past perfect are very useful here] (no future, 0%)  

STEP 4 – Think about 2-3 good options for this answer, a. original, b. lots of information, c. easy to talk about

“often” -> at least once or twice a week for a year or more. 

“child” -> 7 to 15 -> because it is a time interval I can remember and I was quite active from the age of 7. 

Candy shop – confectionary, sweets shop, football pitch (field), video arcade, scrapyard, ranch – horse riding, local pool

STEP 5 Notes – (local pool) – good notes are NOT obvious information, they are ideas which help you be more fluent and give further details. 

• 5km, district pool
• 50m, 10 lane, 3 pools, 1-3m deep
• Peers, trainers, lifeguard, teachers, parents
• Laps, races, diving, water polo, hold breath, rescue
• Front crawl, backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly
• Valuable, travel, new friends, job – lifeguard

STEP 6 – First sentence,

A place that I frequented from the age of seven to ten, about two to three times each week was my local pool, Crystal Lanes, located roughly five km from my home in my district. This recreation center is located on about ten acres of government land and is owned and operated by the city of Victoria. The pool is an Olympic sized 50-meter pool with ten lanes, and about 1 meter in the shallow end to 3 meters at the deep end. The deeper end of the pool also has three- and five-meter diving boards. There are two other smaller pools for toddlers and games. 

I had started going to this pool at the age of 7 with my parents for swimming lessons. And then later, with my peers from school. Of course there were always trainers and lifeguards who were there to make sure the I wouldn’t drown. Between the age of 7 and 15 I learned to effectively swim in several styles, front crawl, backstroke and even butterfly. I attained a lifeguard level one certificate at the age of 15 which later came in really handy to land a summertime job at the beach near my home. I participated in many fun events at the pool including swim meets and even the occasional water polo tournament. 

I have many emotional memories from my frequent visits to the pool. I can clearly recall being so scared of swimming in the deep end for the first time. Also, I remember how proud I was when I won my first race. Now, I look back on these regular visits to the pool with positive thoughts, not to mention that being a strong swimmer, I am confident while traveling to different aquatic destinations in the world and I can take full advantage of water sports like going surfing in Hawaii back in 2018.