IELTS Speaking part 2 - Describe an activity

Language to say What

It’s hugely popular

It’s really trendy now

It tends to be popular with

It’s all the rage

It’s not the most popular/useful/interesting activity in the world, but...

Language to say How

You need patience, persistence, dedication/perseverance.

You need to be patient/persistent/dedicated/perseverant

It’s not for everyone

It takes a while to pick it up

It’s a piece of cake/ a doddle

There’s nothing to it.

Language to talk about challenges

The difficult/tricky thing about it is...

The biggest challenge/obstacle/hurdle with this activity is…

This activity poses a few challenges. For instance, …

In the end, even though it’s challenging, but it’s worth it.

 

Describe your experience of learning a foreign langage, talking about What, How and the Challenges.

 

After leaving university I went on holiday to Spain, and fell in love with the language and this beautiful country. So, I decided there and then that I was going to learn Spanish. It was quite a trendy language in England then for more and more people were going on holiday there and wanted to speak the lingo.

Now, it’s not the easiest langage in the world, especially when it comes to the grammar, and I know learning a language is not for everyone, but I wanted to give it a go.

So, I bought some books and audio recordings and set to it. On top of that, I actually signed up for some face-to-face classes. Everyday, I would listen, read and write a lot. It took a while but eventually I started to pick it up. The big thing I discovered was that you need patience and persistence to learn a Language since it seems to take for ages.

For me one of the trickiest things, without a doubt, was the grammar. It’s so complex. That said, the biggest hurdle was actually not giving up until you make it. Several times I wanted to pack it in because I felt I wasn’s progressing. But I stuck at it and a few months later I felt that I had reached a good level.

So, for me it has been a great experience and it has turned out to be really useful. I use the language in different ways, going holiday in Spain, reading newspaper or books. Learning a langage is challenging but it’s really worth it.

 

Comments

Vocabulary

the lingo = a foreign langage

there and then = immediately

to pick it up = start improving, get the hang of it

pack it in = to stop doing

stick at sth = continue to try doing sth even though it is hard

to give sth a go = to try/to attempt doing sth

set sth in = to being doing it seriously/dedicatedly

Adjectives: patient / persistent / beautiful / challenging / trendy / tricky / useful

Tenses

simple tense / past tense / past continuous / present perfect / past perfect