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Describe a goal you set that you tried your best to achieve: IELTS Speaking Cue Card

You should say

  • What Is the Goal?
  • When did You First Begin to Have This Goal?
  • How You Would Achieve the First Step of Your Goal?
  • How Easy or Difficult Do You Think It Will Be to Reach This Goal?
Show all 100 answers

Cue 1:What Is the Goal?

  • Clearly state the goal you set for yourself, making it specific and personal.
  • Explain why this goal was important to you and what motivated you to pursue it.

Example

The goal I set was to improve my English speaking skills, particularly to achieve a band score of 7.5 in the IELTS speaking test. This goal was important to me because I wanted to pursue higher studies abroad, and a good score in IELTS was a requirement for my university applications.

Cue 2:When did You First Begin to Have This Goal?

  • Mention when you first realized you wanted to achieve this goal.
  • Share any experiences or events that influenced your decision to set this goal.

Example

I first began to have this goal during my final year of college when I attended a seminar about studying abroad. Listening to the experiences of students who had successfully gone through the process inspired me to improve my English and aim for a higher score in IELTS.

Cue 3:How You Would Achieve the First Step of Your Goal?

  • Describe the initial steps you took to start working towards your goal.
  • Include any resources or strategies you used to help you get started.

Example

To achieve the first step of my goal, I enrolled in an IELTS preparation course. I also started practicing speaking with friends who were fluent in English. Additionally, I began watching English movies and listening to podcasts to improve my vocabulary and pronunciation.

Cue 4:How Easy or Difficult Do You Think It Will Be to Reach This Goal?

  • Reflect on the challenges you anticipate facing while pursuing this goal.
  • Discuss your mindset about overcoming these challenges and staying motivated.

Example

I think reaching this goal will be quite challenging, especially since I need to practice consistently and manage my time effectively. However, I believe that with dedication and the right resources, I can overcome these difficulties. I stay motivated by reminding myself of the opportunities that a good IELTS score will open up for me.

Conclusion

    Example

    In conclusion, setting the goal to improve my English speaking skills for the IELTS test has been a significant step in my academic journey. I am committed to working hard and believe that with perseverance, I will achieve my desired score and fulfill my dream of studying abroad.

    Following this structure will ensure you cover all the essential points while providing a clear and engaging response to the cue card topic.

    Tips to answer this Cue Card

    1: Vague Goal Description

    Avoid being unclear about your goal. A vague description can confuse the examiner and make your answer less engaging.

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    Tip

    Clearly define your goal with specific details. Explain what it is and why it matters to you.

    2: Neglecting Timeline

    Not mentioning when you started working towards your goal can make your response seem incomplete. It lacks context.

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    Tip

    Include a timeline in your answer. State when you first set the goal and any important milestones.

    Ignoring Challenges

    Failing to discuss the difficulties you faced can make your answer sound unrealistic. It’s important to show the effort involved.

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    Tip

    Talk about the challenges you encountered and how you plan to overcome them. This adds depth to your response.

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    IELTS Cue Cards asked last week

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    Anonymous student Band 7.5

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    Pitampura Test Centre, New Delhi

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    I like to taste different types of cuisine. Here I would like to talk about my favorite dish at my traditional festival of Onam which is Sadya. Sadya is popular in my city. We are experimenting these cuisines on Onam festival day. Onam is a famous festival in my city. All family members get together in my home and we make a delicious Sadya. There are many ingredients includes that Sadya. Moreover, we make a big feast that day as well as we create a lot of memories together and we wear that day the traditional dress called Sari and men wear the Dhotis. That festival is really important to us because the whole day we are conducting different kinds of games at our homes and all the family members came together. It's a memorable day in my life. This is the festival. We are making the Sambar and Aviyal. These all the kinds of foods are making with the vegetables.
    Talk about a toy you liked in your childhood
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    Anonymous student Band 8

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    Sector 34 Test Centre, Chandigarh

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    The toy which I liked in my childhood was a panda doll, which makes me pleasant and makes me more blush. The pandas are the most beautiful creatures of the world, which looks gigantic and has pooshy cheeks and they are like stars in the clouds and they dream in me. Furthermore, these have been given by my father. My father is a very very beautiful artistic person, who makes me think of that. Every day you will face every difficulties and make you suffer and move forward. Pandas are always seen in Japanese countries. It is my lifelong dream to visit a Japanese country and click a photo with the original pandas, which makes sounds better.
    Describe a time you were in a place where you didn't know the local language
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 6.5

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    Whitefield Test Center, Bengaluru

    Answer

    As India is a very large country full of diversity, so there are many places which have their own language and speak their native language. The place which I visited and I didn't know about their language was Leladakh, which is about 300 km away from my hometown and it is a very good place as it consists of different kind of trees, animals and have many scenic views and I visited over there last year in summers as it was the best time to visit because it has many, it was cold over there and we had summers in our area so it was the best time to visit over there and I went over there with my whole family.
    Describe a time when your friend damaged something you owned
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 7

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    Begumpet Test Centre, Hyderabad

    Answer

    When I was a kid, I had a little pencil box which had these four buttons which gave the pencil box an operative use. When you press the button, the box would open up. When you press the second button, a little part of it would slide out. Basically it was just a little electronical and a fun thing to have and I owned it when I was in 6th. One day after break, I was standing and talking there with one of my friends and another friend of mine was running through the hallway and accidentally she pushed my shoulder and my pencil box hit the ground and it broke into multiple pieces to the point that it was not functional anymore.
    Describe a book you recently read
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 7.5

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    Answer

    It Ends With Us is a book I read recently. It's by the author Colleen Hoare. It's mainly a story about two teenagers, Atlas and Lily, and how they just handle their life going through high school, adolescence, and just domestic violence at home. Both of them come from very, very different families. However, they have one common determining factor between them, which is domestic violence. The abuse that they've seen their moms go through is just insane, and they connect through that on a different level. They're actually in the same high school, but they never speak to each other until Atlas actually crashes into an empty house next to Lily's villa. When Atlas is homeless and he doesn't have anywhere to go, he just comes and breaks into the house next to Lily's, and Lily helps him with all the daily necessities like clothes and food, medicines and stuff. Furthermore, their friendship blossoms into love, but it doesn't really fructify as Atlas has to leave. This book really gave me a lot of knowledge about domestic abuse and how to deal with it.

    All Answers

    Here are all the answers by real-users practicing speaking for IELTS Cue Cards on our IELTS Prep App.

    Band 6-7

    I set many goals in my life, but here I like to talk about the website which I made a goal to design with numbers of technology. I aim to make a website which have a front-end, back-end and also the database, real-time database which have. So I gave the goal a iNotebook website which I aim to done it before my completion of my qualification. So first step I take that I gain knowledge about the website from social media and also from chatGPT, Artificial Intelligence. And however it is not give too much information about that, so I ask to my tutor, so he gave me very good advice and motivate me to do such difficult task in my journey of my degree. Then I also take help of my senior who made this type of website and they are also developing more advanced website. It is very difficult for me because I choose to do this project with numbers of website like ReactJS, MongoDB, NodeJS and ExpressJS. So it is very dangerous for the data prevention because when malicious activity happen in website there is large chances that any hacker can caught my data. So I believe it is difficult.

    Band 6-7

    Since you asked the question, I will answer it carefully and I've taken my time. This idea that I have been working on since 10th grade but because of studies I did not get enough time to work on it but I did try to take out most of my time. I am planning on creating something innovative and revolutionizing what currently we don't have and has much potential. This idea is about, we see people mainly sitting at home or not going out but there are few people who are running, hiking and you see that at times they have battery failure or they have no source of electricity to charge their phones to take proper photos so I have thought of something like piezoelectric that works on mechanical strength to produce electricity so if I can integrate that in shoes and sell it as a product it would definitely be revolutionizing and an innovative idea from my side being an 18 year old who thought about this idea when I was 16. Well, to go forth with this idea would be difficult at first because I have to do it completely independently and by myself so I have to constantly motivate myself in giving time. That's it.

    Band 6-7

    So I would like to tell that my goal is to achieve greater success in life but if you ask me about a material achievement then I would like to describe that how I was trying to buy my own car. So around this time like when I was in my 7th class, I decided to own myself a car once I grow up. So years passed now from the class 7th, now I am working right now, so from that time it's been 2 years since I started working, I was trying to save up for my car investment to own a car, so I tried it, I tried it, I tried it, saving up money for that and I started investing in some stocks and I started a big deposit account for that to make up savings to buy my own car and to make myself more proud and my parents more proud for that. So I chose a car, so now as of now I saved up half of the money to buy my desired car that is a Mercedes, so soon I am going to make the full payment for my car and own a car. I don't know yet how I am going to achieve my best goals, I am thinking so maybe I can achieve or may not but I am trying to achieve it, as luck presides by me that for sure I will be buying my car and I am going to do it.

    Band 6-7

    So, during school time, when I was preparing for the entrance exam of engineering field, I was preparing for the JEE exam. During that time, I was in the COVID bed. So, at that time, there were four chances of giving the test in one year. So, at the first attempt, I didn't score well. Approximately, I just got 45-47 percentile. So, one of our neighbor, whose granddaughter is of my same age, she had also given the JEE mains attempt. She also didn't score well. So, when my parents and the neighbor met, I was also present at that moment. The neighbor told that nothing could happen good with them. They just casually passes the time all the day. That neighbor was at my home and she was saying bad about me. I was not, I didn't know what happened, but just it got hurt to my ego. And from that time, I started working hard on my goal. I had set the goal that I would definitely score good in the next attempt. And after 15 days, the next second attempt was there. So, and within 15 days, I started working hard on the exam. I scored around 85 percentile. I would say the first step of getting this much marks was that I had removed

    Band 6-7

    so talking about a goal which I tried to achieve is something it is a long goal not some short but it is a long-term goal which I have been feeling this from my childhood itself at the age of 12 or 13 from that time also from from the beginning of that time I am feeling this I really want to be an entrepreneur that's my goal and I am planning I have a strong clear plan about how to achieve that I am on my first step through to that because I have completed my graduation after that I need to study in the robotics and automation masters abroad after completing my masters I need to work for two or three years to gaining some for gaining some experience after that after gaining some experience and making after gaining experiences and gaining some money I would like to start a startup a tech startup with an innovative idea so it is not an easy task to become an entrepreneur I know there are different several steps that are not so easy to achieve but I'm so determined to that I have a strong intuition that I would definitely reach that position

    Band 6-7

    I remember this goal that I set for myself for a dance event which was conducted in my junior college back in the year 2018. So this dance event had both categories of solo dance and group dance and I had given my names for solo dance after a lot of contemplation and the reason why I chose solo dance was because I'm very passionate about dancing and I would like to project it whenever possible. So I set a goal to myself that I would want to participate in the solo dance and that I would want to give my best performance and also try winning the first prize for this particular dance event. So therefore I gave my name and my first step towards achieving this goal was to speak with my dance master who is my trainer and also my guide in terms of what songs to choose and he takes care of the choreography. So I approached my dance master with respect to this dance event and he gave me complete guidance on what I should choose, what should be a theme because it's always better to dance having a theme in the background because it adds to the scores that the judges would be marking you on. So therefore I chose a theme related to respecting your gurus which in English means your teacher, your professor or your guide or your mentor and I chose this famous personality in India, Abdul Kalam for this particular role and performed.

    Band 6-7

    I had kept many goals but one of the important goal which I thought is to pursue my master's in social work. I had an interest towards social work and I thought of pursuing my master's in social work. The selection of that area is through entrance, group discussion and interview. I prepared for that entrance and I got selected. It was a little bit difficult task because it was more challenging as it involves many duties and responsibilities and it was not at all easy to overcome that. But I tried and now I am a professional social worker. During my master's programme, I had suffered a lot because my college was located far away from home. We had early morning classes that by 6 am I need to get up from my home in order to reach the college. It was a busy schedule as we need to prepare daily reports. We were exposed to fieldwork practicums and we were not having enough time to study. But somehow I managed because it was one of my main goal to become a professional social worker. Moreover, I faced these challenges and I overcame them. Besides this, I am proud because I had accomplished my goal. It was one of the important goals which I have achieved in my life. Setting goals are always important because it helps in accomplishing the task. If we are not having a goal, it will affect our future because we will not work towards it. If we are having a goal, we will work towards it and it will help in our future endeavours.

    Band 6-7

    So when I was little, like when I was in my 5th grade, I used to have this goal, I used to think like I want to be a teacher, as I love a teacher, as I love my mother teacher who likely used to taught me that time, so by seeing her, by watching her methods and by talking to her, I feel like I also wanted to be a teacher, so my goal was to be a teacher at first, then after some time, I changed it and wanted to become a professor, because when I got to know about teacher is not just a limit, but you can be a professor in a university, so I wanted to be that, so first of all, for the first step to achieve my goal was to, I have to complete the basic studies, the basic of everything which can help me to achieve my goal, and I really like to appreciate my mother also, because she is the first teacher of my life, she taught me everything before the teacher, before the teacher I met and made that goal in my mind to be a professor or a teacher.

    Band 6-7

    So, I am not at all a morning person, I go to bed late, I get up very late in the morning and almost a year ago I decided that I need to get up early in the morning to spare some quality time for self-healing. And initially I thought, okay, I have decided it, I can do it easily, but for a few months alarm used to ring multiple times and I was ignoring those alarms and was getting up on the same time. Then after two or three months I thought, okay, it's high time that I need to stick with my words, I need to be disciplined and need to follow whatever I decide and for that then I did online research and by online research I found out that I cannot change myself over the night, I need to take little steps first. So I gave the target of 30 minutes to myself that, okay, next day I will get up 30 minutes before the regular time, I set up the alarm for 7.30, 30 minutes before my usual getting up time and I got up on the first ring of the alarm and I felt really nice and it gave me the motivation for the next day. I did a little bit yoga that day and I'm still far away on that journey, but I am motivated now, I feel positive, I feel good within me and these days I'm getting up around 6 a.m. In the morning I do yoga and meditation, so I hope I will be able to get up around 4 a.m. in the next two months.

    Band 6-7

    hello so thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak on personal development for me personal development is a skill that everyone should possess and everyone should develop new things in them for me my personal development goal for this time being is a confidence I really want to build my confidence so that I can be very confident in speaking in the crowd so that how can I do that okay so my goal thank you for giving firstly thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak in front of you my goal is to improve my confidence that will also boost my self-esteem as a child I was very timid and shy and I think I still am a little in my school I used to hesitate to meanwhile going on the stage while speaking in front of the audience in college as well most of the college it went in the lockdown phase so I couldn't get more opportunities in the college to go in front of the stage and to speak in front of the larger audience but now when I'm in a corporate world I see that why confidence is so important when you have to speak to your managers when you have to say what you when you want to put forward your ideas to the team to the table then you have to be confident enough to tell them that okay I think this is the right option or this is more suitable to the plan but due to my low self-esteem and due to my hesitation I stopped myself from putting forward my ideas therefore I think I really have to boost my self-esteem and confidence this goal is more difficult for me as I have a like throughout my childhood I have been a very shy person but I want to improve and I want to improve and boost my
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