Describe A Person Who Solved A Problem In Smart Way: IELTS Speaking Cue Card

You should say

Who is this person?
What was the problem?
How did he/she solve it?
What about the solution makes it smart?

19 unique answers with expert feedback

Show all 19 answers

Cue 1:Who is this person?

Introduce the person by mentioning their relationship to you, such as a friend, family member, or colleague.
Provide a brief background about their qualities or skills that make them capable of solving problems.

Example

The person I want to talk about is my elder brother, Raj. He is a software engineer and has always been known for his analytical skills and creative thinking. Growing up, he often helped me with my studies and taught me how to approach problems logically.

Cue 2:What was the problem?

Clearly state the problem that needed to be solved, providing context to help the listener understand its significance.
Mention any challenges or difficulties that arose due to this problem.

Example

Last year, our family faced a significant issue when our small business was struggling due to a lack of customers. The pandemic had hit us hard, and we were unsure how to attract more people to our store.

Cue 3:How did he/she solve it?

Describe the steps the person took to address the problem, highlighting their thought process.
Include any innovative methods or strategies they employed to find a solution.

Example

Raj suggested that we shift our focus to online sales. He quickly set up a website and helped us create social media accounts to promote our products. He even organized a small online campaign to reach out to potential customers.

Cue 4:What about the solution makes it smart?

Explain why the solution was effective and how it addressed the problem efficiently.
Discuss any long-term benefits that resulted from this smart solution.

Example

What made Raj's solution smart was his ability to adapt to the changing market. By moving online, we not only reached our existing customers but also attracted new ones from different areas. Our sales increased significantly, and we are now considering expanding our online presence further.

Conclusion

Example

In conclusion, Raj's innovative thinking and quick actions helped our family business survive during a tough time. His ability to solve problems in a smart way not only resolved our immediate issue but also set us up for future success.

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 Descriptions

Using vague language can make your answer unclear. It's important to provide specific details about the person and the problem they solved to engage the listener.

Tip

Use clear examples and specific details to describe the person and the problem. This will make your answer more interesting and easier to understand.

2: Lack of Structure

Failing to organize your response can confuse the listener. A well-structured answer helps convey your ideas more effectively.

Tip

Follow the cue prompts in order: introduce the person, explain the problem, describe the solution, and highlight why it was smart. This will create a logical flow.

Overly Complex Solutions

Describing overly complicated solutions can lose the listener's interest. It's better to focus on clear and relatable solutions that demonstrate smart thinking.

Tip

Choose a solution that is straightforward yet clever. Explain it simply, focusing on how it effectively addressed the problem.

IELTS Cue Cards asked last week

Reported by Leap students who gave IELTS

Describe your favourite food at a traditional festival or a special event in your country

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7.5

Pitampura Test Centre, New Delhi

Answer

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

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 8

Sector 34 Test Centre, Chandigarh

Answer

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

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 6.5

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

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7

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

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7.5

CBD Belapur Test Centre, Navi Mumbai

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

So, I will tell here about my father, like once there was a situation in our family in which we were at my sister's marriage, my cousin's sister's marriage and when we were there, there was a fight between some of the members of the family and at that time my father was also there but he was not involved in fight, despite he tried to solve the fight, so he went to them, like who were fighting there and he only liked to stop them, so that like they will not disturb, so that they would not disturb another family member and he tried to resolve the situation of the fight there but what happened is, someone from our family bit my father and so he was like injured at that time and I took him to hospital, so the situation was very hectic at that time but my father took it very kindly and he tried to resolve it with a mindful way at that time, so I usually praise my father about it, I usually like to praise my father about that situation because at that time if someone else was there, he or she could not go in between the members of the family and like my father did to resolve the situation at that time, so I think that he took a good decision and he thought in a smart way.

Band 5-6

I like this question as an audiologist and speech-language pathologist we the professional how to handle so many patients from morning to evening so we have to deal with geriatrics from pediatrics and we have to deal everything in detail so as an audiologist the task that we have to handle is to take ear impression of a patient to build one hearing aids so CAC that means completely in the canal hearing aids need ear impression so what is ear impression in the sense ear impression is nothing but the it is taking to check the shape of the ear canal so we are taking that ear impression by putting some sort of material into the ear canal so after some that after some time it will become hard and we have to push it from the ear canal if it is not properly inserted that ear drum will affected and also the one solution for it to get a surgery from the hospital so there is nothing another way to do from that so my senior so one day a patient came and the material got stuck in the ear so my senior is the one person that took in a positive way by plucking it with a plucker but that is used by the END that we are not using it as an audiologist so she thought it in a good way and she handled the situation in a smart way so I admire her for the courage that she had taken

Band 5-6

Recently, there is a war between a country, India and Pakistan. Basically, I am from India. I am an Indian. And the war is getting escalated everyday. And everyone in the country are scared of that. Suddenly, here I am going to describe about Narendra Modi, who is the Prime Minister of India. He has done something special to the Indian people. Because when the war was escalating, he was staying calm. And he was doing such a great thing to a nation. All the military forces and military bases were attacked by the Pakistan military. But particularly, Narendra Modi gave all the permission to the military to take care of themselves. And they can decide themselves to attack whatever the place they need to attack. So, the military forces were given a full freedom. One night, on May 7th, they started targeting a precise location where the terrorists are staying. So, they launched a missile. And it was a successful move by Narendra Modi. The main reason behind it is that the Prime Minister gave a full freedom to the military to attack the places whichever they wanted to. So, it is a major thing that is really impressed by Narendra Modi. And I too believe that the problem is no more escalated because they have seen our power.

Band 5-6

There was a problem with the project, there was a problem with a major project, in the final years of my engineering, there was a friend called Hisham, who helped us, who took out of this problem, inspite of being in his own project, he left that project and came to us and solved our project, there was a problem with the server crash, he helped us in solving the technical bug, which was present in our project, not only our project got good and well back to the same position, but also it impressed our teachers, which made us very happy, after the project was completed, after the presentation, we gave him a small treat for helping us in a moment, where there was a big, helping us in our hard times, we gave him a treat in a good restaurant, this shows us the friendliness of him, he is a very kind and gentle person, he is very down to earth, he never showed his arrogance, though he was good in all the things, but he never showed his professionalism and any ego towards us, attitude towards us, he came to us and solved our problem, which made us very happy.

Band 5-6

So, I was given an assignment in my economic subject during my second semester, so I was also assigned two of my classmates to complete the project in a particular date, but I was really fed up and annoyed by the behavior of my teammates because they did not show any interest in working on the project, so I was really worried and lost my temper because there was only little time to complete my assignment on time, so I seek the help from my friend who is from another class, so I told him about my situation and asked for help, so what he did is, he actually analyzed my complete project and he suggested some methods and he segregated tasks for both of us to complete the project in effective way, so what he did is, he divided the works into two, which I could follow up on one part and another part he took initiative to complete and finally after completing the project, I could able to submit it on time, so only because of his smart move in dividing the project into two halves, that thing really fastened up the project, so after completing the project, I felt very relaxed and grateful for his help on time.

Band 5-6

I have encountered a lot of people solving problems in various ways, be it in a very aggressive way, be it in a very smart way, be it in a very intelligent, patient way. However, my mom, she is a very patient as well as my role model in my everyday life. There was a time where my sister and I were fighting. It was about gadgets, electronic expensive gadgets. It was a laptop. So that time, my sister and I were like both really wanting to take the gadgets. So either it should be me or her, so we were both snatching the laptop from one to another. So my sister, my younger sister dropped the expensive gadgets when I was taking it and she put it and that time, my mom, we were all scared because the display was broken as well as when we touch it, it didn't on, it didn't like, it was off, switch off. So my sister and I, we ran to mom. We were both scared knowing that we'll get scolded. So my mom, she came in, she cleaned the place where we fight. She did it like properly and also she solved it in a very patient way by just cleaning it and after that, she called both of us into the room and we were all discussing about it and she was saying like how we should never do that, how we should do it, how we should just ask politely to one another and then after that, now thinking back, I knew it that my mom is like a person who has done specific.

Band 5-6

Well, I feel that all persons are very smart and intelligent, so that's why they easily solve their problems without the help of other people. But without further ado, I shed some light on a time when who solved a problem in a smart way. It is none other than my mother. I remember that when I was studying in a senior secondary education, so at that time I got sick and I am not able to do something to prepare for my exams. Only speaking and my exams were near and I have fear about this because I am not able to give my exams and I am not prepared for my exams. Apart from this, when my mother know about my situation, so she come there and also help me to divide the slavers according to my ability. Not only, but also they motivate me to increase the goal and also told me that achieving the goal is a piece of cake if we do hard work. So their words are work for me like a miracle. Moreover, also the people of my area come to take advice of my mother because she has a good ability to listen the problems of other without any judgement and he have a good knowledge about the importance of relationships, so that's why they always give practical ideas and solutions to other people. In addition, I say that my mother is very very smart and intelligent and also I felt over the moon because I am a girl of the smart lady and also she help of the other people when they need.

Band 5

My husband, who solves the problem, whatever the problem which I get, he used to solve my problem. The most problem is my school corrections, which he is going to solve very easily and very in a much smarter way. He do all the bits together correction and then he go for the another bit. So, each bundle, single bundle, he do all the correction, then later he go for the another bit. With that, he can do all the corrections together of the different bundles.

Band 5

In our daily routine life we have faced new challenges and for new targets so we have faced some problems in our daily routine life. So if you face any problem in my life then I am always help with my wife. He is always guide me how to take back for this situation. So it's a case of recently when I was going for simla for my exam and there suddenly I face problem in a problem regarding the exam. So my wife give me alternate for this problem and give me the best solution for this problem and I have solved this problem. So in a many little little cues when I get some problems in my life then I always help with my wife and he always help me for this situation and I think wife is the best partner every role in your life. So yeah this is my answer.

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