Describe a time when the electricity suddenly went off: IELTS Speaking Cue Card

You should say

When/where it happened
What happened when it went off
How people reacted / what you did
And explain how you felt about it

59 unique answers with expert feedback

Show all 59 answers

Cue 1:When/where it happened

Begin by describing the specific location and time when the electricity went off.
Mention any relevant details about the setting, such as whether you were at home, school, or work.

Example

It was a hot summer evening around 7 PM when the electricity suddenly went off at my home. I was in the living room, trying to finish my homework while the ceiling fan was running to keep me cool.

Cue 2:What happened when it went off

Explain the immediate effects of the power outage, such as darkness or loss of appliances.
Mention any specific activities that were interrupted due to the electricity going off.

Example

As soon as the lights went out, the room was plunged into darkness. The fan stopped spinning, and I could hear the distant sounds of my neighbors reacting to the outage. My laptop screen went black, and I realized I couldn’t continue my studies.

Cue 3:How people reacted / what you did

Describe how you and others around you reacted to the sudden power cut.
Mention any actions you took to cope with the situation, like using candles or checking on family members.

Example

My family quickly gathered in the living room, and my mother lit some candles to provide light. My younger brother started to feel scared, so I reassured him that it would be okay. We all sat together, sharing stories to pass the time.

Cue 4:And explain how you felt about it

Share your feelings about the power outage, whether it was frustration, fear, or something else.
Reflect on any positive aspects of the situation, like spending time with family.

Example

Initially, I felt frustrated because I was in the middle of my homework. However, as we sat together in candlelight, I realized it was a nice opportunity to bond with my family. We laughed and talked, which made me appreciate the moment despite the inconvenience.

Conclusion

Example

In conclusion, the sudden power cut was an unexpected event that disrupted my evening. However, it turned into a memorable experience as it brought my family together, reminding me of the importance of spending quality time with loved ones, even in challenging situations.

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: Lack of Detail in Description

Failing to provide specific details about when and where the electricity went off can make your answer less engaging and informative. It may leave the examiner with unanswered questions.

Tip

Include specific details such as the location, time of day, and any relevant context to make your story more vivid and relatable.

2: Ignoring Emotional Response

Not expressing how you felt during the power outage can make your response seem flat. Emotions help to connect with the listener and add depth to your answer.

Tip

Share your feelings during the event, whether it was fear, frustration, or humor, to create a more compelling narrative.

Neglecting Reactions of Others

Overlooking how others reacted to the situation can limit the scope of your response. Including others' reactions can enrich your story and provide different perspectives.

Tip

Mention how family, friends, or colleagues reacted to the power outage to add variety and depth to your response.

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Anonymous student Band 7.5

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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 5-6

I was a memorable pastime last summer this electricity suddenly went off. It happened one evening in my hometown. It turned out to be a really special experience for my home and family for the most of me. It was a particularly hot weather and we all were sitting down at the have a dinner together. The air conditioner is on, the television is playing in the background, everything is normal. We just made it out of the meal. A few minutes passed by at 10pm when without a warning the lights went out. The television went black, all the fans stopped, all the houses plunged into complete blackness. There was a moment of silence as they began to register what was happening just happened in Delhi. There was a bit of a gather. My youngest sister, but soon after, heard a collective groan from the neighbors as well as it was clear it wasn't just a problem with our house. After the entire surprise went off, my dad calmly got up and went to find the emergency flashlight. While he was doing that, my mother found the box of the candle within a few seconds. We had a small and flickering light on the dining table, which created a breezy environment. We had a few small, suddenly power cut off, completely changed and the evening passed. We wouldn't watch TV, use our phones that evening then. It was a nostalgic moment that reminded me of my childhood before we were just dependent on the electricity entertainment. It feels like a much simpler and sometimes more meaningful time.

Band 5-6

I remember that one day electricity went off when I was at the age of 8 or 9, that day my cousin's marriage, we had no idea about it, on that day it was really, we are getting a big rain with the wild air, and we don't have any idea what to do also, but at the night time the marriage, the marriage time is nearly at 11 o'clock pm, and we don't have any idea what to do, but during that time we don't even have any smartphones also, I think it will be the one memorable day for them, because the thing which is the marriage is the memorable day, but on their special day there is no electricity or any generator also, by keeping the phone flashlights, during the knocking the, sorry, tying the thread, we all had a flashlight of normal keypad phones, not any smartphones, I think that is the day which suddenly the electricity all went off, and this will be the most memorable day throughout our life.

Band 5-6

Honestly speaking with you, it was a one time the electricity suddenly went off when I was at my brother's house like me and my family went to my brother's house after a long time but due to some issue in the light, the authority of that place turned off the light for four to five hours and it was so difficult for the people to manage the things because even in my brother's house, there was a function of my baby as for my brother also he just arranged the generator soon and because people were reacting so with the angry and they were just blaming my brother as well as my father for you should take care for the things, you should arrange the generator before the function but due to some issues, my dad and brother forget to arrange the generator before the function and it was not informed by the government that light will get off. After that, my brother suddenly arranged the generator and it was such a bad time for me and my family to manage the hundreds of guests plus having a listening huge amount of talks from them.

Band 5-6

In my childhood, current electricity is suddenly cut off, suddenly went off because of different things, different habitants. I personally lived in a village, so current suddenly went off because of nothing reasons. Current time is restricted in my village for 2 to 3 hours in the morning, 2 to 3 hours in the afternoon. So suddenly they will cut the power in the evening most of the time. People will feel bad about because they need to do work and they need to get tuition with the people who are studying and all the things. But I feel happy because of power of no one see the TV and by not socializing with others, all will gather themselves and all will gather at one place and discussing about the other things like what they are doing in life, what their need, what they doing in the house like that. So I felt happy by socializing the other people, not for not for seeing the TV and watching the television and using the phone, getting the charger by using the power stand. Also when electricity suddenly went off, we will do gathering the meetings in the surrounding area with other aunties and all the all the persons surrounded by me. So I feel happy when the current went off in my childhood. But today's generation electricity is must and power should. If the electricity run off also, there is power stations in the home like generator and all the other things. So after current went off, the generator will on, the electricity will be there. They don't need even the socialization by don't getting out of out of box. The people will lead to autism, different disabilities, unable to socialize themselves.

Band 5-6

and the current was the electricity was went off at in the yesterday the electricity was shut down at night 2 a.m. at midnight of 2 a.m. in my home whichever what happened when it off it when it happened it at the time of what happened when it went off air conditioner fan everything got off and it become very dry my room become very dried then the people's were came out and they can't tolerate people and explain how we the electricity was cut off at late midnight yesterday 2 a.m. 3 p.m. the power was cut off the electricity was shut down the electricity was shut down yesterday at night 2 a.m. when it is shut down in my room all the electric appliances such as air conditioner fan light which is switched off and my room become warmer so the people around us they have come out and come out for the ventilation and I think it was a very bad experience at cut off in midnight

Band 5-6

It was a long time ago, like it was back then when I was only 10 years old and I was, me and my elder brother was alone at home. I think it was 7 or 8 o'clock. Our parents were at our neighbourhood. At that time, suddenly the...

Band 5

So, basically yesterday night when I was sleeping in my bedroom suddenly the light went off and I started to feel hot and then I woke up so when I woke up everyone was feeling hot and hot and uncomfortable so we checked around our neighbors is it our light only went off or the whole building's light went off so we got to know that whole building's light got off so when we called the electricity department so they told that due to some problem in their system the whole area's light went off so we asked that when will the light come so they told us it will take around 8 to 10 hours like in afternoon in morning afternoon something so it was so hot that we can't able to breathe properly and started to having some breathing problems so all the society members and all and everyone in our family went downstairs so that we can breathe properly and so that we can have a proper air so yeah that's it.

Band 5

The electricity is the shutdown of electricity is very common in my country but here I am talk about the situation when electricity suddenly went off. I am in the 10th standard and it is the summer time. I am I have a exam of a science then I prepare for the science exam and at the night time I see that the electricity suddenly went off. I am afraid and all my parents walk here and there for finding the light but the no thing but anything not found by my parents. At the time I have a exam tomorrow but the light is not in my home town but then I can close my books and ready to sleep. I think that I can learn all things in on the morning. So by that I woke up early morning and by that I learn the all of things that is important for my exam and the electricity do not come 24 hours in my home town. So that all peoples feel very hot because it is a summer time. So that all was very feel hot and they were very tired and drink lot of water because there are very hot season and water is necessity to their health. So that it is a time when electricity suddenly went off and all people are in the trouble and there are lot of things happen by the electricity.

Band 6.5

Just four days ago, today is 27th October, just four days ago, 23rd October, our electricity went off. We had an occasion at our house and many of my cousins were there. At lunch time, after we had our lunch, we were just sitting and talking to each other. Suddenly the electricity went off and it is currently very hot here right now. I mean above 30 degrees Celsius and we were just losing our minds. We were like what will we do? How are you going to manage? There were many many people at our house. My cousins alone, I had like 6-7 cousins and then we just decided to tough it up. We spent our time at the rooftop because at least there was some ventilation there. And we went there, we just sat at the rooftop and in the evening we ordered pizza. We had a pizza party, impromptu pizza party with our flashlights of our phones. And the electricity finally came back at 1am at night. So at least good news, we got to sleep peacefully that night.

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