The cue card
Describe an interesting neighbour.
What the report preserved: The candidate recalled the topic and said there were follow-up questions on it, but did not preserve the bullet points or the Part 3 wording. The topic is reported exactly; nothing below it has been reconstructed.
How to answer it
A person card where the interest has to be specific or the answer dies at forty seconds. Pick a neighbour with one concrete oddity — the man who repaints his fence a different colour every spring, the woman who feeds six cats that are not hers — and build the whole two minutes on that one thing: what they do, how you found out, what the street makes of it. Avoid the relative you know best; you need a person you observe rather than one you love, because observation is what this card rewards.
What moves the band
- Neighbour lexis: they keep themselves to themselves, we're on nodding terms, next door but one, they've lived here for donkey's years.
- Describe habits with the present simple and one past anecdote — the tense switch is half the grammar mark on this card.
- Part 3 on this topic goes to community: whether people know their neighbours any more, and what changed. Have one cause ready, not just the observation.
These are candidate recalls. These are questions reported by test-takers after their exams, not official or leaked IELTS material. Wording varies by test version, location and memory. Use them for timed practice — never as a prediction of what you will be asked.
Practise these next
Know the number. Now move it.
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