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Need feedback on my recordings for TOEFL Speaking: What mistakes I am making?


john russel

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Hi All,

 

I gave TOEFL recently and got 24 second time in speaking section. I took classes also from native speaker and when he gave me feedback he told me that I will score 28 in speaking. But unfortunately on exam I got 24, not even 26. Can you please suggest me what should I do now?. Its really very frustrating. These are my recordings (practice). Please give me feedback and tell me my mistakes where I am lacking so that I can improve. I really appreciate your help and time. Thanks a lot.

 

Please click on this link to visit my recordings.

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In your recording you did exactly what Joseph wants you to do and a lot of examinees got 26 and higher using that method.

 

I think if you answer the same way as your recording then you should get at least 26 . You said you got 24 in speaking so why not do a re scoring ...there are some test takers who got 24 and did a re score and got 26 and higher. So,what I can suggest to you is go for re scoring and hope that the person who will rate you during the re scoring is in a good mood or will have the same feedback as your native speaker teacher.

 

remember that one step up from 24 is 26 so if you are aiming for 26 then you are almost there... 24 one score up is 26 not 25... Again go for re scoring.

Edited by speak26
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The recordings sound very good overall, and with some work I could definitely imagine you reaching a 26 or higher (but I respectfully disagree with whomever said your responses were on a 28/30 level presently). You possess excellent pronunciation as well as a good command of English grammar and vocabulary. However, there are some flaws...

 

1) You seem to be speaking way too FAST, which is affecting your overall delivery.

 

2) Related to #1, your intonation is off. This is probably because you seem to be rushing a bit from one sentence to the next, which destroys the natural intonation patterns in English. Your intonation should naturally be dropping at the end of each sentence (unless it happens to be a ?) and rising as you start a new one.

 

3) Because of the "flat" intonation and repeated use of the word "and," it seems on the few I listened to that you are often not speaking in sentences, but rather one "mega-sentence" at times with no begnning nor end.

 

4) Although your language usage is strong overall, there are some grammatical errors, like "He thought he has found last week," which is actually a double error (wrong verb tense and no object for "found") and "he has to tell his major soon" in the same section. A sentence or two later, I think you said, "the student is consist two solutions," which would be wrong since it's not the correct verb and it's in passive voice (also, by the way, I've always told students it's a waste of time to use one sentence to say there are 2 solutions and then actually summarize the 2 solutions -- I'm pretty sure if you speak slowly and clearly and use the proper transitions, it will be quite obvious to the rater that you summarized two separate solutions).

 

By the way, there are also errors in your post above... 1) you didn't "give" the TOEFL recently -- you "took" it; 2) you're dropping articles: on "the" exam, "a" native speaker, "for a" second time; 3) when you use "suggest" or "recommend" as verbs (as you may often do on Task 5: problem/solution), you need to use the subjunctive tense correctly. It is wrong to say -- "suggest me" as in "She suggested me to read this book" ... the correct form would be "She suggested that I read this book."

 

These are not terribly major errors, but if you make a few of them in each response, it can drag a 4/4 response down to 3/4.

 

Don't give up, though. You are definitely capable of scoring 26/30 on the TOEFL speaking. The main thing right now, in my opinion, is for you to slow down your delivery and speak in smooth sentences.

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That's a very good question, but I'm not 100% sure whether or not they see the original score. Since they want "fresh ears" to approach the recording again, I would be very surprised if the raters were given the original scores. As you probably know, the scores could end up higher, the same, or even lower after the re-scoring.

 

I met an actual TOEFL rater about a year ago and had a long discussion with him on Skype (and he even did some consulting work for me), but that specific question didn't come up.

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