okay we'll get started hi everybody my

name is J I'm one of the expert Pte

teachers here at e to language in this

life class we're going to look at one of

the trickiest speaking topics tasks

there is that is retell lecture so I'm

going to teach you a really good method

to make sure that you score highly on

this particular speaking task because it

is a real trick it also contributes to

your listening scores as well by the way

so let me firstly just describe this

task to you this is what you'll see on

test day okay you're gonna see something

like this it won't actually tell you

that it's retail lecture you can quickly

read the instructions you're going to

see an image here and you're going to

see an audio player that becomes an

audio recorder when you are about to

speak that's what it looks like and

you'll receive three or four of these

particular tasks on test day and they're

important the sequence of the tasks is

also important to understand that is

there are four parts to this task or

four things that will happen first of

all you'll have pre listening which

basically is just three seconds to look

at that picture and to get an idea of

what the lecture is about then number

two you're going to listen to an audio

recording of a lecture or an interview

that will go for between 60 and 90

seconds after the lecture has finished

you will have ten seconds to prepare to

speak then the audio recorder will beep

and you can speak for up to 40 seconds

so as you can see it's quite a

complicated little series of events that

happens okay it's good to familiarize

yourself with that sequencer on test

there you go okay okay okay bang and

then you do it let's talk about scoring

because if we understand how this thing

is scored then we can deconstruct it and

we can speak in such a way that

maximizes our scores so this is how

you've scored for content you get zero

to five points so zero one

two three four or five points five

points is the maximum that's content

that means you have you have you have

retold the content of the lecture okay

pronunciation zero to five points an

oral fluency zero to five points so what

does the scoring mean the scoring means

this content refers to what you say the

vocabulary the words you use the

pronunciation and oral fluency refer to

how you say it okay I should also

mention that grammar is subsumed in

content so grammar is scored under

content so grammar contents you can

think about like the words the

vocabulary and the grammar that you use

from that link when you're speaking but

then the pronunciation and oral fluency

is like the delivery of your speech and

if you think about it what you say is

worth five points max and how you say it

is worth ten points

max so in some ways your delivery or how

you speak is worth twice as much as the

content of what you say of course you

don't want to sacrifice content you want

to make sure that you get the five

points for content but here's the trick

with this one sometimes the lectures are

so difficult that you hesitate and

you're forced to stop and think and your

oral fluency will decrease and maybe

your pronunciation will decrease because

you're armed arts so we need to find a

balance of how to get that content and

then how to deliver it in a smooth way

smooth and accurate way okay there's a

way to do that I'm gonna show you in a

second in fact I'll show you right now

it's called the method method is like

this first of all you need to take good

notes it's absolutely critical in this

task that you take good notes you will

be given a notepad and a pen on test day

to take notes with if you do not take

notes with this particular tasks you

cannot do it effectively even if you're

a native speaker it would be almost

impossible number two you need to speak

using the e to struck

so let's look at the note-taking first

then we'll look at the e2 structure so

note-taking this is a critical skill

alright let's just do one I'm just going

to show you how to do it so let's say

this is what you see on test day you

have three seconds the audio player is

about to play the lecture so let's do

this

hmm actually I'm gonna get you to do it

first I'm going to just let me get my

technology sorted out I'm going to play

a lecture to you 60 to 90 seconds I want

you to take notes so get out a pen and a

piece of paper I want you to take as

many notes as you possibly can after

you've done that I'm going to do it and

I'll show you what my notes look like

and we can compare notes okay then we're

going to look at the e2 structure of how

we put our notes into a structure to

speak smoothly okay so get out a pen and

a piece of paper I'm gonna play this

lecture in three two one

twenty or thirty years ago if a chicken

caught a cold and sneezed and died in a

remote village in East Asia it would

have been a tragedy for the chicken and

its closest relatives but I don't think

there was much possibility of us fearing

a global pandemic and the deaths of

millions twenty or thirty years ago if a

bank in North America lent too much

money to some people who couldn't afford

to pay it back and the bank went bust

that was bad for the lender and bad for

the borrower but we didn't imagine it

would bring the global economic system

to its knees for nearly a decade this is

globalization this is the miracle that

has enabled us to transship our bodies

and our minds and our words and our

pictures and our ideas and our teaching

and our learning around the planet ever

faster and ever cheaper it's brought a

lot of bad stuff like the stuff that I

just described but it's also brought a

lot of good stuff a lot of us are not

aware of the extraordinary successes of

the Millennium Development Goals several

of which have achieved their targets

long before the due

date that proves that the species of

humanity is capable of achieving

extraordinary progress if it really acts

together and it really tries hard and

that's the end of the lecture I'm trying

to negotiate a lot of Technology here

actually hopefully you heard that just

for my interest if you're in the webinar

there can you just put yes if you could

hear that clearly or put no if you

couldn't hear it okay cool you could

hear it fantastic well done all right

all right nice just for my interest just

right down into the chat how many notes

you took whether it be sort of how many

concepts not necessarily words but how

many different concepts did you write

down five six eleven four five 310 four

okay here's the big key with this one

the more notes you take the easier it

will be to retell the lecture if you

took three or four notes you're going to

struggle to get to sort of 40 seconds

when you speak if you took down ten key

words or sort of you know ten concepts

it's going to be much easier for you to

speak and retell that lecture right so

I'm gonna do this myself

I'm gonna take notes what am I going to

show you I'm going to show you the

screen you won't be able to hear the

lecturer very well but you can just

watch the notes that I take okay here we

go so let me get my pen out here okay

I've got my pen cool that's good all

right let me do that again and now I'm

just gonna play this lecture here we go

twenty or thirty years ago if a chicken

caught a cold and sneezed and died in a

remote village in East Asia it would

have been a tragedy for the chicken and

his closest relatives but fearing 20 or

30 years ago if a bank in North America

lent too much money to some people who

couldn't afford to pay it back

the global economic system to its knees

for nearly a decade

this is globalization this is the

miracle that has enabled us to transship

our bodies and our minds that's enough

pictures and our ideas not teaching and

our learning around the planet never

faster stuff like the stuff that I just

described but it's also bought whoops

hold on why did it stop several of which

have achieved their targets long before

the due date that proves that the

species of humanity is capable of

achieving extraordinary progress if it

really taps together and it really tries

hard okay first of all I apologize for

how hideously ugly my handwriting is

okay but that's beside the point I can

read it and that's good enough so what

are my notes here well I wrote down 20

30 years a chicken caught a flu or

something like that but basically he was

talking about how global pandemics were

rare 20 or 30 years ago but now because

of travel if that if a flu breaks out in

one country it spreads to all around the

world similarly he talked about how bank

if a bank loans people money and then

goes broke it used to be a local issue

but now it's a globe it causes global

economic crises basically the topic of

the conversation or the topic of the

lecture was globalization he also talked

about how globalization transports ideas

and the ideas of fast and cheap there

are two sort of aspects

to globalization both good and bad he

talked about the Millennium Goals and he

talked about how humanity can progress

through globalization okay that wasn't

the structure I was just reading my

notes now but you can see there that if

you get the information from the lecture

and put it on the page in front of you

you've basically got enough information

to then retell the lecture in your own

words right that's the first step

note-taking is critical and I suggest

that you practice note-taking if you go

to e2 language comm if you're a paid

member we've got lots and lots of

lectures so you can sit down and

practice taking notes with those one to

one and a half minute lectures okay

now we're up to step two of the method

and we need to fit those notes into a

structure okay we need a structure and

we need to rehearse this structure

before test day the structure is going

to be like this the speaker was

discussing topic so what was the topic

of the lecture we just heard well it was

globalization so that's going to be my

first sentence and this first sentence

is really critical to get right the

speaker was discussing globalization

maybe the speaker was discussing physics

or speak it was disgusting educational

psychology well the speaker was

discussing French art whatever it is you

just need to get that basic topic of

that lecture what's it about doesn't

need to be specific it can be specific

specific is better but even if you just

get the general idea that's fine as well

that's the first part of our structure

then we talk to say this he talked about

keyword one he mentioned keyword two he

discussed keyword three he highlighted

key word for he talked about keyword

five finally he suggested the keyword

six this framework or this structure

that you're looking at here is critical

for your success yes you need to take

notes but after you have taken notes you

will simply use this

sure to retell any lecture and this

works for a few reasons one first of all

we've deconstructed a score the scoring

of the PhD so we know that the PT wants

to know that you understand the topic

which is the first sentence it also

needs to understand that you get the

details of the lecture which is keyword

one two three four and five and the

final sentence he suggested that while

to get a top score at for content in the

Pte speaking retail lecture tasks you

need to identify a suggestion or an

inference or a conclusion so that's why

we use this structure let's look at the

structure more carefully because we want

to focus on the verbs so the first verb

we use is was discussing just memorize

that one the speaker that was discussing

repeat after me the speaker was

discussing globalization the speaker was

discussing educational psychology the

speaker was discussing mobile phone

technology whatever then we move into

simple past verbs talked mentioned

discussed highlighted talked suggested

now these can go in any order so the key

words one two three four five you can

say let me get out my pen and explain

this clearly okay first of all you need

this verb to start this is your first

sentence was discussing this is how you

start so you need that one that's the

first sentence that stays there and the

final sentence suggested that also stays

there but these ones you can move around

okay you can move highlight it's just

the second spot you can move discussed

down to the fifth spot whatever it is

any order of the verbs it does not

matter and in fact you can add different

verbs you can say he described or she

pointed out or she stressed the

importance of or she referred to or he

expressed so you can use any verbs here

as long as they're in the simple past

that's fine let's focus on prepositions

you'll notice that the purple words

there are the preposition

he talked about we do not say he

mentioned about we do not say he

discussed about or highlighted about we

only use the preposition about with the

verb thought okay please do not say

mentioned about it is incorrect English

fine now it's not that easy the

structure that I just showed you then

would get you

I don't know 60 maybe 65 if you're

aiming for those higher scores you need

to make your sentences more complex okay

it's an excellent structure and it works

and once you practice it you'll memorize

it it's really really easy but we need

to add a few words to make sentences

more complex so we can get up towards

the 79 and above so he talked about

power our key word one he mentioned that

keyword two for example he mentioned

that when a bank goes a bust it is no

longer a local issue it is in fact a

global issue he talked about how global

pandemics used to be localized but now

they spread around the world what about

this third one he discussed the way in

which globalization has both good and

bad aspects

so these pronoun or these phrases that

we slip in here like talked about how we

don't just say he talked about pandemics

he mentioned banks too easy he talked

about how pandemics spread he mentioned

that banks now caused global issues when

they collapsed blah blah blah okay

so you can make it more complex cool

finally if you want if you remember if

you can you can also add some connectors

just between your sentences or inside

your sentences like also in addition

finally so if you put it all together

let me give you an example structure of

a perfect retail lecture okay so the

speaker was discussing the merits of

globalization he talked about how 20 or

30 years ago global pandemics weren't

possible

that diseases were localized you also

discussed how if a bank failed then its

impacts would be local not global that

it wouldn't cause an economic crisis

--tz-- he described globalization as a

miracle although he did say that it had

both good and bad aspects to it he

mentioned the success of the global

minute Millennium Goals and lastly he

suggested that if we all work together

then globalization will succeed so what

we've been able to do by taking good

notes and using the e to structure we've

made the impossible possible

we've taken some abstract lecture and

made it actually possible to retell it

in our own words I'll get to frequently

asked questions at the end of this

lecture by the way well so if you have

questions just hold on but this works

this works this works really well now

also just while you're speaking remember

to stop at about thirty five seconds

just stop before 40 seconds you don't

want to keep talking at 40 seconds all

right pre speaking 10 seconds so we hear

the lecture it goes for 60 to 90 seconds

and then we get 10 seconds to prepare

and to look at our notes 10 seconds

lasts this long by the way so you look

at your notes take a deep breath ok

what's the topic globalization ok I'm

going to sequence this story and beep

you must start speaking so that ten

seconds goes very quickly so in other

words what I'm trying to say is you need

to have memorized the structure it's

quite easy you're not memorizing a

template you're just basically

memorizing the speaker was discussing he

talked about he discussed he mentioned

he described he highlighted he suggested

ok that's it that's all we that's all

you have to memorize in fact the speaker

was discussing topic he discussed he

talked about he highlighted he mentioned

he described he suggested what

the verbs are it's up to you okay

because in that 10 seconds you're

basically going to take a deep breath

look at your notes and go alright here

we go and then ball away you go and then

it will beep and you must speak now just

before we go on if you're on YouTube and

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ok and do think about

coughing up 3 bucks be great anyway

let's move on let's do one let's do one

okay whoops see what's going on here

let's do the one we just did I'm gonna

play it one more time I want you to take

notes then I'm going to give you 10

seconds to prepare and 40 seconds to

speak you may not have memorized the the

structure that's fine the lecture starts

now 20 or 30 years ago if a chicken

caught a cold and sneezed and died in a

remote village in East Asia it would

have been a tragedy for the chicken and

its closest relatives but I don't think

there was much possibility of us fearing

a global pandemic and the deaths of

millions 20 or 30 years ago if a bank in

North America lent too much money to

some people who couldn't afford to

back and the bank went bust it was bad

for the lender and bad for the borrower

but we didn't imagine it would bring the

global economic system to its knees for

nearly a decade

this is globalization this is the

miracle that has enabled us to transship

our bodies and our minds and our words

and our pictures and our ideas and our

teaching and our learning around the

planet ever faster and ever cheaper it's

brought a lot of bad stuff like the

stuff that I just described but it's

also brought a lot of good stuff a lot

of us are not aware of the extraordinary

successes of the Millennium Development

Goals several of which have achieved

their targets long before the due date

that proves that this species of

humanity is capable of achieving

extraordinary progress if it really acts

together and it really tries hard

ten seconds to prepare look at your

notes the structure is the speaker was

discussing he mentioned he talked about

and start speaking now

how did you go just type into the chat

give yourself a score out of 15 give

yourself a score out of 15

someone said very bad someone said 12

someone said 4 7 10 7 10 to 13 12 5 not

bad 6 5 7 3 need to practice cool let's

do another one

let's do another one ok ok let's do this

one here now I don't want the time it's

a start

just give me a minute or less to find

the media I've I've got it somewhere

hold on

yes all right this one's gonna be hard

okay this one's very hard okay

I just want to come as much as you

possibly can and here we go the lick

just starts now if a clock is broken you

take the pieces apart and you find the

one tooth or one gear there that's

missing and you fix that and you now are

able to put the pieces back together in

an additive way and you will affixed the

clock a clock can be fixed using

reductive point for point knowledge now

you have a problem with something else

you have a cloud that doesn't rain

enough during a drought how are you

going to figure out what's wrong I know

let's divide the cloud in half and then

get better tools so we can divide each

half into half and each half into half

and eventually we'll get like one

molecule versus worth of cloud and a

gazillion of them really understand how

each one of them works and put it

together and then we'll understand why

there's a drought it doesn't work that

way

reductive approaches can be used to fix

clocks reductive approaches can't be

used to understand why clouds don't rain

and the whole point of all chaos and

these lectures here is when you look at

the interesting complex biological

systems they're clouds they're not

clocks you need a whole different

explanatory system

you

all right how was that one that was a

genuinely tough lecture and there's a

reason I did that to you it's because I

didn't want to deceive you to make you

think that it was as simple as the the

previous lecture in fact it can be

really hard right give yourself a score

out of 15 for that one

12 12 111 6 9 to 10 12 out of 15 good

okay fine okay some people got to that's

fine that's fine that's fine as far as I

could remember that guy by the way his

name is Robert Sapolsky xur well he does

a number of different academic things

like evolutionary biology primatology

he's a bit of a freak he's really cool

if you want to listen some good lectures

type into Sapolsky into youtube as far

as i remember that that lecture was

about chaos theory or the complexity of

nature compared to man-made objects

something like that anyway I can't do it

unfortunately because I don't have it I

can't listen to it let's think about

what happens when you get an interview

okay what happens when you get two

people when it's not a lecture when it's

in fact a to and fro between two people

okay so how would you structure that

well you would use a very similar

structure you would just say you would

call the first person the first speaker

the first person that's fine

this first speaker was discussing

educational psychology he talked about

how school-age children are using their

phones too much in class which is

becoming problematic he mentioned that

students aren't sleeping very much and

this is affecting their schoolwork the

second speaker discussed how using

phones in schools is in fact a positive

thing he highlighted how students can go

to Google to find out any information at

all he talked about how they're also

very good at typing and he suggested

that in fact computers are helping

people whatever that's how you do it

let's recap and we'll also do some FAQ

in a state

and so the sequence of PT retail lecture

is like this you get three seconds to

look at that picture and to think oh oh

here we go

second you're going to listen to the

lecture or the interview for 60 to 90

seconds yes then you get 10 seconds to

prepare and you get 40 seconds to speak

the method is this you need to take good

notes and you need to take lots of notes

then you need to use the e to structure

which I showed you before and I haven't

gotten here let me just find the e to

structure so we can just recap it bump

bump bump a bump bump bump bump bump a

bump bump bump bump bump Oh yep fine

we'll do the one with the verbs here we

go this is the e to structure the

speaker was discussing complexity theory

and the complexity of nature he talked

about how when you take apart a

wristwatch is in fact quite easy to put

it back together you mentioned that it

may just be one part of the wristwatch

that is broken and when you replace that

specific part it all comes together

again

however he discussed the complexity of

taking apart a cloud in fact you can't

take apart clouds because they're

natural objects and they don't have

parts that fit together like

wristwatches he highlighted the

complexity of natural objects such as

clouds and he talked about how reductive

science does not work he suggested that

we need a new theory of science called

whatever there you go that's how it

works right let me go forward again if a

Q's here we go let me head you off at

the pass with some of your questions Jay

can I use this structure for every

retail lecture yes you can you

absolutely can I did it I got 90 in fact

quite a few of our students have now got

90 in speaking and they have also used

this structure the key is though is to

not oversimplify this structure don't

say the speaker was discussing

globalization he talked about pandemics

he mentioned banks

he talked about no you have to add

complexity to the structure in order to

get a higher score okay

yes you certainly can use it for all

three or four of the retail lectures you

get on test a question - what if I can't

understand the lecture well this is a

strong possibility and when I did mine I

had a lecture on physics kinetic energy

or something I have no idea about

kinetic energy in physics I don't even

know if it's kinetic energy but I took

good notes and I took lots of notes and

then I could simply just regurgitate

what the speaker said in my own words

even if I didn't really understand it

because I had key concepts key words key

phrases I could then it just retell the

lecture okay

oops just realize that if my phone rings

it's a text message you're gonna hear it

cool so if you can't understand the

lecture that's fine

preempt that take good notes and then

just retell whatever it is that you took

down in note form J what if I can't

think of a final sentence okay so the

last sentence of the structure says the

speaker suggested that okay he suggested

that complexity theory is better than

reductive science or he suggested that

globalization will lead to overall

improvements for the human race what if

you can't think of a suggestion what if

what he or she suggested or a conclusion

time just leave it out I guess or you

could just say in conclusion the speaker

was very I don't know what doesn't

really matter it's that last little

sentence is good if you can do it

because the computer is listening for

that key might have suggested or

concluded okay but if you can't so be it

it's fine number four J should I repeat

exactly what the speaker says word for

word well you simply won't be able to

write because there's just too many

words and too much information in that

60 to 90 seconds

so you can take words down directly and

if you use your notes the way that you

say it will be different from the way

that the speaker said it anyway and what

you're doing is you're retelling the

lecture so you're not summarizing it's

different so you can in fact use words

directly from the audio that's fine it's

totally fine so that leads to question

number five should I use synonyms or

words directly from the lecture well I

suggest using words directly from the

lecture you don't need to use synonyms

okay and it seemed going to be

impossible to lift our entire phrases

question six will the speakers have

native English or native nickname will

they be native English speakers

no not necessarily they may have Indian

accents or filipino accents a German

accents or whatever accents so be

prepared for that question number seven

what if I speak for less than thirty

seconds

well it's not good you should definitely

try to speak for more than thirty

seconds but it all depends on your

note-taking ability if you have the

notes and you can fit it to the

structure if you don't have the notes

then your structure will be

half-finished question number eight what

if I speak all the way to forty seconds

well that will be a problem because the

microphone will cut your sentence off

midway through and you may lose a point

for grammar so stop before forty seconds

you can then click the next button yeah

I suggest clicking the next button

that's just better cool guys if you need

help with your PT sign up for free at

WWE two language dot-com you'll get

access to some free materials by doing

that you can also sign up to our live

classes yes but you may want to upgrade

your package to get tutorials one on one

tutorials with expert teachers to get

some feedback on your speaking and

writing you can join in our live mock

test live mock mock tests you get the

point

what else have we got we've got lots and

lots of practice materials all sorts of

stuff for you to help you pass your PT

including all the methods and strategies

that you need do you remember if you

don't want to sign up you can't support

us on patreon cool that's all from me

that's retail lecture if you have any

questions please put them into the chat

I'll spend a few minutes answering

questions