This is an IELTS Energy Podcast Episode 1561.
Will your sense of humor improve your IELTS scores?
Welcome to the IELTS Energy Podcast from All Ears English downloaded more than 35 million times with examiner-trained IELTS whiz Aubrey Carter and Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer.
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Comedy and humor questions are all over the IELTS speaking test.
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Hello, Lindsay.
How are you today?
I'm doing pretty well today, Aubrey.
How are you doing?
What's going on?
Excellent.
I'm curious.
Do you often go to comedy shows, like stand-up comedians?
Actually, yes.
We've been doing this a lot in the last year.
And for my partner's birthday, we're going to a comedy and rescue dogs event.
It's a perfect combination.
Kind of.
Yeah.
There'll be dogs there and comedians and we love both.
So yeah.
Amazing.
I love that.
Do you go to comedy shows a lot?
Do you like comedy?
Yes, I do.
We found this company called, I think it's called like Hidden Comedy or something like that.
It travels.
It's in all the different cities.
And then you find out like that day what the venue is.
And it's just like random stores and places.
It's not like a permanent retail place.
So you never know where it's going to be.
And it's really fun.
I like it.
Wow.
It's fun.
Especially when you I mean usually it's a big mix of, like talent and skill level with these shows, but usually you get one or two really good comedians and it's just fun.
Yes.
And sometimes even the people who are newer and are sort of trying out new material are often great.
For sure.
I love it.
For sure.
Yeah.
And so what kind of comedy questions could we maybe be asked on IELTS?
Yeah, this comes up a lot on IELTS.
So, for example, on part one, you might be asked this do you enjoy comedy shows, or what kind of sense of humor do you have?
Or maybe do you think having a sense of humor is important in daily life.
What about part two?
You could also get a part two question about this.
This could be all over the speaking test.
Part one, two and three.
So in part two you this again.
This is the one where we have to speak for two minutes.
Guys yes, describe a person you know who has a great sense of humor.
I mean, yes.
Right.
Or describe a time you went to a comedy show like so many, so many questions.
And part three.
Like you said, you might be asked why do you think people enjoy being around those with a good sense of humor?
Right.
The sort of more general question about it.
Or do you think humor is culturally specific?
How might jokes differ in other countries?
That would be a great question for Open Conversation Club, side point.
It would actually, you're right.
You guys, if you don't know what we're talking about, when you join our courses, you're automatically invited to our Open Conversation Club where, twice a week, we get together as a club and we practice speaking.
We always have really interesting questions like this one, right?
This is amazing practice for speaking part two.
If you don't have a speaking partner, if you're not able to meet with them as often as you would like.
This is weekly practice, where you're basically answering part one and part two questions.
It's amazing practice.
Really good.
And then a third question you might get on part three is are there differences in humor between older and younger people in your country?
Also really interesting.
Right?
Is it generational?
Very interesting.
So you could get any of these questions.
You need high scoring specific vocabulary.
So we're going to teach a few phrases today that would be perfect for any of these questions.
And then stay to the end.
I'm going to answer a part two question and Lindsay will give feedback.
We'll pull out some of what would make this a band nine answer.
Good.
I'm looking forward to that.
So when it comes to vocabulary, though, we can't just say funny.
We have to say more than the word funny, right?
Funny and jokes.
What else could we say, Aubrey?
What would be some new idioms, new vocabulary?
So one is to crack a joke, which this means to tell a joke or say something funny.
For example, you might say you know, my friend is always cracking jokes at work to lighten the mood.
So this is just a band nine way of saying, telling a joke, saying something funny.
So it's just less common.
Idiomatic.
It's band nine because we know that you know in the speaking text test next door to you they're not using that term right.
They're not using those words, the same words.
They're just saying to tell.
Or to laugh.
Someone is funny.
These are too basic, right?
Exactly.
Another one, burst out laughing.
To suddenly start laughing.
Michelle and I talked about this.
I don't know if you've experienced this.
You probably have, Aubrey.
Especially when you're a kid, you get these laughing attacks.
And maybe you and another friend, something is so funny, but no one else is laughing.
It's not a funny moment.
Right.
Absolutely.
And just out of nowhere, you burst out laughing.
Yes.
It explodes out of you.
Oh my gosh.
When she tripped on stage, the audience burst out laughing, right?
This happened to me once.
It was like a free throw sort of basketball thing.
It was like halftime of a basketball game at high school.
And I was called down to do it, but I did not have good shoes for it.
And I tripped and fell and everyone was laughing.
Luckily I was like kind of a not class clown, but i didn't mind that much, i wasn't like horrified, luckily.
Yeah yeah yeah, you took it in stride a little bit right yes okay good um, and then laugh one's head off is another great one.
This just means laughing really hard, to laugh a lot.
What would be a sample sentence for that one aubrey?
You might say we laughed our heads off watching that comedy movie.
So this is loud, out loud laughing, that belly laughing we talk about, right?
If you're just kind of quietly chuckling, you wouldn't say you laughed your head off.
This is for loud, big laughter.
Yeah, we love this.
Humans love to laugh.
It's good for you.
It sends all these hormones rushing through your body.
It's a good thing, right?
It's a good thing.
Absolutely.
In stitches is another one.
So when you're laughing uncontrollably, so literally, when we say we're in stitches, what are we saying?
We say this for running sometimes too, like I have a stitch.
Oh yeah, a stitch in my side.
Yeah, I mean it's sort of like a pain in your side.
Yeah.
Yeah, this is an idiom for laughing.
You say, I am in stitches.
I'm in stitches.
It means you're laughing so hard you cannot stop.
You're probably crying.
Sometimes this will happen at the most inopportune time.
Something just strikes you as funny.
Sometimes you see this on SNL when they're really trying to keep their composure and be serious, but you can see they're fighting so hard to not laugh.
Yeah.
Because they were probably just in stitches a second ago and they're trying to keep from laughing.
Or you know, sometimes when you watch a movie, at the end there'll be outtakes of scenes and they'll show the stars, kind of like dying of laughter after making a mistake in a take or something.
Yes, absolutely.
I love the outtakes.
Yeah, the outtakes are really funny.
I think it's so funny.
And then a barrel of laughs.
So this is used to describe a person, right?
Usually for a person who is really funny, we'll call them a barrel of laughs.
Yeah.
My best friend is a barrel of laughs.
Everyone enjoys being around her.
Whenever we go out, she has everyone in stitches, meaning again, the pain in the stomach.
Right.
You're just laughing a lot.
Laughing so hard.
And that does sometimes happen.
You're laughing so hard that your stomach hurts, or your mouth, like you're smiling so much that your mouth starts hurting.
Totally.
Lots of physiological responses to laughter for sure.
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All right, Aubrey, now it's time for a sample.
Yeah, shall we do this?
So I'm going to get out my timer here.
All right.
And I will try to use a couple of the phrases that we taught here.
But listen for other interesting vocabulary.
I'll try to use some high scoring vocabulary.
Listen for intonation, linking phrases, all of those things that make you know an answer, a part to answer a band nine.
And potentially a story or a little bit of an anecdote.
Almost always, right?
In order to fill that two minutes, you have to tell some story.
You need something.
You need some material.
Okay.
I'll ask the question, then I'll start the timer.
Describe a person you know who has a great sense of humor.
Go.
Without a doubt, I have to talk about my neighbor, Ozzie.
He actually did live improv when he was younger.
And now, you know, he's a dad.
He doesn't have as many opportunities to actually perform on stage.
But we, as his friends and neighbors, get to benefit of this amazing opportunity, joviality that he has carried through his life right
He is a barrel of laughs.
We'll get together for a fire pit on weekend nights sometimes.
And every time he's the one regaling us with these hilarious stories of things that happened in his college years.
He was in a frat at ASU and crazy stuff was always happening there.
You know, the cops would show up and somebody's passed out in the back.
And that was not my college experience.
That's always funny.
But especially because the way he tells a story, he just draws you in.
And by the end, you're in stitches.
Your stomach hurts.
You're laughing so hard.
And this happens every time we hang out.
He also does a lot of physical comedy.
Not many people do this.
A
But he will like get up and sort of act out the whole story.
He will like sing a song and jump and click his heels together.
Just anything he can do to make the story more engaging, to make the listener laugh harder.
And so it's so fun to always be in his presence.
But the best is that not only is he good at telling jokes and being funny, he makes you feel funny.
Like, if ever I tell a joke or do something funny, he will laugh so hard, just like sidesplitting laughter.
So I love cracking a joke when he's listening because he's the best audience.
He appreciates my jokes and All right.
That's two minutes.
Thank you.
Oh, my gosh.
You made me want to be friends with this guy.
This is the best.
Let's get an intro.
I should send this to him.
He would probably be very flattered.
I know.
I'm sure.
Or he would just be like, it's true.
It's true.
Where's the lie?
Oh, gosh.
What a good example.
What a good example.
What a good sample answer, Aubrey.
Really impressive because you use some of the words that we talked about.
Then you threw in some super impressive stuff, which I want to talk about here.
So what I heard was first you started off with without a doubt.
That's a really interesting way to start off speaking part to answer because it's unique, right?
Yes.
And it's the linking phrase you were like, try.
I always recommend start with a linking phrase when it's top of mind, not later when you I mean yes, you need to use them later too.
But if you can throw one in right at the beginning. kill two birds with one stone, right?
Guys, that is a super smart strategy.
Write that down and put it in your back pocket because that's a brilliant strategy.
Make it easy on yourself to score a seven or higher, okay?
This is one of the things to do.
Top of mind, linking words right at the beginning.
And then you threw in kind of an important like building block vocab term for comedy.
Questions live improv.
Right.
We need to know we need to talk about improv initially, but it's just what is it?
It's kind of short for improvisation where you're sort of coming up with a scene.
You're it's often more than one person and they're acting off each other.
You have to yes.
And the other person and just create it as you go.
You don't have a script.
Yeah, for sure.
I love that.
So good vocabulary.
Then you came up with a real zinger, joviality.
Amazing.
Amazing.
I don't know if this was just spontaneous, but very impressive.
Right.
So someone who is jovial is, you know, gregarious and fun and smiling and positive.
Yes.
All of those things.
Right.
But that is definitely a band nine word.
I'd like, as I said it, I'm like, oh, nice.
That's a good band nine word.
Yeah.
You're giving yourself a band nine.
There we go.
And it's true though, that most people who do have a good sense of humor are good at cracking jokes, are jovial.
So be ready with jovial as the adjective or joviality is the noun.
I love that.
And then you use one of our keywords from today, which is barrel of laughs.
So that sounded like it fit perfectly for this guy that you're describing.
Yes, he is a barrel of laughs.
And then you came up with another zinger regaling us.
Oh, my gosh.
This is not even in my I mean, this is almost not even in my vocabulary compliment, because I know you have an impressive vocabulary.
But this is a great verb when someone is telling a story, but doing it in a really well, a good way, right?
They are regaling us with a story.
Yeah, I love it.
You used you're in stitches, right?
To describe how you normally are when he tells stories.
So this is a good grammar form.
So by the end of his stories, you are in stitches. right?
So interesting way to use diversity of grammar forms too.
And then you did another interesting grammar construction.
You said he will get up and act out his story.
So again, now using the future tense to talk about his habits, the things that he habitually does.
Also interesting.
Yes.
Ooh, that is interesting.
And the examiner would be like, ooh, I'm so excited.
I can give a band nine for grammar.
I'm seeing all these interesting constructions.
Yep.
So big mic drop on that answer.
Aubrey, you've got a band nine.
Well, thank you so much.
I'm excited for all of you to have all of this great vocab.
You might get asked about either your sense of humor or something more general.
If you're just asked to describe a friend or describe what you like to do with friends, these are words you could also use in those answers.
If you have a friend that has a good sense of humor.
And I think also your answer was so strong, partially because you have a lot of material.
It's a true story, which is helpful. not required, but helpful.
And you just enjoy being around the guy.
So it's like, you've got a lot of material to add, right?
It helps.
True, right?
If you can't, off the top of your head, think of someone who's funny, you might be tempted to answer this and say, like I don't really know anyone that's funny.
That would be a hard question to fill for two minutes.
I think it would be better to make up, imagine a person who's so funny and talk about them.
Yeah, I completely agree.
This is one of the ones where you're going to need actual material.
Think about Yeah, sometimes you can, Or someone you know who's just pretty entertaining, even if they're not the funniest person, and exaggerate.
For all you know, a lot of that could have been made up, and it's just a guy who tells bad jokes.
Oh, yeah.
It could totally be fake.
It doesn't matter for me, the person that's scoring your exam.
No, they don't care.
They don't know.
Exactly.
And then thinking about these themes, so comedy, or maybe there's questions about horror films.
You could... define a funny person in a lot of different ways.
Someone that's clumsy, you could fit that in there too.
If you don't know anyone that's funny, that does like improv traditional comedy, it could be someone that's clumsy and you could explain how that's funny in a way.
Don't you think, Aubrey?
Yes, absolutely.
That could totally work.
And this question is interesting because you don't have to actually be funny to have a great sense of humor.
You can just be someone who laughs easily.
Like I was saying at the end, like also, it's having a great sense of humor to laugh at other things and find other things funny.
So you could just talk about someone who laughs easily.
Yeah, that's a better, because the question is actually someone who has a great sense of humor, not someone who's funny.
But so that's a good that's a better response.
So I think, yeah, sense of humor could be described in a lot of ways.
It doesn't have to be that person standing on stage with the mic, you know, at the comedy night.
Right.
Right.
So and you could describe yourself.
Right.
Sure.
Yeah.
Owner doesn't care if you sound a little prideful.
You'd be like, honestly, I have a great sense of humor.
Yeah.
And you could lie.
Even if you don't, you could pretend you do.
And maybe that's how you wish you were and maybe make that up.
So there's a lot of options.
It feels like a very specific question, but there's a lot of ways we could take this to score seven, eight or nine.
Absolutely.
Yes.
And use this vocab, high scoring vocab.
Like you said, I love that the person in the next room probably doesn't know it unless they're listening to IELTS Energy.
I hope they are.
That's true.
That could happen.
I mean, there you go.
Guys, go on and check out IELTS Energy 1556 speaking part one answers about impeccable hotel stays.
We had some fun conversations about our preferences in hotels and how you might answer this question.
Okay.
Yes.
Awesome.
Thanks, Lindsay.
Really fun.
I will see you next time.
Great stuff, Aubrey.
Talk to you soon.
Take care.
Bye.
Thanks for listening to IELTS Energy.
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