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VCE Languages: Core Skills (all VCE languages) (Year 11) · Speaking and Interacting · 11m read

Conversation Basics — Talking About Yourself With Confidence

Talking about yourself — family, school, interests, plans — is the foundation of conversation tasks from Year 11 to the Year 12 oral examination.

Learning objective: Hold a conversation about your personal world, extending answers and using strategies to keep the conversation going.

By the end of this lesson you can:

  • I can answer personal questions with extended responses.
  • I can use fillers and repair strategies.
  • I can ask questions back.

Conversation is table tennis. A rally keeps going when both players return the ball. Extend your answers and ask questions back to keep the rally alive.

Extending answers

THE A-R-E PATTERN
• ANSWER the question.
• REASON — give a reason ("because…").
• EXAMPLE or EXTRA — add an example, opinion or time reference.

STRATEGIES
• Fillers to buy thinking time (the equivalents of "well…", "let me think…").
• Repair: ask for repetition or clarification politely.
• Paraphrase when you do not know a word.
• Vary tenses: past (what you did), present (what you do), future (what you will do).

Worked example (Easy)

Extend this answer to "What do you do on weekends?": "I play soccer."

  1. Answer. I play soccer.
  2. Reason. because I love being outdoors with my friends.
  3. Extra. Last weekend we won 3–1, and next year I want to try coaching juniors.

Answer: Answer + reason + past and future detail turns one sentence into a rich response (then say it in your language).

Common mistakes

  • Memorising long monologues They sound unnatural and break down when questions change. Fix: Memorise flexible chunks, not scripts.
  • Freezing when you do not know a word Silence breaks the flow. Fix: Paraphrase or use a filler.

Practice questions

  1. Which response best extends an answer?

    1. Yes.
    2. I like music.
    3. I like music because it relaxes me, and I play guitar every evening.
    4. Music.

    (1 marks)

  2. Write (in your language) an A-R-E response to "Tell me about your family."

    (3 marks)

Summary

  • Answer – Reason – Example/Extra.
  • Use fillers, repair and paraphrase.
  • Vary tenses.
  • Practise flexible chunks, not scripts.

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