DISCUSSION USEFUL PHRASES

STANAG 6001 LEVEL 3 SPEAKING

 

You may remember that Part A of Task 2 of the oral exam is the dialogue whose aim is to reach an agreement and Part B is the three-way discussion led by the examiner. In order to deal with these tasks, you will need to be able to:

 

• express an opinion

• agree with an opinion

• disagree with an opinion

• compare

• describe causes and effects

•  give arguments

• give solutions

• hypothesize

• justify

• speculate

As well as, especially in Part A to:

• invite the partner to join in

• initiate the conversation/exchange of arguments

• maintain the dialogue

• respond logically to the partner’s arguments

 

In order to do it, it is useful to know some fixed expressions, so called functional phrases used for specific purposes.

Here’s a list of example expressions.

 

USEFUL PHRASES

 

Introduction

Let’s discuss…
We should discuss… …
If we talk about …, it seems necessary to discuss… … and decide which is the most and the least….

Let me start with…
Let’s begin with….
Let’s discuss … first.

Asking for opinion

Do you agree?
Do you share my point of view?

Agreeing

I strongly agree with you.
I couldn’t agree more.
I share your point of view.
I can see your point, but…

Disagreeing

I don’t agree with you.
I’m of a different opinion.
I’m sorry, but I have to disagree with you.

Expressing opinions

From my point of view,…
To my mind,…
In fact,…
To the best of my knowledge,…
The way I see it,…
If you ask me, …
I think…
I’m not sure if…
It is said/believed/known that…
It is obvious that…
It seems (to me) that …

Balancing arguments

On the one hand,… and on the other hand….
Some people say that…, others believe that…
It is said that…. However,….

Summing up

To sum up,…
To conclude,…
To summarize,…
Taking everything into consideration,…

I can suggest the following order, …Do you agree?
I believe the most (important) is … and the least (significant) is …
We (have) agreed on the following order,…
We (have) decided that number one is, number two is… and number three

 

 

PRACTICAL EXAM TIPS

Part A

1. Start by paraphrasing the question in the box. Don’t read out the question.

2. Always refer directly to your colleague’s last opinion/statement, answer his or her question, react to their opinion, etc.

3. Try to be natural. Avoid staged discussions with an assumed result.

4. Negotiate the order.
5. Avoid launching into a monologue. Ask and answer each other’s questions. Focus on one aspect of an argument at a time.
6. The aim of the discussion is to come to a common (at least partially) conclusion. It is welcome if you do come to a common conclusion, but it is not obligatory.
7. The goal of the task is achieved if you discuss all the factors in detail and come up with the list/order.

Part B
1. This part is moderated by the examiner.
2. The questions are not written on the exam card you receive in Part A.
3. You answer the examiner’s questions and then may be encouraged to discuss them further with the second candidate.
4. The examiner may take part in your discussion and ask additional questions.

 

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