240 Speaking Topics with Sample Answers

Q174. There is such a thing as being too independent. Do you agree
or disagree?
A. Sample Answer
There is such a thing as being too independent. To begin, independence is a great thing to have
because it shows that you can do things on your own. However, being too independent can lead one
to become overworked. If you are always doing the things on your own, you will feel overwhelmed
by the amount of work you have taken on. For instance, when you are in a new country, you’ll have to
translate everything on your own, which is very time-consuming and frustrating. You will become
burnt out by trying to do everything independently. This brings me to my second reason that it can
lead one to have an inability to ask for help. If you become too independent, you might feel ashamed
or too confident to ask for help when needed. Since one can become overwhelmed and lose the
ability to ask for help, I believe there is such a thing as being too independent.
B. Create new sentences using the expressions below.
(1) turn to one for
(2) on one’s own
(3) make sense / stand to reason
(4) be inferior to / be superior to
C. Find an error in each sentence.
(1) I finally turned to him to help me.
(2) Being independent is prerequisite to be successful for one’s field.
(3) Don’t hesitate in asking for professional advice from the experts.
(4) Secured the sources of professional knowledge, I set out for my own business.

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Q175. Should the mistakes a person makes in the past affect a
person’s future? Why or why not?
A. Sample Answer
I believe that the mistakes a person makes should affect that person’s future. First, mistakes are
made to be learned from. If one made a mistake, it means that they did something that they should not
have been doing. Therefore, we should take the lesson learned so that we don’t repeat that same
mistake. As the saying goes, history repeats itself. So, why should we keep making the same mistakes
when we can learn from them and not repeat them again? Furthermore, we need to learn from the
mistakes made, then forget the negatives and remember the positives. We don’t need to remember
forever the feelings we had of failure when we made a certain mistake. Instead, we should remember
the positive outcomes that we received from the aftermath of that mistake. When one learns from a
mistake and continues on in a positive light, then that mistake has affected a person’s future in a
positive way. There is no way around our mistakes affecting our future because that is the nature of a
mistake.