10 VNU-EPT SPEAKING TOPICS 2016 (2) Topic False idolization - regarding somebody as a hero with blind adoration or devotion – can cause embarrassment or even anger when an idolized person turns out not to be a real idol What are some reasons for false idolization and how to stop it? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Topic A report by UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) states that human populations have been over-exploiting the Earth’s natural resources by unsustainable development As a developing country, Vietnam has also been undergoing unsustainable development Discuss some major causes and effects of this social issue in the context of Vietnam Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Topic In Ho Chi Minh City, a recent ban on after-school tutoring which leads to job dismissals for violations has caused a lot of discussion nationwide Are you for or against this ban? Why? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Topic With the development of technology, Internet fraud is increasingly popular all over the world Discuss some major cases in Vietnam recently and some solutions to prevent it Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Topic Some countries apply humane punishments for prisoners by giving them certain facilities in prison Other countries insist that prisoners be punished severely by minimizing basic living conditions during their time there Do you think prisons should be a decent enough or a harsh environment? Why? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Topic In Vietnam, a new traffic law taking effect on August 1st, 2016 imposes the same fine on people who go through the red light and the yellow light Do you agree or disagree with this new rule? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Topic In Vietnam, a number of reality shows for children, especially music contests, appear to have adult content: children singing adult songs, wearing too much makeup, etc Do you think it is normal or inappropriate? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Topic Should Vietnam have more public holidays or longer holidays? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Topic 9: Should the time for Vietnamese university education be shortened to 3-4 years instead of 4-6 years like before? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Topic 10: More and more Vietnamese parents send their children abroad for high school education as early as 15 years of age Do you agree or disagree with this decision? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations False idolization - regarding somebody as a hero with blind adoration or devotion – can cause embarrassment or even anger when an idolized person turns out not to be a real idol What are some reasons for false idolization and how to stop it? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Introduction: Nowadays, many people, especially teenagers, are regarding their favorite singers or actors as perfect idols And when their idols turn out to be not perfect, they become angry and bad things Reasons: I think there are some reasons for this problem: - Firstly, teenagers nowadays are strongly affected by TV and movies When the actor plays a good character in the movie, teenagers believe that he is also a perfect person in real life like his character So, when the actor turns out not to be as perfect as his character in the movie, teenagers tend to become angry and even attack their idol - Secondly, the media companies always build up perfect appearances and personalities for their singers and actors They are always fashionable and very well behaved when they appear in front of their fans even though it is not their real personalities - Finally, over compliments on newspapers, magazines or social media make some people think that idols are perfect Teenagers strongly believe that and become crazy when bad news is released Solution: To stop this problem, I think the best way is educating our children how to admire somebody in right way We shouldn’t prevent our children from admiring people that we don’t like We should tell them that nobody in this world is perfect and admiring somebody is learning only the good things from them We should also introduce to our children some famous people that we think it is good to learn from them Conclusion: I think that will help your children admire somebody smartly with awareness A report by UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) states that human populations have been over-exploiting the Earth’s natural resources by unsustainable development As a developing country, Vietnam has also been undergoing unsustainable development Discuss some major causes and effects of this social issue in the context of Vietnam Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Introduction: In my opinion, Vietnamese people have been doing many things which lead to this social issue Causes: - The first thing is that we are keeping exploiting the natural resources too fast for the nature to recover Thousands of trees are cut down every year without re-planting Even when we plant new forests, it takes years for them to grow Besides, we take minerals and nutrition from the land for crops but don’t provide them back by fertilizers or give the land time for self-recovery - The second thing is that people are wasting the resources The amount of clean water is reduced day by day The natural land is reduced, too Large area of farming land or forest turns to be roads or buildings There will be no more space for the nature - One more thing is that people are destroying the environment by leaving rubbish everywhere Smoke or wastewater from companies, factories and daily rubbish are discharging into the environment every day Effects: Unsustainable development has been badly environment, people’s heath and the social development affected the - For the environment: it is badly polluted and not safe for animals, plants or even people to live For example, thousands of fish in our Central area were killed due to the sea is polluted - For people’s health: the fast we develop, the more diseases we catch because of the unsafe environment we are living in - For social development: unsustainable development also makes the distance between cities and the countryside is much further Development brings more jobs for people in big cities but also create more unemployment All money and the best things are invested for the big cities and the countryside seems to be forgotten In Ho Chi Minh City, a recent ban on after-school tutoring which leads to job dismissals for violations has caused a lot of discussion nationwide Are you for or against this ban? Why? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Introduction: In recent years, more and more parents have let their children go to tutor classes In my opinion, I agree with the ban on after-school tutoring in Ho Chi Minh City because of some reasons Reasons: - Firstly, children need time to grow, not just to learn There are many other things in our lives for children to explore and grow in a perfect way, not just learning in classes or schools Children nowadays seem to spend most of their time on learning: hours at school, then they come home for about hour to take a shower, eat and then continue tutor classes until night They even have classes on the weekends Children need time to play, enjoy and explore the world outside to grow naturally It’s good to let them join some extra courses to improve their skills or aptitude but don’t force them to learn too much - Moreover, to stop tutoring is to stop the problems it brings Some teachers force their students to go to their tutor classes to get high mark; some show their tutoring students answers before the test; some treat students badly if they don’t attend the tutor classes, etc The ban on tutoring helps stop these problems Conclusion: Although the purpose of giving weak students extra classes is good, there are many problems occurring Therefore, I agree with the current ban on after-school tutoring Extra classes should be under control of The Department of Education and Training With the development of technology, Internet fraud is increasingly popular all over the world Discuss some major cases in Vietnam recently and some solutions to prevent it Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Introduction: With the development of technology, many people using it to bad things to others, especially fraud Some major cases: This kind of crime is very various Here are some common cases that have happened recently: - One of the most common cases is fake notification about something we can get for free They ask us to click on a link to receive the free prizes or lucky present Many people believe that the information is true and click on the link, but it is virus The viruses may destroy our data or steal our personal information - Another case is that they send us fake promotion notice from the banks or phone networks They ask us to provide our account information or even ask us to so some money transfer For example, a guy stole millions VND just by spreading fake promotion notice from Viettel on facebook - One more case happens when people use online service to book tickets, hotel rooms or online shopping Some websites put fake photos to attract us to use their services but the real products are not like that Solutions: To deal with these frauds, I think we: - shouldn’t click on any strange links or websites - shouldn’t believe any promotion information which is not sent by the official email or phone number of the companies - When booking or shopping online, we should read the information carefully, compare the information with the photos and only use the services of the trustworthy companies - Finally, we shouldn’t send any personal information such as bank account, password via email because the hackers can easily steal the information Some countries apply humane punishments for prisoners by giving them certain facilities in prison Other countries insist that prisoners be punished severely by minimizing basic living conditions during their time there Do you think prisons should be a decent enough or a harsh environment? Why? Give reasons and examples from your reading, experience or observations to support your point of view Introduction: In my opinion, prison should be a decent enough environment The countries in the world should give prisoners certain facilities for their basic living conditions Reasons: - Firstly, I think prison is a place where people who committed crimes are kept and educated In prison, they have chance and time to think carefully about what they did and regret about that Through labor and training, prisoners are re-educated to become good people and make sure they won’t bad things again when they are back to the society - Secondly, I think when someone is sent to prison; the true meaning of this punishment is that prisoners will have no freedom anymore It’s not aim to putting them in bad living conditions or being violated Some prisons in Syria, India or Philippines treat the prisoners very badly The prisons there are very crowded and dirty I totally don’t agree with that - One more important thing is that they are prisoners, they are wrong but they are still humans So, they have basic human rights and should be given basic living conditions such as beds, blankets, foods, drinks or at least clean space to live Conclusion: In conclusion, despite their faults, prisoners are still humans, so they should be treated humanely In Vietnam, a new traffic law taking effect on August 1st, 2016 imposes the same fine on people who go through the red light and the yellow light Do you agree or disagree with this new rule? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations As we know, from 1-August, Viet Nam applied new traffic law, police fine on people go through the yellow light as red light Currently, this law makes concerns for people and there are some different opinions in social In my opinion, I agree with that law because of some reasons: Firstly, the law is true because go through the yellow light also means violence the traffic law And who violent the traffic law should be punished It is true We all know that when the yellow light is on, we must slow down and then stop when the red light is on But many people try to go as fast as possible to go through the yellow light before the red light is on Although they don’t pass the red light but it is still wrong Secondly, it may help reduce traffic accidents With the new law, I think there will be less people trying to pass the yellow light Many researches on newspapers show that the number of accidents caused by passing red light is very high But the real reason of most cases is that people try to go as fast as possible to go through the yellow light before the red light is on Therefore, giving harsh punishment for people passing the yellow light is true Finally, this new law shows that our government is giving strong action to traffic issues, which is really good The law has been established long time ago but there were still so many people break the rules and cause accidents So, changing the law, raising the punishment to force people to follow the rule is thing that the government should I thing when the punishment is raised to million in maximum, people will pay more attention to the traffic light and follow the rule better Because the purpose of the law is good for us, I agree with it In Vietnam, a number of reality shows for children, especially music contests, appear to have adult content: children singing adult songs, wearing too much makeup, etc Do you think it is normal or inappropriate? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Currently, in our country, we have a lot of contest on television for children as The voice kid, Viet Nam’s got talent or Idols, so on In those contest, children must make up, dance and sing adult songs I think that it is not suitable for children because of some reasons Firstly, children may have psychological problems They will have some thinking which is not fit their age and this problem will affect the growth of children When they join contest, they may sing songs about love and perform sexy dance, which they don’t understand and not suitable with their age Secondly, it affects their learning at school When they join contests, they must spend a lot of time to practice with trainer, so time for studying at school will be limited; this leads to bad studying result One example is Phuong Mỹ Chi, after she became a runner-up of the voice kid contest, she has joined a lot of music shows and she couldn’t go to school regularly She received warning from school for not go to school for such a long time Thirdly, it is an infringement of children‘s rights Some cases, children join contest because their parent forced them, they can’t choose anything, and they just know that they must join because their parents want Actually, almost of contests just serve for adult’s purpose, they make children famous, take them to a lot of shows and earn money from them Children become a tool to make money for adults I think that we should let children grow naturally, not let them their childhood because of business purposes Should Vietnam have more public holidays or longer holidays? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations I think it will be better if we have more public holidays than longer holidays, because of three reasons: Firstly, our job and business will be affected more due to long holidays When people rest and relax for so long, it will hard for them to get back to work with full motivation People may feel lazy and not fully concentrate to their tasks Everything will finally back to normal but it may take a long time This reduces the productivity of companies and also affects the economy So it is better if we have just or days off after hard-working time than a long period like week or more Secondly, more accidents will occur When people have longer days off, they will return their hometowns or go on some tours Many people travel at the same time may cause traffic jam Besides, holidays mean parties with beer and alcohol It is very dangerous to travel while we are drunk There were more than 200 people died due to traffic accidents in days of Tet holiday in 2015, and the number was up to 300 in 2016 I cannot imagine what would happen if the Tet holiday lasted for weeks or even a month! Finally, there will be more chances for criminals Illegal entertainment may appear much on long holidays, such as gambling, ante or cock-fighting for money In addition, when we have long holidays, we may leave our home for longer time This gives the thieves more chances to break into our house while we are not there Besides, public places are always crowded on holiday These are the ideal places for criminals such as robbers, pickpockets or swindlers In short, I think several days off among the year and a long holiday at Tet are good enough We don’t need to make the holidays any longer Should the time for Vietnamese university education be shortened to 34 years instead of 4-6 years like before? Why? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Vietnamese government has agreed with the new format of college and university education that the time for Vietnamese university education should be shortened to 3-4years instead of 4-6 years like before In my opinion, I agree with it and there are three reasons for this decision Firstly, the time and money investment for university education will be reduced Education cost huge amounts of money, especially university education It requires several of expenses such as facilities, equipments, materials, teachers, employees, teachers and students’ accommodations, etc There has been a lot of time and money invested in universities some of which are wasting for unnecessary costs Therefore, if the university time is reduced, these kinds of investments can also be reduced and used more reasonably Secondly, unnecessary subjects will be crossed out The studying time is reduced from 4-6 years down to 3-4 years That means the university must make some big changes in their training program They must focus only on what students really need for their major and omit some less-related subjects For example, English-major students not need to learn Math or Statistics Besides, the practical sessions will be preferred to the theories Finally, this helps the students improve their abilities and self-study skills Reducing the university time doesn’t mean cutting down on the necessary knowledge Therefore, students have study more They will spend less time at university but they are required to self-study, read a lot, more researches and learn as much as possible from practicing This encourage the students to improve their strengths and also help to recognize who are really good students In short, I think it is reasonable to shorten university time to 3-4 years instead of 4-6 years like before More and more Vietnamese parents send their children abroad for high school education as early as 15 years of age Do you agree or disagree with this decision? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations In Vietnam, there are more and more parents who send their children aboard for high school education as early 15 years of age I agree about this because some reasons: Firstly, every student wants to enlarge their knowledge and studying abroad is one of the best choices Studying in another country not only helps students learn more but also give them a chance to practice and improve their foreign language and explore a lot of new things such as culture, lifestyle or food Besides, living far from their parents helps them mature and self-reliant Moreover, they often have higher income and live better afterwards Secondly, many families nowadays have enough money for education abroad With the fast development of our society, people’s living conditions are also increasing They earn enough to pay for the studying and living fee for their children in other country Last but not least, the process for going to study abroad is now quite easy It is now integration period, so the procedure to go abroad is simplified a lot to encourage people Moreover, the procedure to apply for studying abroad for secondary or high school students is easier than for college or university students Therefore, many parents prefer to send their children to studying abroad before they turn 18 And I think it is a smart choice In conclusion, although some people may think that let children leave home at 15 years old is so early, I still think that it is possible and good for them What are some ways to control the increasing number of drug addicts in Vietnam? Give your opinion and support it with reasons and examples taken from your reading, experience, or observations Nowadays, in Vietnam, there are more and more people become drug addicts, especially the young The situations are getting more complicated when drug addicts become more aggressive, lose self-control and commit serious crimes such as robbery, assaulting or even murder In my opinion, there are some possible ways to reduce the number of drug addicts in Vietnam Firstly, the law should be stricter The punishments for both the drug addicts and drug dealers should be stronger to prevent people from committing such kind of crime According to the Law of Vietnam, the minimum punishment for drug dealers is years in prison and maximum is death penalty For the drug users, they have to pay money punishment from 50 million to 500 million I think these punishments are still not enough Secondly, the young should be well-educated to stay away from drug Both families and schools should pay more attentions to youngsters who are very innocent yet curious and impulsive They need to be taken care not only physically but also mentally Many young people become drug addicts and commit crimes due to the lack of parents’ love and care Finally, healthy entertainments should be provided enough for the young Many teenagers are attracted by bad things because they don’t have enough good and interesting entertainment channels I think we should consider their demands, interests and hopes to provide them with suitable and healthy entertainment channels such as hobby clubs at school, sports clubs, science clubs, etc  ... when their idols turn out to be not perfect, they become angry and bad things Reasons: I think there are some reasons for this problem: - Firstly, teenagers nowadays are strongly affected by TV... social media make some people think that idols are perfect Teenagers strongly believe that and become crazy when bad news is released Solution: To stop this problem, I think the best way is educating... them that nobody in this world is perfect and admiring somebody is learning only the good things from them We should also introduce to our children some famous people that we think it is good to