IELTS skills: Clarification - Making sure you understand This page continues the academic discussion skills section by looking at how to ask for clarification. There is also an example discussion to show how to use some of the phrases, Asking for clarification In an academic discussion you will need to listen to many different speakers and try to follow their line of argument. This is not always easy even for native speakers, and there may be times when you get confused or lost. In such instances, it can be useful to ask the ‘speaker a question or ask for clarification. The verb fo clarify means to make something clearer and so the response should help to make the information clearer and easier for the listener to understand. The speaker is likely to paraphrase the information and give ‘additional detail to aid understanding. In addition to asking for clarification, you may wish to ask questions to check your Understanding. In order to do this, you will have to repeat or paraphrase what the speaker has just said. If you think you understand this is definitely a more useful approach than asking for clarification, as the speaker can just respond 'Yes' if you are correct, or correct, any misunderstandings you have Once you have asked for clarification or checked for understanding, it is useful to respond to ‘show whether you now understand or not, so that the speaker can either continue or provide more explanation Phrases for each of these functions, i.e. asking questions, asking for clarification, checking understanding and responding, are shown below. Asking questions ‘+ [have a question. + Ive got a question about... + Could | ask a question? + Sorry, could | just ask... Asking for clarification ‘+ Sorry, I didn’t understand what you said about... = [didn’t quite understand what you meant aboutiby. + What did you mean aboutiby...? + Could you explain... + Could you tell me more about...? ‘+ [didn’t quite follow that. Could you explain again? Checking understanding ‘+ Sowhat you're saying is that...? + Soyou mean that...? + Are you saying that...? + If /have understood you correctly, your point is that...? Responding + Yes, Isee. + Yes, that’s clear now. + OK, thanks, + That's fine now. + Sorry, | stil don't understand, + Im sorry, but could you explain that one more time?