Interaction: defend your position under pressure

The monologue was you, alone, making your case. The second half of the B2 oral is interaction: the examiner pushes back, and you have to defend under pressure — think on your feet, concede what is fair, refute what is not, and keep your French intact while you do it. That last part is where marks leak: articles, agreement, pronouns and verb endings (P48–P50) are the first things to break when you stop reading from a script.

It works in three steps. Step 1: state a position on the topic — speak it or type it, just one sentence. Step 2: an examiner (the oral coach) reads it and comes back with one to three pointed counter-arguments aimed at your position — not generic ones. Step 3: you record a spoken rebuttal to each — this is the graded speaking. Every rebuttal is scored the way the monologue was — a delivery signal plus a B2 rubric — but on the things that matter in a debate: does it respond to the challenge, does it defend the position, is it accurate aloud, and does it stay fluent under pressure. You also see the speech-to-text of your reply, and can save your recording locally.

The moves that hold up under pressure:

• Concede, then turn. Certes..., mais... / Vous avez raison sur ce point, cependant... Face à l'examinateur : Vous avez raison sur ce point : les jeunes recrues apprennent moins vite à distance. Cependant, deux jours de présence par semaine suffisent à les former.
• Refute with a reason, not just "no". Je ne partage pas cet avis, car... Face à l'examinateur : Je ne partage pas cet avis, car la productivité n'a pas baissé dans mon service : ce sont les réunions inutiles qui ont disparu, pas le travail.
• Buy a second to think, in French. C'est une bonne question... Disons que... — never switch to silence or to English. Face à l'examinateur : C'est une bonne question... Disons que tout dépend du métier : un comptable peut travailler chez lui, un infirmier non. Je parle donc des postes qui le permettent.
• Watch the grammar you drop first: the article after a negation, the past participle's agreement, y/en and clitic order, the ‑ent you cannot hear but must produce. Tenue jusqu'au bout : Je n'ai pas d'argument contre la flexibilité ; l'étude que vous avez citée, je l'ai lue aussi, et les salariés interrogés n'en parlent pas ainsi.

Pick a stance you can defend, state it, and face the examiner.

Can't record right now? Each challenge has a Can't record? option: type your rebuttal and the rubric still grades it, or rate yourself. Either way the attempt counts toward your Production orale progress — and completes the speaking track: pronunciation, monologue, and now interaction.

Pour les tournures elles-mêmes — celles qui s'emploient à l'oral, distinguées de leurs équivalents écrits et marquées courant ou soutenu — voyez la boîte à outils de l'expression. La discussion qui suit l'exposé se joue souvent là : relancer, concéder, attribuer une position sans la reprendre à son compte.