How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

5/11/2009 3

How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

INTRODUCTIONTable of Contents• INTRODUCTION• MASTER STUDYLIST• ADVICE/ RESOURCES• DIRECTORY• BONUS SPEAKING

MATERIAL!

Firstly, avoid wasting time, just study what is needed. How do I do this?Take a free IELTS practice test, determine your current strengths and identify your weaknesses, papers can also be found here.

Secondly, check your results with the requirements for your objective band score, now you have your MASTER STUDY LIST as your guide for thefuture.

Thirdly, make English your goal and the IELTS will become much easier.

ToC

How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

MASTER STUDY LISTPractise test date: Resources:EXAM DATE: DirectorySPEAKING – Official speaking Criteria PDF

Quick Tip: Grammar is KING, identify your issue and plan to dominate it.

Fluency and coherence Pronunciation Lexical Resource Grammatical Range/Accuracy

Areas identified to improve:

How do I improve these?

When do I plan to this?

Quick Tips: Speak slower, louder and don't be afraid of small pauses.

WRITING - Official Examiner Comments on writing papers PDF.Official Writing Criteria PDF

Task Response/ Achievement Coherence and Cohesion Lexical Resource Grammatical Range/Accuracy

Areas identified to improve:

How do I improve these?

When do I plan to this?

Quick Tip: Grammar is KING, identify your issue and plan to dominate it.

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

LISTENING – Official Listening Tasks

Quick Tip: TV is easier because of the visual clues, try the radio or podcasts for real improvement.READING - Official Reading Tasks

NON OFFICIALSkills considered vital.

Do-codification(From sounds into meaning)

Simultaneous Coordination(Listening, writing, and

comprehension)

Accent awareness -differences

between British, American and

Australian accents.

Exam Familiarity.Do you know the exam

structure? (Multiple choiceversus written answers).

Areas identified to improve:

How do I improve these?

When do I plan to do this?

NON OFFICIALSkills considered vital. Skimming Scanning

Speed Reading Exam Familiarity.

Do you know the examstructure? (Multiple choiceversus written answers?)

Do I have these skills?

How do I improve these?

When do I plan to this?

Quick Tip: Develop these skills in your own language first, then try in English.

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

Advice/ ResourcesGoalsSome advice on goal setting,Setting annual goals such as onehour of study ever day all year, is amassive task. I've found moresuccess stating onehour of study every day for 7 daysand then extending it for another 7days. This way it simply makes amassive task much moreattainable.

WritingGrammar is king. With poorgrammar it is impossible to score inthe other areas, so first sort thegrammar out, take your time doingthe writing, firstget the skill then work on the time.To monitor your improvementconstantly check your writing, alsoget it professionally checked at asight like:ieltswritingtask.net. Find out what

your issues are and DOMINATEthem! Podcast 001, has greatadvice for this, and this site is fullof free grammarquizzes to test your ability. Andthen when the grammar is totallyunder control, start learning howto write ielts essays, a great site forthis isieltielts.com

ReadingSpeed is king. Around 3000 wordsin 1 hour? Learn to speed read,learn to skim and scan, practiseeven in your own language whenever possible.Watch this video from Patrick fromOnline IELTS programme .A personal favourite for speedreading is Zap Reader

SpeakingConfidence is king, and practice isthe queen. Get the confidence bypractising, a cost effective solutionis to try and reproduce what youhear, the BBCpodcasts are excellent for this.If pronunciation is an issue, checkout these YouTube guides.

ListeningApart from listening every day tosomething in English, you shoulddevelop your transcribing skills, inthe exam you will coordinatelistening, writingand comprehension so writingaudio into text is excellent practice.This video explains why English cansometimes sound completelydifferent to what is written.

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

1 . IELTSPodcast.comYes this is my site! And offcourse I think it iswonderfull! Interviews withall the experts in the field,from Robby to Ryan andeven immigration help!

2. IeltIelts.comRyan has had an onlinepresence for a long timenow, he’s an establishedauthority in the field. Thebest thing about the site(after the videos) is heoffers his quality e-booksfor very fair prices.

3.Simon-ielts.comSimon is also an IELTSinstructor and clearlyknows a lot and shares it.You can tell by his studentscomments he must be afantastic teacher. The bestpart of this website is theengagement with hisreaders.

4.DCielts.comDominic is like the‘Godfather’ of the Ieltsworld. This has to be one ofthe best resources on theInternet. It’s anencyclopedia for IELTSstudents, itcovers every single elementof the exam, and for free!He has disappearedrecently but no doubt willbe back soon.

5. Ielts-blog.comAnother valuable resourcefor tips and advice, thesection about modelanswers gives an excellentoverview of what to expecton the writing exam.

6.UsingEnglish.comDo you want to improveyour writing fast?Write an essay -get itchecked, find your errors,find the theory, then do the

quizzes on this site. Thismethod has worked for allmy students.

7. MyIeltsTeacher.comApart from a catchy namethe site offers a library loadof information. My favoritepart is a section aboutletter writing – something alot of other sitesoverlook.

8. Teachers OdyssseyMiracel has an awardwinning blog for IELTS help,essay correction andguidance.

Directory

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

MORE RESOURCES!ONLINE COURSES

Online IELTS programme Is another fantastic site,this site has over 450 videos and a facebookfollowing of over 13,000 Facebook Likes!

IPASS Ielts is a great site to study the entire IELTScourse online, they even offer a guarantee toincrease your grade or your money back.

BOOKS

English Grammar In Use with Answers and CDROM: A Self-study Reference and PracticeBook for Intermediate Students of English

Top recommendation from various senior tutors,especially with respect to grammarimprovement.

Cambridge IELTS 8 Self-study Pack (Student's Bookwith Answers and Audio CDs

Great guide – Purchase the paperback edition asit costs half of the hardback.

Get Rid of Your AccentA practical, intensive approach to developing a

British RP accent.

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

BONUS SPEAKING CHEAT SHEETSpeaking Plan Ben Worthington

IELTSPodcast.comA detailed analysis and answer sheet for the IELTS

Speaking.These are set phrases and are a rough guide, they will

be good starting your preparation for the IELTS.Learn to use them in context, adapt them, masterthem, they will help but only if used correctly.

Part 1: Introduction and Interview

GeneralisingIf the examiner asks you your opinion about yourhome / studies / job / country you can add these'generalising‘ phrases to show a different aspect ofyour language ability.

More than likely the examiner will ask you some questions regarding your opinion or yourself, in this situation you could 'enrich a normal answer' with something a little more impressive.

To some extent the weather is poor but I do love the city centre, especially the...

On the whole I do enjoy living in Manchester..

By and large Manchester United was a wonderful club.

I’m pretty sure that…

In my case…

I personally believe/ think / feel…

It’s my opinion that…

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

What I meant was…

To put it in other words...

Let me explain it to you...

What I’m saying is…

Let me put it another way...

Sorry, what I would have liked to say was...

Let me rephrase what I just said...

Don’t misunderstand me, what I wanted to say was...

RestatingIf you see a funnyexpression on the examinersface, and you feel theyaren't following you, firstslow down then use one ofthese:

Correcting mistakesIf you make a mistake, andyou know you did, you caneither ignore it oracknowledge it with aperfect sentence:

Off topic?If you do find yourself offtopic, which is possible dueto exam nerves, here aresome phrases to get back ontrack:

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Where was I?

Anyway,…

In any case,…

To get back to what I was saying,…

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

Part 2: The LongTurn - PresentationTo start with uselanguage signposts tohelp the examinerfollow where you aregoing:

IntroductionFor an introductorysentence, something simpleis ok

Phrases for the body of thePresentation.Here we have a collection,if you are following the idea/ example model. You canstart with a general ideaand usethese phrases:

Generalizing

Firstly, First of all, to begin with,

Secondly, Second,

Lastly, finally, to conclude, to summarise, to cut a long

story short

What I'd like to speak about is...

I'm going to speak about … and …

My topic is … , firstly I will cover… then …

Mostly In general

In most cases

In many cases

Then, if following the model above you will give an example, here are the phrases to communicate this:

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

Giving examples.

Take McKinsey for example... To illustrate this...

A case in point is... To show you what I mean...

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com 10

Part 3: Two-Way DiscussionIn Part 3 of the IELTSinterview, which lastsbetween 4-5 minutes, youwill participate in adiscussion with theexaminer based on thetopic in Part 2.

Starter sentencesHere are some universalsentences to get you goingin the right direction

Similarity SentencesIf something is similar usethese (be careful somerequire practice to be usedcorrectly):

Expand / Develop points.If you want to furtherdevelop reasons orexplanations use these:

I once read an article about ...

I once watched a film about.... It said...

In the same way,

In the same way as Manchester industrialized so didLiverpool.

just as, Just as United used to win trophies, so did Inter Milan.

Similarly, Similarly, we also studied via the internet.

what is more,

furthermore (formal),

besides, in any case,...

moreover (very formal),

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How to Approach the IELTS Exam- Ben Washington

www.IELTSPodcast.com

as well as that, in addition,

To explain a logical consequenceWithin this part you may want to explain a logical consequence in a formal manner:

therefore,

consequently

as a result

Final last wordsThe examiner will very likely be from an Anglo Saxon country, in these countries manners are paramount, sometimes it is even excessive. So start with a big warm smile and remember to say please and thank you at all the appropriate times.

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