Preparing for Your IELTS Exam
Even if you pop out of your mother’s uterus speaking shakespeare english, that does not guarantee you’ll pass this exam
You might have heard of various test options to measure your english competency such as like TOEFL and TOEIC. Another alternative you may find today is IELTS. IELTS provide two different exams: General — typically required for citizenship, and Academic — measures your english proficiency for entering institutions. The academic is more difficult as it requires the exam takers to have an analytical approach to certain cases like reading charts and stating personal opinion on particular issues.
So what makes IELTS different? I personally found it more efficient than the former methods I have encountered. Before taking the exam, it is essential to get familiar with the structures. Forget using 2B pencils to block the circles in the answer sheet (yes, that’s the old school TOEFL multiple choice format I’m talking about), let’s discuss IELTS shall we?
Exam Structures
Just like TOEFL, The IELTS exam consists of four different sections — Listening, Reading, Writing, Speaking. The difference is in the format of the exam. IELTS has various question types in order to measure the English proficiency. These various question types will be difficult to solve for people who never practice on working on them. The writing section will challenge the writer to be analytical and test his rationalities by provoking to counter (or affirm) an argument whileasking for real life examples and points to prove. In the speaking section, there will be face to face encounter with a native — instead of speaking awkwardly to a computer while your voice is being recorded.
• Listening — 30 minutes, 40 questions.
There are four parts in this section.
Part one: a conversation netween two people in everyday social context.
Part two: usually monologue or speech in a conference.
Part three: a conversation up to four people. This is where it gets tricky. It’s generally a discussion between students and lecturer.
Part four: a monologue on an academic subject. You might find some confusing terms here.
The answers in listening section is always sequencial, so be very alert with the recording. Now, here’s the main difference in IELTS exam compared to others — you will most likely not find the answer in the question. You will be paraphrasing. This means you need to try to find some key words or synonyms to identify the answers. If there’s a question you can’t answer it’s best to move on to next one and forget about the one you leave blank. It’s important to stay calm and finish the section, then come back to that blank — take a guess.
• Reading — 60 minutes, 40 questions.
There are 3 passages in the reading section. The first passage is usually the simplest, then it gets longer and harder, no pun intended. And finally the last one is the killer passage. Having this in mind, you know have to split the time not evenly. I would recommend you spend as little time in the first passage, and more time in the latter. Read quickly and get the idea of the paragraph, time is of the essence here. Underlining the keywords will help much (e.g: dates, places, characters, etc).
• Question types in listening & reading section:
Multiple choice — A, B, C, D.. pick one.
Matching — match a list of items to a list of options on the question paper.
Map/Diagram labelling — In this type of question, your ability to read maps or diagrams will be tested. Usually a tour guide describing a city or a sales describing a product.
Form/table/chart completion — Filling in gaps in a form, table or chart.
Sentence completion — Filling in a gap in a sentence.
Short-answer questions — Answering simple questions from the information given.
Identifying information (True/False/Not given) — Alright, this type of question only comes up in the reading section but it can be a real pain the the ass. Basically, you only have to distinct between a valid information and an invalid ones. But what makes it difficult is there is a possibility that they never give you any information about the question anyway, which can cause you to waste time in trying to look for facts that are not there in the first place. It is important to understand the difference between ‘False’ and ‘Not given’. ‘False’ means that the statement contradicts the information in the text. ‘Not given’ means that the statement neither agrees with nor contradicts the information in the text.
A word limit is given in the instructions. For example, ‘NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER’. You will lose the mark for writing more than the word limit.
From the various question types, you need to asses which one is the easist to finish. Again, it’s important to keep calm and positive. Doing the harder one first may waste more time and can be frustrating thus resulting in blow in your morale. So keep your momentum going by working on the simpler ones first.
• Writing — 60 minutes, 2 tasks.
Describing graph/chart/diagram (150 words) — In this task you will be asked to describe a graph/chart/diagram. Your answer must be written as a whole piece of connected in text format (i.e. you must not use notes or bullet points). You wouldn’t have the time to describe the whole situatuin of the graph, so you must focus on the important ones. Describe the most significant growth of the graph and state the comparison. This task tests if you can give a well-organised overview of the visual information using language that is appropriate in its register and style. Remember that there’s still another task waiting and it requires more words than this one. So I’d suggest you to try spending not more than 20 minute on this one.
A point of view/argument discussion (250 words). —
In this task you will be given a random fact, and asked if you agree or disagree. Then you will have to support your argument by giving examples and conclude with a thesis statement to strengthen your ideas. Such argument may be:
“International travel is cheaper than ever before, and more countries have opened their doors to tourists. Do the advantages of this trend outweigh the disadvantages?”
It will help your marks if you use proper hierarchy in your writing. For instance when stating your points, mention first, next, and finally or to conclude and so on. Also, connect sentences using transition signals. Transitional words and phrases are what gives your essays coherence, we need them to join sentences and thoughts together. For instance, to add something one can say: also, plus, in addition, further, furthermore, moreover, additionally, to add to that, next. To make a contrast there are such words like: however, contrastingly, in contrast, on the contrary, on the other hand. These elements will mantain the coherence in the writing.
• Speaking — 15 minutes, 3 parts.
The first part of the speaking test is basic conversation where you’ll be asked about your background. Next is where most people find it quite hard. This is when you are given a piece of paper and you have to speak non-stop according to the topic on the card for two minutes. That short period of time can feel very long when you speak alone, but you better use the time wisely or you’ll lose marks. Then the final part you will be asked about the topic you talked about. This time deeper conversation will take place. Check out the video below.
Study Tools
Dictionary
Of course you won’t have the privellege to look at dictionary on exam day. But as you practice, here are some online dictionaries worth using according to lifehack. I personally use yourdictionary.com. The reason is besides it tells the definition, it also have tabs to show synonyms and use of the word in a sentence. This is useful remembering IELTS answers are mostly synonyms not the actual words given.
Youtube
If you’re like me (i.e having no money to take courses for exam preps) then you better be thanking God for the internet. You can look up videos on youtube just like the one I gave you previously. There are many tutors with different styles of tutoring. Now what of these tutors, they have different many different methods that they suggest you to follow in doing the tasks. For example, in the reading task a tutor may tell you to skim through the passage quickly and try to get the whole idea within short period of time. Other tutor will suggest to read only the first and last sentence of every paragraph to save time. You choose what suits you.
Maybe at the end of the day you have to create your own method — your own framework in your mind to solve the puzzle.
Dump exams
Never go for the exam before doing any simulation. Dump exam questions can be gathered from websites like ielts-exam. I prefer to look for ebooks. After doing dump exams, I was surprised to find the questions are much more difficult than the real exam. It may be frustrating at first but at the exam day it was a huge relief to know I’ve taken harder punches in the training.
Go for it
Now that you’re familiar with the exam format, it’s time to set the exam date & make your payment. This is the no-turning-back point. Always remember IELTS is not just about English proficiency. That may be only one-third of it. The rest is preparation.
