READING TIPS FOR TODAY
Reading test advice
Follow this Reading test advice, and make sure you understand how to respond to ‘completion’ type questions.
It is essential that you write your answers on the answer sheet. Nothing you write on the question paper will be marked.
You may write your answers on the question paper and transfer them to the answer sheet before the end of the test if you like. However, it is important to note that you will not be given extra time to do this.
You must write your answers in pencil.
Make the most of your Reading test:
- look out for the title, headings and any special features such as capital letters, underlining, italics, figures, graphs and tables
- make sure that you understand the questions and follow instructions carefully
- pay attention to timing; do not spend too long on one passage or question
- do not try and read every word; remember, you are reading for a purpose
- if you do not know the answer to a question, attempt it but do not waste time; move quickly onto the next one
- do not panic if you do not know anything about the subject of the text; all the answers can be found in the text
- the word(s) you use must be taken from the Reading text; you must not change the form of the word(s) in the text
- do not worry if there is a word that you do not understand – you may not need to use it
- check your spelling
- be careful to use singular and plural correctly
- focus precisely on what you are asked to do in ‘completion’ type questions
- if the question asks you to complete the note ‘in the…’ and the correct answer is ‘evening’, just use ‘evening’ as your answer; note that ‘in the evening’ would be incorrect
- pay attention to the word limit; for example, if you are asked to complete a sentence using no more than two words, if the correct answer is ‘silk shirt’, the answer ‘shirt made of silk’ would be incorrect
- attempt all questions; there are no penalties for incorrect answers, so you have nothing to lose
- check your answers
WRITING TASK STRATEGIES I'M SURE IT HELP YOU MORE....
THIS WILL HELP YOU IN WRITING TASK1 AND WRINTING TASK ...
IELTS Writing strategies
Spend 20 minutes on Task 1 (150 words) and 40 minutes on Task 2 (250 words). Task 2 is longer than Task 1 and is worth twice as many marks.
Task 1
Before you write
As you write
How you write
When you have finished
Task 2
Before you write
As you write
How you write
When you have finished
IELTS Reading: Three things you must know about multiple choice
In IELTS Reading, your biggest enemy is the clock. You have three passages to read in an hour, so you are going to be in a hurry — and when you rush, it’s easy to make mistakes. So it’s important to do some of the hard work before you even arrive at the exam hall. Try to spend 15 minutes, right now, reading and digesting three important facts about multiple choice questions in the Reading test.
How many answers?
You may have more than one multiple choice task in your IELTS Reading. Let’s look at an example. You read the instructions for the first passage and see that you have to choose two answers from each question. You go ahead and complete the exercise, correctly choosing two options each time.
You then move on to the second passage, and there is another multiple choice task. It’s very easy to skip the instructions and carry on choosing two options per question, just as you did in the first multiple choice. This would be a very big mistake. It is highly unlikely that the second multiple choice will be the same as the first. It is almost certain that in the second, you have to choose either three or one option per question. If you choose two, you will get zero marks.
Lesson: Read the instructions for each section very carefully, even if you think you know what to do.
Use your knowledge of the world
You can often use your common sense to help you answer a multiple choice question. Let’s look at a very obvious example. You might get a question about something very general, like the sun:
The sun is:
- hot
- blue
- cold
- yellow
You have seen the sun, and you know it’s not cold, so you can eliminate that answer, and you know it’s not blue, so that can’t be correct either. So we only have two answers left: hot and yellow. At this point you need to go back to the passage and find something that relates to hotor something that relates to yellow. Your knowledge of the world is unlikely to be enough to lead you all the way to the correct answer; but it can take you half way there.
If in doubt, guess
If you can’t find the answer to a multiple choice question, guess. You are not penalised for wrong answers. You are only given credit for answers that are correct. There is another danger to leaving an answer blank: it’s easy to get confused and write the next answer in the box. Then you risk all of your subsequent answers being wrong because they are all in the wrong boxes.
What’s next?
This advice comes from a video in Road to IELTS. The same video also includes British Council IELTS experts’ advice on:
- Skimming the text and questions
- The importance of synonyms
- The importance of understanding the task types
- True / False / Not Given question — perhaps the hardest task type in IELTS Reading...
IELTS Listening: Help! I don’t understand the accent!
The problem
IELTS is an international test, so you might hear a range of different accents, including Australian, British, New Zealand and North American. Remember that you only hear the audio once in the Listening test so you need to be absolutely confident that you can pick out every detail first time. An unfamiliar accent can get in the way of that. While there will not be any extreme accents, you should at least be familiar with a range of ‘standard’ accents.
The solution
Start by reading this extract from a report from the US Library of Medicine:
‘It is well known that there is a processing cost when listening to speech in an accent other than one’s own, but recent work has suggested that this cost is reduced when listening to a familiar accent widely represented in the media, and/or when short amounts of exposure to an accent are provided.’
This means that ‘short amounts of exposure’ to an unfamiliar accent really can help you to understand it. So it’s sensible to spend some time listening to the most common dialects when you are preparing for the test. It’s not difficult to find radio stations online that enable you to do this.
Here are some examples:
- ABC Radio from Australia
- CBC Radio from Canada
- BBC Radio 4 from the UK
It’s easy to find others, and you may even find it interesting to listen to some more unusual accents such as Louisiana or Caribbean. In fact, you can have lots of fun finding radio stations worldwide on tunein.com!
Another approach is to listen to some TED talks. TED speakers come from many different countries, and often the talks have transcripts, so you can check the accuracy of your listening. Here are three examples from the Top 20 TED talks:
- Ken Robinson: How schools kill creativity (British accent)
- Amy Cuddy: Your body language shapes who you are (North American accent)
- Pranav Mistry: The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology (Indian accent)
If you want to listen to different accents in the context of IELTS, then try Road to IELTS. You’ll find that the activities and practice tests include a variety of accents to give you an authentic IELTS experience.
LINKING WORDS FOR WRITING
HERE ARE SOME LINKING WORDS FOR WRITING TASKS .... READ CAREFULLY AND PRACTICE IT DAILY ....
ADDITION/ SIMILARITY -
in the first place
again
moreover
not only ..
but also to
as well as
as a matter of fact
and together with
in like manner also
of course
in addition
then likewise
coupled with equally
comparatively in the same fashion
way identically correspondingly first,
second, third
uniquely
similarly
in the light of like
furthermore
not to mention as
additionally
to say nothing of
too equally important
SUPPORT / EXAMPLES
in other words
notably
in fact
to put it differently
including
in general
for one thing
like
in particular
as an illustration to be
sure
in detail
in this case
namely
to demonstrate
for this reason
chiefly
to emphasize
to put it another way
truly
to repeat that
is to say indeed
to clarify
with attention to
certainly
to explain by all means
surely
to enumerate
important to realize
markedly
such as
another key point
especially
for example
first thing to remember
specifically
for instance
most compelling evidence
expressively
to point out
must be remembered
surprisingly
with this in mind
SUPPORT / EXAMPLES
in detail
in this case
namely
to demonstrate
for this reason
chiefly
to emphasize
to put it another way
truly
to repeat that
is to say indeed
to clarify
with attention to
certainly
to explain by all means
surely
to enumerate
important to realize
markedly
such as
another key point
especially
for example
first thing to remember
specifically
for instance
most compelling evidence
expressively
to point out
must be remembered
surprisingly
with this in mind
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