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September 2010

IELTS Preparation tips from competition winners

The response from the competition winners was simply overwhelming. Nothing makes me happier than seeing how people while being very busy still have so much compassion, that they make time in their evenings and write back, to share advice and help others.

Here is what Radi Ivanov (Band 7.5 in Academic IELTS) said:

“As far as I am concerned – practice, practice, practice! I spent a month preparing for the exam, using IELTS-Blog.com and the Target Band 7 book.

I wrote lots of essays and reports, and also read many on the Internet. Reading books, magazines and newspapers in English also helped me. I carried out mock exams at home and tried to act as if I’m in an exam situation. This helped me a lot with getting used to the test format and the timing, which is very important.”

And here is some advice from Annette Helling-Benze (Band 7.5 in Academic IELTS):

“To answer your questions, I just followed your tips in the book, practiced intensively for 4 weeks and I used the Writing Correction service for reports and essays. The comments from the teachers were the best source for me to do assignments better. I bought 2 x 8 corrections.

The different subjects for essays or reports were a great challenge for me, too. I could improve my writing skills a lot and I can use them now for my University courses.”

On behalf of all the readers of IELTS-Blog I would like to thank Radi and Annette, for their kindness and help.

IELTS Results competition winners in August 2010

It is my pleasure to announce the winners of the IELTS results competition in August. As more and more people participate, the number of winners is also increasing!

Today we have 6 of them to congratulate, and what makes me even happier is the fact that 3 out of the 6 winners were using my book Target Band 7 – to achieve an even higher overall band of 7.5!

Anyone who just became a member at IELTS-Blog should know the reason why we hold this competition every month. Here is how it works: people email us their scanned IELTS results, and every month we pick the best scores. Where did the idea come from? It’s very simple – this is our way to find people who prepared for IELTS successfully on their own and ask them these 2 questions:

“How did you study to get such a high score? What are the secrets of your success?”

And why should you care? Because you can learn from other people, just like you, who achieved a great IELTS score, by studying like they did. This is why I hope that today’s winners will write back to me and share their tips for every test taker’s sake.

And the winners are …

Academic Module – 1st place

  • Dr. Manal Salem from Yemen, Band 8.0

Academic Module – 2nd place

  • Miglena Georgieva from the UK, Band 7.5
  • Annette Heling-Benze from Germany, Band 7.5
  • Radi Ivanov from Bulgaria, Band 7.5

General Training Module – 1st place

  • Srinivasan Ramakrishna from India, Band 8.5

General Training Module – 2nd place

  • Furqan Javaid from Pakistan, Band 8.0

Congratulations to the winners! I am arranging for your special certificates to be sent to your emails, and your results will be displayed in the IELTS-Blog hall of fame.

We would love it if you shared your methods of studying that enabled you to achieve these remarkable Band scores. Please send us an email to IELTS-Blog and share.