IELTS Preparation tips

I always trust in kindness of people, and it rarely lets me down. Today we have a chance to learn from 2 of our best IELTS scorers, Dr. Vanita Krishnan ( Band 8 ) and Olivia Widjaja ( Band 8.5 ). When I asked them, here is what they said helped them to score as high as they did:

Olivia said:

“Thank you for letting me to participate in the competition.

I don’t think I have any special techniques or strategies on how to study for the IELTS test, however I did look for resources on the Internet, when I Googled “IELTS study guide” I came across your site, and I was reading all the comments people wrote and finally decided to buy the Target Band 7 book. I found your book to be very helpful and it was the only book I had.

I tried to do all the exercises you gave especially the writing part, because I knew it was my weakest point. Before attempting the writing exercises, I read all your tips and also the samples from your blog. I only read the band 7 and 8 essay samples, and tried to mimic their styles of writing in the exercises.

For the reading part, one tip I would give is that in the exam, read all the questions first before reading the text, that way it would help you look for the key sentences you need to answer the questions. Also, they used lots of synonyms in the text and the questions, and that would be a hint for your answer.

As for the speaking part, just practice the exercises provided in the book and be confident, be yourself on the test day.

Lastly, I hope this helps and best of luck to everyone.”

Dr. Vanita said:

“Thank you for selecting me as a winner in the IELTS results competition.

Well, my advice to the candidates is to make it a point to read articles from good newspapers like the Times of India and improve the vocabulary as well as the reading speed. The students need to solve at least 2 to 3 versions of the IELTS booklets published by the British Council.

As far as the speaking section is concerned, I think students should record their own answers during the practice sessions and listen to them to get an estimate of how well they speak and whether the language is fluent. Also, practicing speaking in front of the mirror helped me build my confidence.

Finally, I would like to wish all the IELTS test takers ALL THE VERY BEST !!!!”

Today I have a very nice surprise for you. One of the November “Best IELTS Score” competition winners, Shankar Lal (an engineer from Pakistan) has shared his methods that helped him score Band 7.0 in the exam.

Shankar said:

“It is very exciting to get the desired score in the IELTS test, but it needs lots of work, practice, motivation and ambition when you are preparing for it.

As far as I am concerned, I found Cambridge IELTS series very helpful, from book 1 to 7 there are practice tests which made me familiar with the real test format. The material presented in books is according to needs of the test taking candidates. Besides these 7 books, there are 3 other books known as Insight into IELTS, which provide the tips and techniques about taking IELTS exam.

Last but not least, the book which made IELTS very interesting for me was “Target Band 7”, I think this is an awesome book, for all the 4 test sections, there are very nice tips which I think if anyone follows, they are guaranteed to get Band 7.

From all the 4 sections, I found reading section a bit hard and needed a lot of practice, the only thing which made it hard was shortage of time in the test, because sometimes the passages are very lengthy and tough. So one should practice, keeping the time limits in mind.

The second difficult section in the test was the writing section, although the 1st task of this section (writing the report) is easy as it needs only little practice, but the 2nd portion is a little bit harder and one should be well prepared for it. There are some familiar topics which most probably appear in the exam with little variation, so at least those should be well prepared. The only perfect solution for it is practice, practice and practice.

The listening section is easy if you have listened all the listening tests.

Finally, the speaking section looks very hard, but if you understand all the three parts of this section and prepare for it from Target Band 7 then it become very interesting to you. The main factor that matters is confidence. If you don’t hesitate and speak fluently with the examiner then hopefully you can get a good score.

I wish all the best to the candidates taking the test.”

My sincere thanks to Shankar for taking the time to share his tips with us!