1.

Accent: One of the major areas of concern in listening is the ACCENTS. It could be Canadian, America, British or Australian accent. Sometimes every section have different accent, which makes it difficult for the individual to sync accordingly. This could only be overcome by practicing sample papers. The more you practice the easier it will get for you to acknowledge the accents and respond promptly.

2.

Order of answers: Always follow the serial number to answers, especially for diagrams, maps and tables as 99.9% of the times the answer comes in that order .In case you missed any question, quickly jump to next one and if possible make a quick note on the side of the question paper regarding the previous conversation only. Never take notes of entire conversation rather practice to train your mind to listen to the answers only. A simple trick to do so is read the questions beforehand as this will give you fair idea of what to expect.

3.

Write-n-Scrap Strategy: Usually IELTS confuses its listeners by giving wrong information at the first place and correcting it later. This is done to test the attentiveness of the test takers. For these types of questions you can opt for Write-n-Scrap Strategy. For instance if the speaker is talking about a specific day, date, time, house number or phone number for reference, you should jot down every detail at the same time instead of waiting for the right answer to come and if the speaker changes the answer during the course of the conversation then write the new answer and scrap the previous one. Always follow the speaker till the end of the narration as half knowledge is often dangerous.

Remember, there is no negative marking for wrong answers so it is better to fill in some information rather than keeping it blank and always write answers in CAPITAL letters for better understanding.

1.

Follow the Order: Unlike Listening in Reading the test takers have the liberty to attempt any section first. However, it is a very important to attempt each section in given order, that is, from section 1 to last. Do not ever start your exam from last section assuming that it is the difficult part and will require more time to solve. Instead, go with the flow. Solve section 1 first as it will give you confidence to proceed further because of its easy format. Remember, you will not get more marks to solve the difficult questions.

2.

Read Instructions Carefully: Always read the instructions cautiously as easily avoidable errors could occur if you pay no heed to the instructions. For Example, at times the question demands the answer to be in YES/NO/NOT GIVEN format whereas, the test taker assume it to be in TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN format and proceed accordingly, hence losing marks.

3.

Scan-n-Skim: Out of all the different types of questions in reading test only few types of question requires full understanding of the passage whereas, the other types are simply based on the location of the information. To identify the type of question you must first go through the questions and analyze whether it demands the full understanding of the passage or not. For instance, in case of “Complete the summary” type of questions, you need to go through the entire paragraph. On the other hand, for multiple choice questions, scanning for specific information is advisable. Another such example is for “Matching the headings” types of question and the formula to crack such problems is:

Heading + First Two sentences =Full Paragraph

It will not only save you a lot of time but also trains your mind to be precise and spot on.

4.

Search for Keywords: Read the question and look for the keyword and then go back to the passage to find the exact location of the word and underline it. Once the word is detected then read the related question carefully to find the answer. Usually the answer lies between the line before the keyword sentence and the line after it.

Just like Listening, there is no negative marking in reading as well for wrong answers so it is better to fill in some information rather than keeping it blank and always write answers in CAPITAL letters for better understanding.

I hope this information will help you to get your Target scores. For techniques regarding Writing and Speaking, I will be back with another blog soon. Till then PRACTICE! PRACTICE!ANALYZE