IELTS listening lesson from Simon

IELTS listening lesson from Simon

overall

In this lesson, we’ll just quickly cover some basic information and some general tips.

So starting from the basic information. it’s very important that you know that the test expects.

Really know the test.

Let’s look at the general information about the test.

Well, it’s about 30 minutes long.

And at the end of the test, you then have 10 minutes to transfer your answers to a single answer sheet one piece of paper.

For all the answers, there, you got 10 minutes to do that.

So it’s a good time to check your answer, to check your spelling, especially.

There are 40 questions in total, so forty points by the way.

Band 7 is about 30 up to 40, so you can make 10 mistakes, so you can still get band 7.

That gives you an idea of how much points you want.

Each question is worth one mark, forty marks together.

There are 4 sections of 10 questions, start at easier, and get more difficult.

The answers are always in order.

Of course, if you were listening and the answer was five minutes ago would be very difficult.

So the answers have to go in order as the recording plays.

There are only 3 types of question in the listening test.

You got mostly gap-fill questions, there will be lots of those just filling words in gaps. there will be some multiple choice questions that are quite common as well. and you might have a simple matching question.

Finally, you need to be ready for various English accents you’ll hear, British English, Australia…

The main English accents are present in the tests

So it’s a good idea to do practice and get used to listening to those English accents.

But don’t worry about too much English accents, whatever you hear, the speaker will speak the English test very clearly. and they won’t speak too quickly.

So you should be able to understand everyone of the speakers, with just a little bit practice of getting used to different English accents before you are going for your test.

Don’t worry about it too much.

One final thing that we do worry about the test is that you only hear the recordings once.

This is the most difficult aspect to IELTS listening.

If you have a chance to hear the recording again the second time, you could the any answer you missed.

But you don’t have that chance for the listening test.

Once you heard it, and if if finished, and you missed the answer, you missed it. you don’t have another opportunity.

Now let’s look at the 4 sections of IELTS listening in some detail.

section 1

Start at section 1, you will always hear two speakers in section 1

and they will be having an everyday conversation nothing academic.

It’s all everyday conversation, like making a booking of a hotel, of travel, or may be joining a library, something simple like that.

One of the speakers gives basic information to the other one.

So you might hear for example a receptionist in a hotel asking a hotel guest for their basic details.

And you’ll have to do simple gap-fill, filling in some missing details, whether or gaps, those details will be very easy things, like names,addresses, data, times, numbers, easy information that’s missing.

You listen to the recording, filling the information, be very careful at your spelling.

So section 1 is quite easy, but i recommend you try to get a high score, very high score, (9 or 10 correct)

That means you can make mistakes later in more difficult sections.

practice section 1 a lot, until you are very good at it.

Before telling about section 2, let’s quickly look at the key technique.

And that is using the breaks to read ahead.

There will be breaks in the recording where you got time to read and those breaks will be before each section starts, in the middle of each section(except in section 4)(there is no break in that one) and the end of the each section.

When you get those break, start you reading time to prepare the questions that are coming next.

Don’t look back, don’t check what you don’t, that’s a waste of time, always read ahead.

section 2

Ok, let’s go on section 2 now.

In section 2, you use all of the break time at the end of section 1, of course, to prepare for this.

You are going to hear one speaker only in section 2.

And in this section, you’ll be given a short speech about a non-academic topic like tourism, a park, some local facilities.

You’ll hear the speaker speaking and you’ll have to do a gap-fill, may be some multiple choice questions, or may be some matching about what the speaker says.

There is a middle break in section 2, so you only have time to prepare 5 questions at a time.

So section 2 is still quite easy, so i recommend you aim for a high score.

Prepare section 2 a lot, until you become good at it before you worry too much about section 3 and 4.

section 3

Let’s move on to section 3 now.

In this section, you use breaks, you use breaks at the end of section 2, and the break in the middle to read ahead and underline the key words that you should listen for.

You’ll hear 2 or 3 speaker, probably 2 main speakers ,and may be even a third. it could be an example that a teacher and two students.

So this is a little bit more academic. it supposed to be talking academic topics, a conversation related to education or training, for example a tutor with a student.

There will be gap-fill, or multiple choice, (multiple choice questions)

This section can become quite difficult.

If you got a multiple choice question, this is why you really need the break to read ahead.

And underline keywords in questions and choices that you are given.

But don’t forget, when you are listening later in the recording, you are going to listen for keywords or synonyms, that means you might not hear the exact words that are given in question, you might hear a similar word.

So for example, if the question contains the word “lesson”, don’t be surprised that you don’t hear the word “lesson”, you might hear the word “tutorial” or “seminar” instead of the word “lesson”

So be aware that you are underlining key word in the question or choices, but you might not hear the exact word, so it’s important in section 3 and 4.

So this is a difficult section, so you might only aim for 6 or 7 correct answers in this part if you do vary well in section 1 and 2, you can make mistakes here.

And this is same in section 4.

section 4

But look at section 4 now.

Use the break at the end of section 3 to read ahead.

There is no breaking in the middle of section 4.

So you need to read and underline as much as you can in the break at the end of section 3.

Underline keywords ,remember.

There is no break in the middle.

You’ll only hear one speaker at this time.

And this speech will be about an academic topic

You’ll get gap-fill, may be multiple choice questions.

And you need to listen for the keywords or synonyms as we said in the previous section.

This section should be difficult. section 4 is supposed to be the most difficult section.

And the reasons are here: you hear the faster speech, there will be more content, so there will be more extra information, which doesn’t necessarily contain any of the answers.

You might hear for example, a whole 30 seconds ,or even a longer speech without any answers being given by the speaker.

So be ready for that.

Those are the 4 sections.

Then i’m going to talk about knowing the test.

For the best way of course, to know the test inside-out perfectly, is to do some real practice tests.

This will give you the best idea of the test is really like, and what you need to do to really improve.

summary

Before we come to the end of this lesson, we will just repeat some of the key tips given.

• read ahead during the break. (only check back at the end)
• underline keywords when you got the break time.
• listen for keywords of synonyms.
• be careful with spelling.
• don’t get stuck on a difficult question, and move forward.
• concentrate. (if you miss concentration, you will miss a lot more answers)

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