Have you seen the video lesson that I published here a few years ago?
Check it out and feel free to ask any questions about the lesson in the comments area below.
Have you seen the video lesson that I published here a few years ago?
Check it out and feel free to ask any questions about the lesson in the comments area below.
It's a good idea to do practice tests (e.g. using the Cambridge IELTS books) in preparation for the listening exam. Here's some advice to help you benefit from doing practice tests:
1. Your score is not the most important thing
The important thing is what you have learnt by doing the test. Were there any new words or phrases that you can learn? What did you find difficult? Did any of the questions trick you? In other words, what do you need to do to improve your score?
2. Check how accurate your answers are
Be strict with yourself; every grammar or spelling mistake is important. For example, if the speaker says "The library has a collection of newspapers", you must not write "collection of newspaper".
3. Get into the habit of moving on
If you missed something, forget about it and move on. Always prepare for the next question rather than worrying about a previous question. When you are given 30 seconds to check your answers, use the time to look at the next section instead.
Watch the following short video, and fill the gaps in the summary below it.
If you can't see the video, listen to the recording below.
Fill the gaps to complete these sentences:
If you want to get a better score in IELTS listening, the most important thing is to do lots of listening practice. You need to put in the hours!
To "put in the hours" means "to do the necessary amount of hard work". But let's use this phrase more literally by considering how many practice hours you are actually doing every day or every week. Do you know how many hours you spent listening to English yesterday, or last week?
Maybe you could keep a record of the time you spend listening to English this week, and maybe you can try to increase this listening time next week. A person who listens to 10 hours of English per week is probably going to improve much faster than a person who only manages 30 minutes.
Watch the following video and fill the gaps in the sentences below it.
If you can't see the video, here's an audio version:
Fill each gap with a maximum of two words and/or numbers:
What percentage of Earth’s surface is covered by water? _____
When viewed from space, the ocean is by far the planet’s _____.
What figure is given for the total volume of water in the ocean? _____
The ocean also contains over 99% of the world’s _____.
Part 1 is supposed to be the easy part of the listening test. It is almost always a simple gap-fill exercise with basic information about some kind of booking or appointment.
But does this mean that you don't need to practise part 1? No.
I recommend doing lots of practice for part 1. You should be aiming for 10 out of 10 in this part of the listening test because you will probably lose points in parts 2, 3 and 4.
In fact, a good idea would be to focus only on part 1 until you regularly get 10 out of 10. Get as many of the official Cambridge books as you can, and do all of the part 1 questions.
Don't move on to parts 2, 3 and 4 until you master part 1.
Note: there are some official listening tests samples on this page.
Have you heard about the small changes that have been made to the listening test this year? There's no need to worry, but it's best to be informed!
Here's what the official IELTS website tells us:
..........
From 4 January 2020, some small changes are being introduced to the instructions and layout of the paper-based Listening test:
..........
Note: Perhaps the only change that may affect you is the second one. You'll need to be ready to start question 1 straight away.
Often you don't hear the exact words given in the question. Instead, you hear a synonym, a similar word, or an opposite. For example, if the question contains the word difficult, you might hear too hard or not easy.
Try the following exercise (from Cambridge IELTS 4, page 85). The speaker explains the problems involved with 4 different school science experiments.
Listen and choose the correct problem for the 4 experiments.
A) too messy
B) too boring
C) too difficult
D) too much equipment
E) too long
F) too easy
G) too noisy
H) too dangerous
Experiment 1: ______
Experiment 2: ______
Experiment 3: ______
Experiment 4: ______
Students often ask how many correct answers they need (out of 40) to get a band score of 7 in the reading and listening tests.
According to official IELTS guidelines for academic* reading and listening:
Note:
The score needed for each band can change depending on the difficulty of each test. If you have a really difficult test, the score needed for band 7 might be 28 or 29. If the test is easier, you might need to score 31 or 32 to get a 7. Click here to see the banding guide on the official IELTS website.
*General reading is scored differently.
Watch the following short video and then fill the gaps in the summary below.
If you can't see the video, listen to this audio recording:
Summary:
Isaac Newton was renowned for his expertise in 1)_____, 2)_____, 3)_____ and theology. His Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy was published in 4)_____ .
Newton’s first law is named the law of 5)_____.
His second law relates to 6)_____.
His third law states that for every action there is an 7)_____ and 8)_____ reaction.
Newton also invented the first 9)_____ telescope, he devised the theory of 10)_____, and he is credited with the invention of the mathematical study known as 11)_____. He is considered to have had one of the greatest scientific 12)_____ in history.
Listen to the following recording and complete the summary below.
There are more people living in cities than in ______ areas. Urbanisation is the defining phenomenon of this century; half of the world’s population is urban. Many people are enticed from rural areas by the ______ of a better life. We need to improve living conditions for the urban poor by providing adequate ______, clean water and ______.
One key to making cities ______ better is good planning. Planners need to ______ cities to make them beneficial for all citizens. Cities need green transport and green ______; they need to be energy ______ and pedestrian- ______, with housing and jobs to ______ people to come to live there.
Here's the full transcript for the listening exercise in last Tuesday's lesson. The speaker talks quickly, so it's useful to see exactly what she says.
I wanted to spend a little bit of time today talking about the importance of work experience as you're considering different management programmes. Now this will vary a lot school by school. So some schools actually will have a minimum number of years of required work experience, so you should enquire with all the schools that you are interested in, sort of, what their recommendations are.
At Stanford specifically, we don't necessarily look at a certain number of years of work experience, but what we’re really looking for are your leadership examples that you’re able to draw from in your life. And as a result, some people actually come to us a little bit earlier on in their careers.
So, most years we might even have, you know, one or two students who come directly after university, but they’ve got incredibly strong leadership examples to draw from: maybe it is from being involved in student government, or clubs, or organisations, or starting a non-profit organisation, or having been involved in a family business growing up. So they’re able to draw and refer to those leadership experiences in the classroom.
Listen to the following talk by a director from Stanford Business School.
Fill the gaps in the sentences below:
Tip: If you have more time, you could try to transcribe the whole recording.
Here's a nice way to combine listening practice with topic research for the writing or speaking test:
For example, to get some ideas for the 'genetic engineering' writing topic, I watched a few videos on YouTube. Here's a link to a short, useful presentation about genetically modified food:
Click here to go to the video (it's only 3 minutes long).
If you watched the video, answer this question:
What is a transgenic organism?
Students often tell me that they find it hard to decide whether an answer should be singular or plural, especially when they aren't sure whether or not they heard the "s" on the end of a word.
Try the quick exercise below. For each sentence, decide whether we need the singular or the plural, or whether you think both would be acceptable.
Are you doing the following things in order to prepare and practise for the IELTS listening test?
If you're doing all of these things, keep going! You might not notice it, but your listening will be improving gradually.
Here's an easy way to check your spelling for the IELTS listening test:
For example, here are some of the listening answers from Cambridge IELTS 14. Record yourself reading this list, and then test your spelling tomorrow.
Out of 25, how many words did you spell correctly?
Listen to the following talk about unemployment, then answer the multiple choice questions below. Make sure you read all 3 questions carefully before you start.
1. A year from now, the unemployment rate will be
A) fairly good
B) not as high in California
C) very high for the country as a whole
2. One problem is that
A) employees cannot work for more than 33 hours per week
B) employers will extend working hours instead of hiring new staff
C) there are too many part-time workers
3. If the economy begins to improve
A) more people will be discouraged from looking for work
B) people will think that there are more job opportunities
C) there will be an expansion of the workforce
Here are the two questions (from Cambridge IELTS 14) that I showed you last week. This time I've underlined the keywords.
21. How will Rosie and Martin introduce their presentation?
A with a drawing of woolly mammoths in their natural habitat
B with a timeline showing when woolly mammoths lived
C with a video clip about woolly mammoths
22. What was surprising about the mammoth tooth found by Russell Graham?
A It was still embedded in the mammoth's jawbone.
B It was from an unknown species of mammoth.
C It was not as old as mammoth remains from elsewhere.
..........
Use the transcript below to answer the following questions:
Martin: We thought we needed something general about woolly mammoths in our introduction, to establish that they were related to our modern elephant, and they lived thousands of years ago in the last ice age.
Rosie: Maybe we could show a video clip of a cartoon about mammoths. But that’d be a bit childish. Or we could have a diagram, it could be a timeline to show when they lived, with illustrations?
Martin: Or we could just show a drawing of them walking in the ice? No, let’s go with your last suggestion.
Tutor: Good. Then you’re describing the discovery of the mammoth tooth on St Paul’s Island in Alaska, and why it was significant.
Rosie: Yes. The tooth was found by a man called Russell Graham. He picked it up from under a rock in a cave. He knew it was special — for a start it was in really good condition, as if it had been just extracted from the animal’s jawbone. Anyway, they found it was 6,500 years old.
Tutor: So why was that significant?
Rosie: Well the mammoth bones previously found on the North American mainland were much less recent than that. So this was really amazing.
Before you hear the recording, you have some time to read the questions and underline key words (the words that you intend to listen for).
Which key words would you underline in the questions below?
(from Cambridge IELTS 14)
..........
21. How will Rosie and Martin introduce their presentation?
A with a drawing of woolly mammoths in their natural habitat
B with a timeline showing when woolly mammoths lived
C with a video clip about woolly mammoths
22. What was surprising about the mammoth tooth found by Russell Graham?
A It was still embedded in the mammoth's jawbone.
B It was from an unknown species of mammoth.
C It was not as old as mammoth remains from elsewhere.
..........
Tip: Don't underline words that are repeated in each choice (e.g. mammoth). Only underline the words that show you the specific differences between each answer choice.
Tourism and tourist information are common topics in the listening test. Here's a short video that I found about the tourist centre in my own city, Manchester:
If you can't see the video, listen to the recording below:
Quick exercise:
The speaker mentions the numbers below. What do they refer to?
Here's an interesting video that someone sent me the other day. I think we could get some good ideas and vocabulary from it, perhaps for topics related to children and education.
I haven't had time to pick out the good vocabulary from the presentation. Maybe you could help me to do that, by sharing your notes in the 'comments'.
Every time you listen to something in English, you have an opportunity to improve your vocabulary knowledge (or 'repertoire'). You might hear a new word or phrase, or you might learn something about how a word is used.
For example, I was pleased to see the following comment below last week's listening lesson:
"I didn't know the meaning of 'urge' before this video, thanks Simon!"
This is the kind of 'noticing' that leads to improvements when you're learning a language. Keep your ears and eyes open, and develop your noticing skills!
Here's another short talk from ted.com. If you find it interesting, watch it through to the end. If not, just try the quick vocabulary exercise that I've made below.
...
...
Complete the phrases that the speaker uses in the first minute of the talk.
Multiple choice questions in the listening test are always difficult. I can think of four reasons for this:
Here's a good example from Cambridge IELTS book 10, page 12.
Which TWO facilities at the leisure club have recently been improved?
A) the gym
B) the tracks
C) the outdoor pool
D) the indoor pool
E) the sports training for children
Which two answers did you choose? Did you experience any of the four difficulties that I mentioned above?
Watch the first 3 minutes of the video and answer the questions below. Watch with subtitles if you find it difficult. You might also like to watch the rest of the presentation if you find the topic interesting.
1. The speaker states that
A) speaking a language is a critical skill
B) babies are language learning geniuses
C) adults cannot learn a new language
2. The speaker’s tests on babies involve
A) training them to respond to a sound change
B) training them to recognise the sounds of all languages
C) training them to respond to a panda bear
3. The speaker describes babies as 'citizens of the world' because
A) they understand everything they hear
B) they can recognise the difference between the sounds of any language
C) their listening skills are as good as adults’ listening skills
Are you really working on your mistakes and learning from them?
Whenever you make a mistake in a practice test, you have the opportunity to make a small improvement. But this will only happen if you analyse the mistake carefully, comparing your answer with the correct answer in order to understand what went wrong.
Perhaps you made the mistake because of a particular word or phrase. Perhaps you misunderstood something, or missed a key detail because you were stuck on a previous question. Or perhaps you couldn't keep up with the speed of the recording and the amount of information. If you want to make progress, you need to find out what the problem was.
Take the time to analyse your weaknesses and learn from them.
The following situation often confuses people:
I agree that this is confusing. However, my advice is simple: write 16th July as your answer, without the year. This is the answer that the IELTS people want.
So, make sure you write the day (number) and the month. Only put the year if the question asks for it (e.g. which year...?) or if the instruction allows you to include more than one number.
Questions 23 to 25
Complete the notes on the diagram below. Write no more than three words and/or a number for each answer.
(Source: official IELTS DVD)
I was searching for a video related to yesterday's reading passage, and I found the following lecture. It's a presentation about how to improve your English accent, so I'm sure that many of you will find it interesting and useful.
Tip: if you want to learn more about sentence stress in English, skip to minute 28.30 and you'll see a good illustration.