Hi

Do you think you could answer the following IELTS speaking question within a few seconds of an IELTS examiner asking you?

• What do you think motivates governments to give aid to other countries?

If you think you would need some time to think about your answer before starting to speak, then check out the video below for some ideas of how to deal with difficult questions in the IELTS Speaking test.

(If you can’t view the video above, try viewing it on our YouTube channel). Read the full post »

Hi

If you listened to the recording I recommended last week in my post ‘An example of IELTS-type speaking (3)‘, you may have thought that the native speaker talking about his daily routine was very fluent. I certainly did when I first listened to the recording.

If you listen again, you’ll probably notice that he uses ‘er‘ and ‘um‘ every time he pauses to think of what to say next.

“I…um…usually wake up at 6 a.m…um…er…I have to go to work at eight, so I…um…”

These sounds, which are called ‘fillers‘, help to make him sound more fluent the first time you listen to him. If you use some fillers in your IELTS Speaking test when you pause to think of what to say next, your examiner may think you sound more fluent.

When I listened to the recording ‘Daily routine‘ a second time, I counted more than 40 ‘er‘s and ‘um‘s in total, which goes to show that it’s okay to use fillers frequently. (If you say ‘um’ or ‘er’ between every word, however, the examiner may think you’re not very fluent at all).

Pete

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Hi

Check out the video below to see Kevin, a Chinese candidate, do Part 2 of an IELTS Speaking test.

As you’ll see on the video, I’ve said what IELTS band score Kevin got in his test and I’ve also included a suggestion about how to speak for two minutes.

(If you can’t view the video above, try viewing it directly on our YouTube channel). Read the full post »

Hi

How will your IELTS score be affected if you mispronounce some words (i.e. pronounce some words incorrectly) in your IELTS speaking test?

To answer that question yourself, imagine you’re an IELTS examiner for a moment.

Imagine that you’re listening to a candidate in their IELTS speaking test and notice that he or she pronounces a few words incorrectly.

Imagine that after the speaking test you read what it says in the public version of the official IELTS band score descriptors for pronunciation (quoted below).

What score would you give the candidate? Read the full post »