Sample essays
Click on the links below for sample IELTS essays
5 paragraph model
nuclear technology – with commentary
Families and modern lifestyles – with commentary and vocabulary quiz
4 paragraph model
Education – school curriculum commentary
Coherence is an important part of the essay writing process in IELTS. In this post I look briefly at how it works and how you can use it to impress the examiner by analysing a sample essay. But coherence is not just a boring way to impress the IELTS examiner, it can also make your essay easier to write – and that must be something worth
This is the first in a series of planned IELTS speaking videos. The idea behind these videos is to explain some of the necessary speaking skills for IELTS. Each video focusses on one particular skill: this first one is all about listening to and answering the question – undoubtedly the most important skill of all.
Thank you to Mao and Manuel for helping me out with this.
Like new technology? Doing IELTS? Here are some ideas for you.
Vocabulary is 25% of your score in IELTS speaking and writing and one of my concerns as a teacher is that learners either spend too little time on this key area or go about it in the wrong way. My purpose here is to show you how the internet can help with vocabulary and can even be
Grammar may not be the most important factor in IELTS writing and speaking, but it is certainly an important factor. Stop right there.
I hate IELTS
On my Twitter profile I say: “I hate IELTS”. Do I? In a way, yes. Let me explain briefly why.
It is very easy for both teachers and students alike to become so obsessed with the exam itself that learning the language becomess at best a secondary goal. Indeed, I used to make a speciality
This is a complete IELTS writing task 1 lesson. You will find here a quiz on the exam, a sample task 1 question, an interactive quiz guiding you through a possible approach to this part of the paper and then an online timed exercise and finally a sample answer.
Think and plan
The concept here is to get you doing and most importantly thinking. For me… Continue reading
What is the best advice for the IELTS speaking exam?
There are many possible tips. The first and most important is to take it seriously and prepare properly for it. It’s noticeable how IELTS forums are full of questions about the writing paper but contain very little about the speaking. That represents a problem. In my experience candidates fail as often on the speaking paper as the writing paper.
Do you want IELTS speaking practice? I may have the answer for you. It can sometimes be quite difficult to find the opportunity to practice – the internet can help you. I thoroughly recommend Voxopop (previously known as Chinswing) to you. It is an ideal forum in which to practise your IELTS speaking.
What does it do?
It allows you to listen/read a question and then record your answer
A short time ago I posted a quiz on the format of the IELTS exam. One question which caused a lot of problems was to do with the format of the reading exam. Many people apparently believed that you were given extra time to fill in the answer sheet at the end of the exam. You are not. Indeed a large part of the difficulty of the
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