1) In the listening and reading sections, most of the students do not keep a track of the word limit. It is important to write your answer within the given word limit or else your answer will cost marks.
2) Concentrate on spellings. The words which bear the double and triple consecutive letters may confuse you and so practice enough before you give the main test.
3) Unlike the listening section, no extra time is given in the reading section to transfer the answers from the question paper to the answer sheet. Do not retain all the answers till last rather transfer the answers related to one section immediately after solving the questions in the respective section.
4) Get the required awareness about the exam format well in advance. In reading, students tend to choose the short passage to solve first by misinterpreting that to be the easiest one. The three passages arranged in ascending order according to difficulty level ( which means passage 1 being the easiest and passage 3 the toughest). Answering the passage in the given order makes it feasible for you to attempt all the questions within the stipulated time.
5) Time Management plays a vital role in the reading section. Stick on to the time management strategy and solve the 40 questions accordingly.
Time management should be:
Passage 1 – 10min
Transfer answers – 5 min
Passage 2 – 15 min
Transfer answers – 5 min
Passage 3 – 20 min
Transfer answers – 5 min
6) In the writing section, the word count is crucial. Maintain a minimum word count of 150 and 250 for task1 and task2 respectively. Any response less than the required word limit will be penalized.
7) A common myth is that longer essays score better. In fact, writing longer essays a terrible mistake and is even dangerous which cuts your scores off. Maintain the word count but don’t write for longer than required.
8) IELTS is not a test on knowledge, it’s a test on language ability skills. Ideas don’t matter, words do! Present your ideas without hesitating, by doing required prework, whether its right or wrong.
9) In speaking too, there is no right/wrong answer. Express your opinions/ideas without faltering. Never frame your answer into more than one word/one sentence but neither speak more. Speaking more than required also harms you. In the first and third rounds of speaking, 3-5 sentences will suffice.
10) In the case of the 2nd round, speaking for 2 minutes is mandatory and keep in mind that your response should answer all the prompts given. Make use of the 1min given to you before you start speaking by doing the scratch work. Never ask the examiner to change a question rather, try to answer from whatever you know.
