My IELTS Classroom Podcast

Hey! Today, Nick and I are travelling back in time to complete the IELTS Cambridge 6 Test 3 listening test, which was first published in 2007. Why? Well, it's not because we were younger and better looking then, but because we want to give you a chance to experience the older IELTS test format, which seems to be making a come back in exam rooms. This is an interactive lesson, so you can downl...

Hey! Please do NOT panic! There are no major changes happening to the IELTS exam (that I am aware of) in 2023 - they are not adding a new section to the speaking exam, or changing the amount of time that you have for each section, or making the reading passages more difficult. However, some of our students have reported over the last few weeks that some of the exams that they have sat at the start...

Hey! Yes, Nick and I have finally got out hands on a copy of the new Cambridge IELTS 17 General Training book! Today, we look at the four essay questions to discuss how difficult the questions are, how we would approach each one, and what ideas we would use as the basis of our arguments. As always, we recommend that you spend time analysing the questions and coming up with your own arguments befor...

Unless you have been living under a rock (or not spending every moment on social media), I am sure that you have heard about Chat GPT - the new artificial intelligence search engine that can write advertising campaigns,  poems, or hundreds of pages of code in milliseconds (and trust, me this is just the tip of the iceberg). Oh, and I did I mention that it will deliver these to you as if they had b...

Happy New Year! Yes, we are back for a third year of the My IELTS Classroom podcast  (albeit a bit late as Shelly has had COVID!) Last year we helped students in 138 different countries prepare for IELTS in 52 episodes that totalled almost 2,500 hours of contest! If you were one of the 150,000 people who downloaded an episodes - THANK YOU! It really means a lot. Today, Nick and talk about New Year...

Can you hear the sound of bells jingling? That't right! It the final Tuesday before the 25th of December, which can mean only one thing - it is our annual Christmas IELTS Quiz. Only this year, there are absolutely NO questions about IELTS whatsoever, so it really us just a chance for Nick and I to let our hair down and talk about the Christmas traditions we enjoyed growing up in the UK. Obvio...

At the end of last week's episode (in which Nick and I explained how the examiner will band your speaking performance for Fluency and Coherence, I sent out a call on social media for our listeners to record themselves attempting four current speaking part two questions. We will highlight some common errors and give expected scores based on the public band descriptors. Useful Links  Join our n...

In the IELTS Speaking exam, the examiner will give you a score in 4 areas: Fluency and Coherence, Lexical Range, Grammatical Range and Accuracy, and Pronunciation. Your final score will be the average of these four scores rounded down. However, recently I realised that that there is a lot of confusion among students as to exactly what the examiner is looking for when they grade Fluency and Coheren...

Hey everyone. IELTS reading MCQs have always been one of the most difficult to tackle in IELTS. That is because they can either test your understanding of the information given in the passage of your understanding of the writer's purpose or aim. Until now, 90% of questions have focussed on the former, but I noticed that in Cambridge IELTS Academic 17, almost ALL of the questions asked you to...

Every few weeks I get an email from a student who would like to know how to prepare for the IELTS Life Skills test. Sadly, I know nothing about the test, so I usually just point them in the direction of the official website and wish them luck. However, this week Nick discovered that one of his friend's had recently taken the test, so today he is going to explain to me exactly what the test is...

Use code BLACK15 to get a 15% discount on all our courses this week. Find out more on this link: https://www.myieltsclassroom.com/pages/writing Hey! IELTS is well-known for recycling the same topics for Speaking Part 2 again and again. However, they do sometimes introduce new topics into the exam, which can confuse some students. Today, Nick and I analyse 5 new IELTS Speaking Part 2 topics from 20...

Shelly is sick today, so we are planning a re-run of our most popular ever episode - how to nail IELTS Listening Part 3! Many students find Part 3 of the IELTS listening test the most difficult. There are a number of reasons for this: there are more than two voices, the questions usually focus on the outcome of a discussion in which many views are offered, and you may also be asked to locate a per...

Last week, IELTS IDP announced that they are planning to introduce a new test called the IELTS One Skill Retake. This will give students the opportunity to retake only one section of the four skills (Listening, Reading, Writing or Speaking) in the IELTS test if they did not achieve the score they aimed for the first time around. Obviously, this could make a HUGE difference to the experience test-t...

Today, Nick and I take you on a tour of IELTS spelling. We will cover the basic spelling rules that every test-taker needs to know, such as when you should replace a -y with an -ies, and when you have to double consonants in a word. Then, we will look at words that are commonly spelt incorrectly by IELTS test-takers, before finishing with a light hearted quiz to see if you can spell better than a...

Yes! That's right - this week Nick and I are looking at a grammar point - parallelism! This is not a topic that is widely discussed in the IELTS world, but if you are looking for a score of 7.0 or higher in Writing, it is definitely something that you should pay attention to. In today's lesson, Nick and I will explain what parallelism is, and take you through the different situations it...

Hey! Today, Nick and I take a look at what we think are the letter prompts from the new Cambridge IELTS 17. (In other words, although the book was published in July, we were unable to get our hands on a copy so are relying that these are the real questions based on a third source!) We will look at each question in turn to analyse which tone you will need to adopt, and how you should approach each...

Hey! I have noticed over the last few years that students really struggle to write letters that are genuinely informal. Even good students who follow all of the language rules for informal letters send me letters to mark that feel "cold" and "stiff" and simply still " too formal". Why is that? Well, that is what I sat down this week to ponder, and the result is this p...

Hey! We're back this week with a look at some common problems students (who haven't taken our writing course!) run into with essay writing. In today's episode, we look at some common problems with organisation, grammar, and ideas which can prevent YOU from scoring a 7.0. in writing on exam day. In this episode, we will talk about the 5 mistakes Nick and I find most often in First As...

Today, Nick and I give IELTS Cue Card Feedback to 7 of our listeners. We will highlight some common errors and give expected scores based on the recordings. You can read more about today's episode at:   https://blog.myieltsclassroom.com/ ielts-cue-card-feedback-2021 Episode notes Last week, I sent out a call on social media for our listeners to record themselves attempting three speaking part...

Hey! Last week, Nick and I completed an Academic reading passage from Cambridge 17 Test 4. Today, we thought that we would do the full listening from the same test. Click here to download the questions for the lesson Join us as we complete each section of the test. We will starting by outlining how we would approach each part and reminding you of the best way to approach each one.  Then, we will g...

Join Nick and I today as we go through the Cambridge IELTS 17 Academic Reading – Timur Gareyev – blindfold chess champion  In the test, we will discover that although there are definite “rules” for each type of question, there are times when IELTS may break those, so you should be prepared for everything! Plus, if you have never seen our unique Read Once, Read Well technique (then where have you b...

In IELTS Speaking  Part 3, the focus moves away from you to the world around you. This means that you must be able to  speak about abstract topics, which is not easy even for high-level test takers.  If you want to take part in next week's episode, you can record your answers to the IELTS Speaking Part 3 questions at the end of this blog post: : http://blog.myieltsclassroom.com/ ielts-speakin...

Hey! You are in the IELTS reading exam and everything is going well, when suddenly you find a word that you do not recognise, but you know is important. What do you do? Do you pause and think for a few minutes? Do you skip the word and continue reading? Or do you quickly make an educated guess using one of the 5 techniques offered in this podcast?! Yes, today Nick and I look at a bottom-up reading...

Hey! Maps have long been a possible question-type in Academic Writing Task 1. However, until recently, 99% of maps focused on changes that happened in a town. In recent exams, however, there have been more maps tha focus on changes to specific buildings or road systems. The problem is that many students still try to use the same key features and organisation for these maps as traditional town maps...

Hey! It's time again for Nick and I to generate ideas for some recent IELTS essay questions. Today, we look at 6 real IELTS Essay Questions 2022, which were all taken from exams in July and August. You are welcome to sit and passively enjoy the episode, but you will get a lot more out of the lesson if you actively take part. You can find the questions at  https://blog.myieltsclassroom.com/ re...