In this post, we give you some great IELTS listening tips to help you take your listening to the next level. Read on for our 10 great tips for your IELTS listening!
Exposure
It is important to expose yourself to a wide range of accents. Although most of the speakers on the recording are native speakers, they could come from different countries, such as the UK, Australia or South Africa, or from different areas of a country. For instance, the UK. may only be a small island, but there is a great difference in regional accents. There may also be some non-native speakers on the recording.
One good way to improve is to listen to TED Talks as there is a huge variety of topics and lots of different speakers. Practice taking notes on a talk and then go through the recording to see if you were correct. The talks are not very long which is another bonus, and there is always a transcript that you can check if you are unsure of something. There is usually only one speaker which is great practice for part 2 and 4 of the test
Watching TV shows and films are other ways to improve, and obviously if you are interested in the material then you can maintain your focus. There will be multiple speakers, so this can help you improve for parts 1 and 3 of the test.
One step at a time
Make sure you are looking at the section you are waiting to listen for. Many students try to look through each section before the listening test starts. There is no point looking through later sections if you are waiting to listen to section 1.
Look at each section one by one to give yourself maximum time to look at the questions and highlight key words, as you are given plenty of time before each part of the listening test to go through the questions and notes for each listening section.
Learn to multitask
You will have to learn to do a number of things at the same time. You need to be able to look at the questions, listen and take notes at the same time.
You will be given a pencil and paper to make notes in the computer-based test, while in the paper test, you can obviously write and make notes on the physical question paper.
Another important part of multitasking when you are listening, is being aware of the next question. You don’t want to miss one answer, only to suddenly discover that you have also missed the next two or three answers as well. Keep an eye on the subsequent questions so that you know if they begin discussing the next part of the script.
Pay attention to the instructions
Pay close attention to the instructions as they will change for each set of questions. Examples of instructions are: Write no more than two words and/or a number, You may use any letter more than once, etc.
This may sound obvious, but you may be surprised at how many students make errors by using too many words. Another important fact to remember is that you should not use contractions in the test as they will be counted as two words! For example, they’re counts as they are, while it’s will count as it is.
Practice your predicting skills
When looking at the question, try to think of what kind of information you need to answer it. You can sometimes predict very precisely what the answer is likely to be. For example, if the question asks ‘The cheapest way to get to the airport is by 1. ………………….‘, you know you are looking for a form of transport. However, because you are looking for the cheapest way, some answers are much more likely than others: bus seems most likely, or perhaps train/underground/airport express. The answer is probably not going to be taxi, as this is often a more expensive form of transport (although do not totally rule it out!)
It is not always possible to predict a likely answer so accurately, but you may still be able to guess what you are likely to hear based on the questions. For example, if you are looking at a map you may think of words like next to/beside/on the left/on the right/opposite. There may be currency symbols (£, $, etc.) or dates so you know that you are listening for numbers. Thinking ahead will help you to predict what kind of answer you are likely to hear, as well as the language that is likely to appear around the answer.
Repetition & summarising
Some words or numbers will be repeated, particularly in Section 1. Someone is usually giving personal details, for example applying for a job or making an enquiry and booking at a hotel. It is important to pay attention to the spelling of names, and numbers, such as prices, telephone numbers or house numbers. In these cases, spellings are often repeated, or numbers are confirmed. Be careful, as one speaker may make a mistake, at which point the other speaker will correct them!
In other questions, the speaker may list several things or talk around a topic before summarising. Consider the following question:
What does John like most about his job? A really important keyword here is most. When predicting what you might hear, you should expect John to say several different things that he likes, and then summarise or repeat to tell us his favourite thing about his work.
It’s not the best paid, but there’s so much that’s great about my job, you know, the people, the place, things like that. I like the location of the office as it’s not too far from home and I can walk to work, so the commute’s pretty easy. The atmosphere in the office is also good, there’s plenty of light and there are a lot of plants. I suppose the best thing is the company culture because everyone’s friendly , we are all motivated and we work so well together as a team.
So, the answer to the question would be ‘(the) company culture’.
Develop your shorthand
Shorthand is a technique where you don’t write words in full, but you write short parts of words that you can still understand when you read them back a short time later. It is commonly used by journalists and secretaries who need to take lots of written notes very quickly.
Shorthand is useful because some answers will come quickly and close together, especially in tasks such as section 4 summary completion questions. Using shorthand allows you to write only part of the word(s) and then complete the words during the pause at the end of the listening section or when you transfer answers at the end of the test. For example : tra lig = traffic lights, hos = hospital, lib = library. Writing the full words is advisabe at the end of the section so that you don’t forget what your abbreviations mean when you transfer the answer!
Grammar & spelling
Sentence completion and summary completion questions have to be grammatically correct. One of the most common errors is singular nouns and plural nouns –‘s’. It is important to get these correct because three or four errors with nouns could have a negative effect on your overall band score. Also, try to make sure your spelling is 100% accurate as three or four spelling errors makes a big difference. Always double check.
Don’t leave any answers blank
If you miss any answers, you should always guess. Many listening questions require you to select answers from a list of possible answers. This means that you have a reasonable chance of getting a missed answer correct by selecting one of the possible answers.
However, as discussed earlier, it is also often possible to predict the answer to questions quite accurately. If you miss the answer in the listening, you can use these predictions to give you a fairly good chance of picking up some extra marks.
When you finish the listening test, there should be no unanswered questions left on your answer sheet!
Remember to think of synonyms in the question
As in the reading test, the language used in the questions is often different to that used in the listening script. As you read through the questions, identify keywords and think of other ways to say the same thing. You can also paraphrase the entire question to give you an idea of what you might hear. Doing this, along with predicting likely answers, can go a long way to helping you to anticipate what you are likely to hear and helps you to listen more accurately.
So, that finishes our 10 tips for the listening test. Do you do any of these things already? Which ones do you think will help you to improve your performance in the listening test? Remember, you can find out more about IELTS scoring on the IELTS.org website. If you liked this post, why not check out our 10 great IELTS reading tips? Don’t forget to like this post, comment and share it to help other people preparing for the IELTS test.
Take care and best of luck with your test preparation!
