This is an IELTS Energy Podcast, Episode 1602 Expert Answers to 3 IELTS Listening Questions.
Welcome to the ielts energy podcast from all ears english downloaded more than 35 million times with examiner trained ielts whiz, aubrey carter and lindsay mcmahon, the english adventurer.
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When you have questions about the IELTS exam, who do you ask?
Today we're answering three questions posted in an online IELTS forum, so you have answers you can trust.
Thank you.
Over on the All Ears English podcast.
All right.
Hello, Aubrey.
How's everything going today?
I heard it's really warm in your town today.
Is it very hot out?
It is really warm.
I'm not ready.
Here in Arizona we have a really long hot summer, but usually we have at least until early May for it to be nice and more mild.
But we've already had almost 100 degree days a few times.
Yes.
And it's too early.
It's too early for it to be this hot.
Yeah, we're recording this in, you know, kind of mid-March.
So it is way too early for that.
Not good.
But we can still stay inside and talk about IELTS.
So it's okay.
Yes, exactly.
I've got air conditioning, so I should not complain.
Aubrey, when was the last time that you had to consult an expert on something?
Hmm.
I guess it would count that my daughter is enrolling for college and she was setting an appointment to talk to a counselor and I talked to this counselor with her.
So that was definitely consulting an expert.
We wanted to know like, what's the best track?
What classes should she sign up for right away?
So we're like, let's find an expert and get some advice about this.
Yeah.
I'm all about talking to experts.
Anytime I know I'm waiting into an area where I just don't know what I'm doing, I will try to find an expert.
Same.
More and more.
I wonder if listeners out there have this frustration with websites.
I can't always find a phone number like the contact us.
There's no phone number or it'll be like fill out this or email.
I'm like I want to talk to someone now.
I know i feel that way too.
Michelle and i were talking about that on the podcast this morning.
Every time you go to a website and get customer service, they try to bring up the ai bot and i just say person person, person.
Yes, talk to a real person.
Yes, totally.
This is interesting.
You guys definitely need to consult an expert when you have questions about IELTS.
But there are a lot of other options of places to go to ask questions.
And you may have taken some of those.
And so what I did is I went to some of the forums, some of the IELTS forums online.
I was looking because those forums, they can help you see what questions other students are asking.
Yes.
Or like some questions, you just don't think of them until and then you hear someone else's question.
You're like, I should have thought to ask that.
Yeah, there's that old phrase, you don't know what you don't know.
Right?
Exactly.
If you don't have some level of at least having gotten started with IELTS, you actually have no idea what to ask.
You can't ask good questions.
Yeah.
Right.
So if you see a lot of these questions on forums, it's probably going to do that for you be like oh, I didn't even realize I needed to know about this.
I didn't even realize that's something I should be asking about.
But the problem with forums is can you trust the answers posted there?
It's not IELTS examiners answering those questions, or at least very rarely.
It's usually other IELTS students and they might be right.
They might not.
And we include this advice in terms of AI too because, don't forget, the AI scans some forums at times, right.
Or blogs.
It's using everything online.
Yes, yes, exactly.
So today we are going to answer three questions that we saw recently on IELTS forums.
And we are giving you expert answers that you can trust.
So I'm excited.
These are all about IELTS listening.
So these might be questions that you haven't thought of before, or maybe you have.
Today, you're going to get an answer that you know you can trust.
Love it.
Excellent.
Guys, go ahead and hit follow.
Our show is based on the examiners, the examining system, right?
The scoring system, exactly what the examiner wants on every section of the test.
So you're not going to find any inaccurate advice here.
You're going to find everything linked back to your score, which is what matters for your future.
Okay.
Absolutely.
Yes.
And if you like that, hit follow, because we have so many episodes that you need to make sure that you listen to so that you're ready for test day.
Yes.
Got it.
All right.
So the first question we found in a forum, Aubrey, can I go ahead and ask it?
Yeah.
All right, here it is.
Can we move forward to the next question if we want to see them in IELTS listening, even if they belong to a different audio recording?
OK, this is such a great question.
Yeah.
And I am so.
I'm excited to talk about this one because I have a feeling students that haven't taken IELTS exam might get there on test day and then have this question and be like what should I?
I don't know.
Right.
So it's good to think about this ahead of time.
Imagine you're taking the test. you, the audio finishes.
Well, there's two times this could happen.
When you read the questions for the first section there's 30 seconds there you might finish them and feel like you're ready.
And so then you might think, should I move to the next questions and take time to read those?
The answer is no.
No.
Because that 30 seconds is so vital.
You want to be making predictions, getting really familiar with what you're going to hear so that you can be listening for those keywords.
And if you skip ahead to the next questions, then you're looking at keywords that you're not going to hear in that audio section yet.
Yeah.
Keep in mind, the time that you're allotted is meant to be spent in a certain way, right?
Exactly.
So if they wanted you to go look ahead at all the questions throughout the rest of the listening exam, they'd give you the time to do that.
So go with how the exam was designed for the best score.
Yes.
And it's tricky because you do have that option with the paper exam.
You could look ahead to the entire book if you want.
And with the computer exam you can click on question numbers at the bottom of the screen to move between questions within the same section.
You could move ahead and look at those questions if you wanted to.
But the problem is then you're not taking the time.
And that's the last thing you want is to start off already feeling scattered or not prepared.
Exactly.
So use your time in the right way.
We teach you more about how to use your time on the listening test in our course, Three Keys IELTS.
Guys, go over to allersenglish.com slash K-E-Y-S.
That will give you the most comprehensive study plan to learn this stuff in depth.
Absolutely.
So our advice here is do not jump ahead to future questions before the recording prompts you to.
There's not enough time.
So the second time that students might do this is when the audio ends for the first section.
You also don't want to jump ahead then.
Take those few seconds to make sure you answered each question, check your spelling, check capitalization and make sure the grammar is correct, because when you are filling in an answer, read the sentence you've written it in to make sure that the grammar is correct, right?
You need to take those few seconds to sort of check your answers and proofread what you've written.
Then when the audio prompts you, that's when you move to the next section.
All right, perfect.
What else do we need to know here, Aubrey?
Yeah, so this is interesting.
You should also not read future questions.
If you finish reading questions for one section, have time to sort of mention that.
But for example...
Don't read the questions for section four while waiting for the audio for section three to begin.
Right.
As we said, this can sort of confuse you and cause you to lose your place or be listening for the wrong keywords.
So use those 30 seconds strategically.
Yeah.
Underline keywords.
Think about what type of answers might fit.
Make predictions.
You need that full 30 seconds.
The predictions are huge.
They're part of our system that we teach you.
And it really matters.
I know that we're trained to kind of have the attention of goldfish now, right?
We're sort of like, like right now I have five browsers open, right?
We're all over the place.
Actually, right now, when we record, I'm pretty focused, which is the one time during the day when we are focused on what we're doing.
But After this, you know, 16 browsers will be open.
I'll be jumping around the internet, right?
And that's how we think we've trained ourselves to think this way.
Don't let that happen on the exam.
You have to work against that.
Bite that instinct to read the questions and then read the next questions.
No use that time to make predictions, to be really ready to think about what parallel expressions you might be listening for, because you're likely not going to hear those exact words from the questions.
It's going to be synonyms and paraphrases of it.
Perfect.
All right.
I feel like that wraps up question one really nicely.
I mean, that's a great question though, isn't it, Aubrey?
Yes.
Really good question.
I'm glad you have thought about it now, because that is totally the kind of thing that on test day you could read the questions and then immediately have that instinct and there's nobody to ask.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
You can't ask it.
Yeah.
You can't ask anybody at that point.
You have to have done all this preparation ahead of time.
Exactly.
Okay, here's the second question, Aubrey.
If anyone could tell me how the listening module is conducted for British Council, I will be extremely grateful.
Will we have headphones or will it be played on a speaker?
Very practical question.
Yes.
And if you haven't taken IELTS before, you might not know.
And even if you have taken IELTS before, you might not know, because it does depend on the testing center.
Yes.
So a few notes here.
For the computer delivered test, headphones are always provided by the testing center.
So just plan on using the headphones they give you.
But for the paper-based test, they might give you headphones.
Some centers still use speakers and you'll hear the audio from a speaker in the room.
So if you want to really be prepared and know whether you're going to use headphones or it might be a speaker, you should call the specific testing center and ask what their setup is.
Yeah, we recommend that.
Get yourself in the mindset of what to expect and then be prepared for maybe you get the wrong information.
You know, someone might tell you yes, you will have headphones when you show up on test day.
And there are no headphones?
Don't let that throw you off.
Totally.
This is the kind of thing whether you have headphones or not for the paper-based test, you will be able to hear the exam.
Unfortunately, sometimes the audio is harder to understand when it's coming from a speaker.
That's not right by you.
But for the most part, you should be able to understand that audio.
Mm-hmm.
And if we need special accommodations, can we ask for that?
What can we do?
Yes, definitely.
If you have hearing difficulties or require any specific type of hearing aid or amplification.
If you need it to be louder, inform the test center at least six weeks prior to the test so that they can make any modifications.
Okay good, when you, right before the test starts they're going to give you.
You'll have five to 10 minutes there to test your headphones, to check, make sure you can adjust the volume.
Be sure to do that, right?
Don't just wait until the test starts and, oh, now I'm plugging in my headphones.
Take that time they give you to test and make sure that everything's working properly.
Perfect.
Good.
Really, really good.
This is all about centering our mind, getting calm, feeling well prepared as that recording starts to play.
And you might be wondering if you can take your own headphones.
What do you think, Lindsay?
I kind of doubt it.
I doubt it.
No.
Generally, test takers are not allowed to bring their own headphones.
So you will need to use the headphones provided to you at the testing center, unless you're not allowed to use headphones if there's a speaker in the room that's playing the audio for the exam.
All right.
So good to know.
So good to know.
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All right, Aubrey, we're ready for our third and final question.
Here it is.
I can't understand the IELTS listening clearly.
They always read too fast.
Join the club, right?
I feel like whenever someone's reading Spanish or French, it's so fast.
Just slow down.
Reading is so hard.
I know.
Listening at those speeds.
So this is more about strategies and how to practice in advance to be able to understand that IELTS listening audio.
So first of all, focus on those keywords.
You have made predictions.
You're listening for specific keywords.
You are not expected to catch every word, right?
You're going to read those questions and know the key information you're listening for.
You won't understand every word and you don't need to in order to get these answers correct.
Yeah, this comes back to practice.
Listening for nouns, numbers, names, places, and verbs that give meaning.
Those are the things we're listening for.
Right, Aubrey?
Exactly.
So, for example, if the question asks, what time does the class start?
You will have predicted that you are listening for a number for that time.
So that is the keyword to listen for.
Mm-hmm.
And if there's other kind of random details about who's attending the class, and there has no question about that.
If there are words in that audio that you miss, don't worry about it.
You don't need to understand every word.
Yeah, we teach you all this in the course, right?
This is you need to go more in depth into this strategy to really build it.
But you know, again, what should be our goal here, Aubrey?
Yeah.
Your goal is to get used to catching those keywords under pressure.
It's not understanding every single word, right?
Similar to the reading exam.
It's not a comprehension exam.
You're not even going to read all of that text.
It's about skimming and looking for keywords.
And for the listening exam.
It's about listening for those keywords, for the synonyms and paraphrases of those keywords in the questions.
Yeah.
Would we ever want to train with faster audio?
Like I know it's easy to put audio on 1.5x now on our phones.
Would that ever make sense?
Absolutely.
Right.
When you first start studying for IELTS, you may be slowing down audio as you build listening comprehension.
But closer to your test date, it's really wise to practice listening at faster speeds 125x or 15x or choose speakers that you can tell speak really fast.
We don't slow down for our podcasts.
All Ears English podcast is actually great practice for listening comprehension practice.
So if you're not following All Ears English, definitely follow that podcast as well.
Because you do need to listen to faster speech if all you're listening to is podcasts that are made for language learners, and they're slowed down and it's simpler vocabulary.
That's not good IELTS practice.
Yeah, that's kind of one of the things that makes our shows different here at All Ears English.
We don't slow down for you.
A lot of shows do, but we don't want to.
We want to give you the most real natural English you could find out there.
So open the search bar, type in All Ears English, and get on that show and hit follow.
We come out with new episodes five days a week.
But I love this confidence builder here Aubrey, because if we are doing this for the couple weeks leading up after we've gathered our strategies, we know exactly what to do.
We're going to go into that test and it's going to feel slow, right.
Which is great.
Exactly.
Exactly.
Because IELTS listening audio is not extremely fast.
Right now, it might feel fast as you're building listening fluency.
But if you're listening to podcasts at higher speeds, that IELTS listening will sound slow, because they actually don't read that audio as fast as most native speakers speak.
Yes, of course.
So that's good to know too, right?
Different accents.
Should we be listening to different accents?
Yes.
This is our third tip because IELTS listening audio can be in any English accent.
It could be Australian.
British English.
So you need to practice with all of these accents.
Listen to podcasts with hosts of all these different accents.
Listen to TV shows.
But it's really wise if you're watching TV with a different accent, practice not watching the show.
Just listen, because that is the best practice for IELTS audio.
You need to be able to hear speech with that accent. without watching their lips move.
And it's also just fun to get that variety.
Variety is fun.
It's fun to hear English coming from different accents, right?
It's a great way to practice.
I was just chatting with an Australian guy yesterday at an art show and I was just loving his accent.
I'm like, I just want to chat with you for an hour just to hear your accent.
I love the Australian accent.
I much prefer it over the British accent.
This is my bias, my feeling.
But yeah, he was really offended because I asked him I thought it was a New Zealander accent.
I asked him and he was like, How dare you?
Okay, they sound slightly different.
But he can be hard to tell them apart.
Similar for an American, like sometimes we can't tell, but he thinks they're very different.
So he was offended by that.
Yeah.
I mean, that makes sense.
I mean we can tell the differences between the Midwest accent and the Mountain West accent.
Probably right.
It's in the US.
Exactly.
We know those differences.
Whereas an Australian speaker might not be able to hear it.
No, for sure.
Exactly.
Interesting.
Well, I'm glad we approached these three answers and questions here, Aubrey.
Really good questions.
What's our final takeaway for today?
Yeah, it's tricky when it comes to forums.
I think they are a great tool for you to see the questions that you haven't thought of asking right.
A lot of questions that have been asked there, you're likely going to have that reaction of like oh, I hadn't thought of that.
I'm glad to know this answer.
But you can't always trust those answers because often it's a student that's just kind of giving their experience or what they think.
So you can always send questions to us.
If you are in Three Keys IELTS you can ask questions and get answers right away in our community, because you want to get expert answers that you can trust.
Yeah, exactly.
We will answer your question within just a few business days, right, Aubrey?
If you're in our course, if you're not in our course and you're listening to the podcast, we can't guarantee that answer right away.
We have a turnaround time on the show.
It's multiple weeks, but still send us your question if it's something you're interested in, and we will do our best to answer on the show.
All right.
Absolutely.
And we'll give you a shout out.
So you can send those questions to support at aldersenglishcom or you can leave them in a comment on our YouTube channel, IELTS Energy TV.
All right.
Sounds good, Aubrey.
See you soon.
Bye.
Awesome.
See you next time.
Bye.
Bye.
Thanks for listening to IELTS Energy.
Hit subscribe now, and don't forget to find your estimated band score at allearsenglishcom.
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