This is the IELTS Energy Podcast, Episode 1522.
Is your IELTS vocabulary pulling its weight?
Welcome to the ielts energy podcast from all ears english, downloaded more than 35 million times with examiner trained ielts wiz, aubrey carter and lindsay mcmahon.
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On IELTS Speaking Part 1, it's a guarantee that you'll be asked about work, study, or your hometown.
Today get four super flexible idioms that you can apply to virtually any question on the speaking test.
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Hey there, Aubrey.
What's shaking?
I'm doing great.
How are you, Lindsay?
Good.
Aubrey, I have a question for you.
You ready?
Yes.
All right.
It's about teamwork.
So have you ever been on a team where not everyone pulled their weight?
Yes, definitely.
It's funny.
I'm thinking of I was once playing tug of war with adults at like a team building thing.
Oh, no.
And I remember one girl who was just sort of barely touching the rope, kind of like pretending she was playing.
Everyone else is like pulling for all their worth.
And she's just sort of like.
Definitely not pulling her weight, which is funny.
That's almost more the literal.
You're actually pulling your weight's worth on that rope.
Interesting.
That's the rare occasion where the literal meaning matches the metaphorical meaning.
That's so fun.
So what happened?
Did she get kicked off the team or what?
I can't remember.
This was a while ago.
I feel like we all fell because the other team kind of gave up and let go.
And so then we all just fell.
Has that ever happened to you with a tug of war?
I'm curious if our listeners out there do a tug of war where you're just like pulling a rope and trying to get the middle past a certain point.
Well, I'm curious if our listeners do, because that was a, was that a work team building thing?
It sounds like.
Yeah.
I'm curious if that's common around the world, these kind of team building, like field day type events, where you're, You know people go out and do like the sack races maybe, or whatever it is they do or the truss falls.
I love it.
I'm very competitive and I think it's very fun, but it's not for everybody.
There are certainly some people who are kind of hanging back like, you really have to do this.
Oh, yeah.
I could totally see you right at the front of the rope.
Like you're the one right there.
Let's go, people.
Yeah, yeah.
So funny.
So what are we getting into today?
How is this related to our topic?
Yeah.
This idiom, pull your weight.
Yeah.
It actually came up recently on the All Ears English podcast.
I was like, oh, this would be great for IELTS.
This is a great idiom to use on IELTS answers.
It's flexible.
You could like there are a lot of things you could be asked that you could use this idiom.
So today we're going to share this idiom and a few related idioms.
And in sample answers, examples of how you could use them on IELTS.
And when it comes to IELTS vocabulary, it makes sense to go for an 80-20 approach, where we're focusing 80 of our time on 20 of our time.
I don't know, I can never articulate that 80-20 thing.
But the point is we learn vocabulary terms that can apply to multiple types of questions, right?
Right.
Exactly.
Right.
Eighty percent of IELTS speaking questions you could probably use this idiom on.
You can sneak it in.
Right.
So, and also especially because you will be asked on part one, either about work or study, or home or hometown.
Yes.
So you need idioms to describe working and being on a team.
So there's a good chance you'll be able to use these.
And this can be used in a lot of ways saying you didn't pull your weight.
Someone else didn't.
You wanted to pull your weight.
There's a lot of ways this could manifest.
So guys, go ahead and hit the follow button before we get any deeper into this.
We publish twice a week here on IELTS Energy and all of our information and our knowledge is gained by a former examiner.
Aubrey, you've been doing this for a long time.
I know exactly.
I think I'm going on six years, right?
And so, yeah, I feel like I'm definitely an IELTS expert.
Absolutely.
And this is going to be interesting.
The more I work with students as they're taking mock IELTS speaking exams and getting ready.
They aren't using a lot of idioms.
And I'll talk to them after.
They're like, I feel like I've used a bunch. but they just didn't come up.
I wasn't asked any questions that I could use them on.
So a part of the problem is those idioms aren't flexible enough.
It's like you have to be asked the exact right question to be able to sneak that in.
So we're trying to focus on some flexible idioms.
That lots of different questions you could be asked.
Right, so you're saying students had memorized like a list, that they couldn't find a way to use them, right?
Yeah, and they might even be using them in practice answers.
But if you're not asked questions, right question and you can't figure out how to use it.
And what a waste if you've learned that idiom and can't use it to boost your vocabulary scores.
Exactly.
We need to have skills that are a lot more flexible, right?
So let's go through some of these phrases that are more flexible or just better.
So again, pulling one's weight.
Let's talk about this again.
Yeah.
So this means doing one's fair share of work. definitely not just about work.
I shared for this.
Team building, like if you're playing on a sports team, if you're planning a party, anything that you're doing in collaboration with someone else.
That's when you can either say someone did do their fair share of work, or that you did, or they didn't, if they sort of shirked their responsibilities.
Yeah.
So it's all about your attitude towards this.
There's a lot we could say here.
So here's a sample sentence.
It's extremely important for me to pull my weight at work.
I want my team to know they can count on me.
So if you're asked about work or study, you could very easily say this, right?
You need a few sentences.
You can say where you work and then share your work ethic.
Say this and use this idiom.
It's kind of unexpected that you'd be able to use an idiom talking about your job.
You absolutely can.
Absolutely.
What's another example, Aubrey, where it might show up?
If you're talking about studying, you could say I had a group project in one of my classes and it was so frustrating that not everyone pulled their weight.
Mm hmm.
One hundred percent.
I love that.
So that's a great one.
So write that down, everyone.
Make sure you have that in your back pocket.
Practice it.
That's the key.
Right.
Practice how it fits into your part one answers.
Yeah, exactly.
All right.
Our second phrase here. similar meaning to do one's fair share.
So to contribute equally to a group effort, right?
There are multiple ways to say this.
So maybe on part three, you're asked what makes a good team member?
And you can say it's absolutely vital for every member of a team to do their fair share.
Yes, I love that.
Do their fair share.
Contribute equally. the same amount, right?
So good.
Yeah.
Or Lindsay, what if you're asked the part three question?
Do you think group projects are effective in schools or universities?
We might say something like group projects and university courses aren't always ideal, because sometimes group members don't do their fair share.
And that happens in graduate programs all the time, right?
Absolutely.
Busy adults, people might have children, they might have work full.
Many people that I went to graduate school with were working full time.
Yeah.
Right.
So everyone's busy.
Everyone wants to do their, their fair share, but you have so much going on that.
And then if someone else picks up the slack these people, you know people in graduate school they're so busy they're going to let somebody else pick up the slack.
So this happens.
Sometimes it's not equitable because everyone's busy.
Yeah, it's so true.
It's so true.
So I think all of our listeners have definitely had a relatable situation that they could share here, right?
So that's why I love these expressions.
We've all participated on some kind of a project and inevitably some people are kind of going to work harder than others, right?
So we have something to say.
And it can be more informal.
If you're asked about household chores, planning parties, choosing a place to go with friends, all these types right.
It's so flexible.
If you think about anything you could be asked about that has anything to do with friends family coworkers, this you could use on that question to talk about your friends or yourself.
And if you do your fair share, pull your weight with whatever it is.
Yeah, it reminds me of an example of even a trip that we took recently to in Colorado.
It's a tradition to go to a hike up to huts.
I don't know if you have this tradition in Arizona.
We have hut trips.
And people like pay money to go and stay in these kind of deserted huts with a group of maybe four or five people.
And what you have to do is you can't bring a dog because it's dirty for the dog, right?
So you have to basically make your own water from the snow outside on the ground.
That's why you can't bring animals.
And you have to boil your own water.
You have to do chores.
And we got there and we realized that not everyone was doing their fair share, Aubrey.
You know, we were the only ones doing the work and then everyone else was just napping.
Yeah.
So this can apply to our experiences with friends and family too, as you said.
Absolutely.
And there are so many questions that you could be asked on IELTS Lindsay, where you could use that story.
And when you share that story, you have to have practice so that you're ready to throw in these idioms.
You don't want just to be saying, right, not everyone worked.
Some people were napping while I did the work, right?
Instead, you want to have these idioms ready to say that somebody didn't pull their weight.
You got it.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So good, so good.
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Okay, Aubrey, we are back.
Another great one is Pitch In.
Similar.
Yes, it's an idiomatic phrasal verb.
It means to help out or contribute effort to a task.
So, for example Lindsay, on part two if you were asked to describe a time when you worked as part of a team, what could you say?
Yeah, I mean, you could share an example like this.
As a teenager, I volunteered at a food bank and I was on a team that planned their annual fundraiser.
Luckily, everyone pitched in and we were able to divide up tasks and I worked on design invitations and making decorations and the event ended up going really smoothly.
So everyone pitched in, right?
Yeah, meaning everyone contributed equally, right?
It was not the case of your trip up to the Hudson.
Not everyone was pitching in.
And that's the interesting thing about all of these phrases.
You can use them either way, right?
Negatively or positively to say everyone pitched in or not everyone pitched in.
Yeah, very flexible, right?
Mm-hmm.
You could tie it into any narrative, any story, even if you're frankly making up a story which we say we can do on IELTS.
Not like the examiner is going to fact check you.
No.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Good.
All right.
So our fourth phrase here is step up to the plate.
This is a fun idiom that comes from baseball.
Yeah.
When the batter steps up to the plate, it means to take responsibility, especially when it's really needed.
Maybe nobody else will or when it's difficult.
Say, I got to step up to the plate.
For sure.
What comes to mind is what maybe I don't know.
Your parent owns a business and maybe they pass away or they retire.
And then maybe you get promoted in the family business up to CEO or something like that.
That could be an example there.
Yes.
That reminds me, have you seen the film, The Wedding Banquet?
It's pretty new.
I saw it on my flight to Cancun.
You know how it's usually like newer films.
You know, Bowen Yang was in it.
I can't remember the names of any of the other actors, but I highly recommend it.
It was really great.
But this in the beginning it's someone who finds out that he is going to have to sort of take over the family business, but he's an artist.
And it was like a He is not at all interested.
He does not want to step up to the plate.
It's a great movie.
I'd highly recommend it.
Interesting.
Now, Aubrey, is there any other example of how you might answer a part two question?
For example, what if someone asked you, describe a group project you did at school or university?
Yeah, okay.
Here's an example of a sentence I could use in that part two.
During my final year at university, I was assigned to a group project.
A lot of the students were not very communicative, so I had to step up to the plate to organize our meetings.
Someone always has to do it, right?
Right.
Someone needs to take that responsibility to make sure things actually happen.
Yeah, it's always when you're assigned to a group and you sit down and everyone's quiet.
You're like, OK, someone's going to have to do this role, the leadership role.
Right.
Yes.
And I think this is so useful to see that there are these four very different ways to talk about taking responsibility, to talk about doing one's fair share and equal part of the work.
Because if you get a part two question, where this is perfect, you want to tell a story about either you or someone you know stepping up to the plate.
You're going to need a variety of vocabulary.
You can't use the same one over and over.
So here you have a lot of options to talk about this in a lot of different ways.
You could use all four of these on your IELTS exam.
So guys, write these ones down and look for other.
This summer we are covering a lot of these very flexible winning vocabulary phrases, right?
So pay attention to those.
Don't get pigeonholed into memorizing lists of unuseful vocabulary, right?
Exactly.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Aubrey, is there another episode our listeners should check out right now?
Yeah, we want to make sure you guys don't miss episode 1519.
It was called Avoid IELTS Traps with this Listening Part 2 Practice.
We did a live Listening Part 2 on the podcast.
And then you can see, use the strategies.
We walk you through using strategies for the listening exam.
And we're pointing out some of the traps that are in every IELTS listening exam to make sure that you don't fall for them on test day.
Yes, we want to be fully prepared, know all the tricks and traps of the examiner so we can sail right through it and recognize it.
Don't let it stop us.
Yes, so good, scroll up if you missed that one and definitely hit follow if you're missing any episodes.
Oh for sure.
And so don't forget guys, there's a good chance that you'll be asked on part one about work or study, so have these words ready and other flexible vocabulary terms.
Yeah, so many questions on the ielts speaking exam.
You could use these idioms, so practice.
I do like pull some random speaking questions and see how could I add this.
How could I use these idioms?
Excellent.
Good stuff, Aubrey.
You have a good weekend and we'll see you back on IELTS Energy very soon.
Awesome.
See you next week, Lindsay.
All right.
Take care.
Bye.
Thanks for listening to IELTS Energy.
Hit subscribe now, and don't forget to find your estimated band score at allearsenglishcom.
Slash my score.
