The IELTS Academic Listening test comprises 4 parts and takes 30 minutes. The Listening test assesses your ability to understand core ideas, detailed process information, intention, and attitudes of the speakers and an individual’s ability to understand the development of ideas. Further in this article, we will learn tips to improve your IELTS listening score.

There are 4 recordings in the Academic Listening test, and individuals need to answer 40 questions based on their comprehension of these recordings.

In recordings 1 and 3, individuals will hear a dialogue between two or more speakers. Recordings 2 and 4 entail a monologue that is often an educational lecture. Individuals are expected to answer questions based on the recordings. Questions can range from multiple-choice, summary, note-making, or flow-chart completion.

Tips to improve IELTS Listening

IELTS has a unique format like all international language testing systems, so familiarising yourself with the structure and details of the test is imperative.

Listening to lectures often follow a predictable pattern or structure. Some important tips for improving IELTS Listening are:

• Your listening skills can be improved by becoming an attentive listener. Listening to various English narratives, such as podcasts and Ted talks, will introduce you to new vocabulary. Once you’re familiarized with the process, moving on to more academic material. The goal is to make active listening a vital part of your life.
• Emphasize Keywords because during the test. The recording will be played just once. You will be given ample time to read the instructions and questions before the recording starts. Underlining the keywords as you read the questions and predicting the recording context is a very smart move.
• Using your sense of judgment and not getting tricked is also very important. Often, questions are deceiving. The speaker may say a prominent thing, but that might not be the answer. Pay attention to the details.
• Concentration is Key, as in the IELTS Listening test. The recording is played only once. It is imperative to concentrate for the whole 30 minutes.
• Notes should not be written in whole sentences; instead, write down the main ideas and shorten. You simply need to jot down enough information to aid your recollection later on.
• You must be familiar with the English alphabets and how they are pronounced in questions where you must type out words spelt out in the audio. The letter ‘W,’ for example, is pronounced ‘double-u’).
• If you’re having problems answering a question, put it aside and go on. Don’t waste your time worrying about it. Come return to it later if you have time left at the conclusion.

These IELTS listening tips will undoubtedly assist you in following conversations and monologues throughout the listening assignment. Now let’s concentrate on types of questions for the IELTS listening test in order to get a high band score.

IELTS Listening Questions

The questions for the listening test are uniform for both the IELTS Academic test and the IELTS General Training test. Individuals will need to answer 40 questions based on four recordings. There are 10 questions for each part of the IELTS Listening test.

These questions are framed to test your ability to understand the following:

1. Core ideas and factual information
2. Specific views and attitudes of speakers
3. The flow and development of ideas.

IELTS Listening questions can look like:

• Multiple Choice: In a multiple-choice question, you are required to choose one correct answer (A, B, or C). It is either a question followed by three possible answers or a part of a sentence followed by three distinct ways to complete it.
• Matching: Individuals are required to match a numbered list of items from what they hear in the listening audio to a corresponding set of options on the question paper. Matching assesses the understanding of the information given by the speaker. It also assesses an individual’s ability to follow a conversation or to assess your ability to recognize relationships and connections between points in the listening text.
• Planning, mapping, diagram labelling: The matching task assesses your skill of understanding information and representing it as a visual representation. This includes comprehending language expressing directions (e.g. straight on/turn left/opposite).
• Summary completion and Note-Making: In this task, you have to fill in the gaps in an outline of the listening text. This outline will focus on the main ideas/themes in the text. Please adhere to the word limit in all tasks, or it may be marked as incorrect.
• Sentence Completion: Sentence completion highlights your ability to identify the key information in a listening text. It tests your understanding of functional relationships such as to cause and effect.
• Short-answer questions: In these types of questions, you are required to write a short answer using facts from the listening text. Sometimes test takers are presented with a question that asks them to list multiple points. Short-answer questions assess your ability to identify concrete facts, such as places, prices, or times, within the listening text.

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IELTS listening format

The IELTS listening exam will take around 30 minutes, plus 10 minutes for transferring responses to the response sheet. In both the Academic and General modules of IELTS, the listening exam is the same.

Students will respond to many questions after listening to 4 taped monologues, texts, and conversations by a range of native speakers. This would contain questions that test the ability to absorb basic concepts and specific factual information, as well as the ability to comprehend the speaker’s opinions and attitudes, the meaning of what is said, and the ability to follow the evolution of ideas.

1st section: It consists of a conversation between two persons in a normal social context, such as a discussion in a lodging agency.

2ndSection: A monologue delivered in a real-life social setting, such as a lecture about local facilities.

3rd Section: A conversation in a training or educational context involving up to four people, such as a university lecturer and a student discussing homework.

4th section: A monologue about an intellectual topic, such as a university lecture.

How to improve IELTS score?

Improving your IELTS score is contingent on practice, familiarity with different accents, and an adaptable vocabulary. In addition to that, concentration is also extremely important to understand the intended meaning of a recording.

How to improve IELTS reading score?

• Focus on Your Grammar: The utilization of precise grammar is imperative to make your message understandable to the reader or the listener. The refinement of grammar is essential to convey a clear message or idea to the examiner.
• Refine Your Reading: Your reading should be fluent and faultless to impress your IELTS examiner and secure a good score. Practicing daily reading from various sources such as newspapers will help you to strengthen your reading skills and ace the reading test.
• Take Assistance: Undoubtedly, a vast range of material and guidance is available on the internet to prepare for the IELTS Exam. However, this material is not presented in a streamlined manner which is sometimes can act like a roadblock in your productivity.

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Check Out: IELTS Accepted Countries

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How to improve IELTS speaking score?

Listening is an extremely important part of Your IELTS Exam. Carrying out coordinated daily practice will help you to refine your listening skills and ace the exam. The utilization of material available online is an excellent way to attain the desired score.

• Remember that the IELTS Speaking exam is a semi-formal test, so use your words effectively. The goal is to prove that you are capable of meaningfully conversing in English, so be relaxed in your choice of words but refrain from using slang or other inappropriate short forms.
• Speaking constructively is a chance to show how fluent you are. Develop the habit of giving reasons for your answers. Answer questions like how, why, when, where till the examiner does not interrupt you. Fluency is one of the four IELTS assessment criteria, so just maintain a good flow of speech.
• Do not rush your speech. Speaking too fast won’t help improve your fluency score and will result in you making more mistakes. Remain calm and maintain your natural speed. Just ensure you enunciate adequately and pronounce your words correctly.

How to improve IELTS Writing score?

To ace the exam and focus on your problem areas, first, let’s understand the assessment criteria:

• Task achievement – effectively addressing and illustrating the main points in the task.
• Cohesion and coherence – organizing and linking your ideas in order for sentences to flow in continuation
• Lexical resource – accurately displaying your range of vocabulary
• Grammatical range and accuracy – using words in a sentence to make it accurate

Top tips to improve your writing include:

• Be cognizant of time. You get 60 minutes per section so remember to include time for planning and checking what you’ve written.
• Be mindful of word limits. You need to write at least 150 words for task one and 250 words for task two. Anything less or more, and you will lose marks.
• Organize your ideas. Spend time brainstorming ideas and selecting what information you’re going to present. Construct your ideas logically, and include cohesive devices between paragraphs, sentences and phrases.

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