IELTS preparation at home hi there My name is Ben Worthington and in this video we're
going to look at six tips to help you prepare for IELTS at home and then we're going to
look at why IELTS language schools or language academies preparation academies are pretty
much useless right let's get into it straight away so number 1 if you're preparing for IELTS
at home you need to get familiar with the exam it's your responsibility so how do we
get familiar with the exam well we find practice tests we do some mock tests you know some
mock practice tests and we get familiar with the areas that are causing us to lose points
it’s quite straightforward and if you want more information about that go to IELTS Preparation
in 10 Days I've got another video about that I go into it in much more detail on how to
prepare but it's your responsibility find the practice tests you get familiar with the
exam number 2 this is closely related to the first tip you get disciplined because if you’re
going to a language academy you know that you're going to be preparing three hours on
a Friday for IELTS and you need to have the same structured approach when you are preparing
for the exams you also must apply three hours on a Friday to only practicing IELTS by the
way when you do this put your phone into flight mode or something like that and minimize the
distractions so you can get a full work cycle in place a whole block of pure IELTS preparation
so next point same as before do not confuse watching YouTube videos about IELTS with preparing
for IELTS these are related but personally I think you get more value actually doing
the writing task and getting feedback rather than watching a video about how to write an
introduction of course they are useful but you need to find a balance I'm talking from
experience when I prepared for tests I just like watched videos watched videos watched
videos when actually I should have been doing what the video prescribed okay it also reminds
me of just one small joke it was like what did the father spider say to the younger spider
to his child spider he said stop spending so much time on the web okay if you like that
if you like the joke you made me smile you can become what’s it you can find a tutor
online and an IELTS tutor that you find online it's going to be my opinion probably better
quality than the one at the language center because the one at the language center probably
has to do conversation classes classes for children classes for teenagers oh and then
on a Friday afternoon IELTS classes whereas if you find a tutor that’s specialized in
only IELTS preparation then it's much more likely you're going to get better quality
results okay this is one of the reasons why I decided as an IELTS professional to specialize
only in preparing students for the IELTS especially the writing task and I just think with more
specialization you get better results just more focused it’s quite clear next one before
I tell you about why I think language academies are useless we've got two more results so
two more tips convert your home into your preparation center so this goes back to what
I was saying before block the time put your phone in flight mode and also just stick the
vocab you need that you want to learn stick it on your fridge stick it on your bathroom
mirror make it your preparation center also prepare for success I think I was going to
say it before I can relate it to what I said about discipline if we fail to plan we're
planning to fail so when I say make your home your academy or convert your home to your
preparation center what I'm saying is just put the papers the test papers on the table
in the morning before you go before you read before you have breakfast and then you're
just more likely to read it okay now the next one is feedback you're not alone in this okay
if you're preparing at home it's quite easy just to think of yourself as isolated in your
own IELTS bubble so this is where it's important to get feedback on the exam on your written
papers to get feedback on your speaking in order to find the errors and then improve
on them this is why in the IELTS speaking confidence online course that we have we offer
a free mock exam so you can discover your errors also with the writing course’s feedback
along the course now then last one last tip if you're preparing at home also related to
discipline is you should find an accountability okay find somebody who you can study with
perhaps make a watch group together or a Facebook group whatever and just share your resources
and make promises with each other okay today I'm going to do two hours of IELTS preparation
if I don't here's $10 okay just simple stuff like this and it just really helps if you’re
in a group together and can motivate each other so get others involved and share the
resources that you've found next one let's see so I'm going to tell you now why language
academies in my opinion are not that good for preparation so first of all you have to
make sure that you're getting a tutor who’s specialized in this in IELTS preparation as
I said before you know dealing with a bunch of kids on Friday morning and then starting
to deal with a bunch of students for IELTS preparation are completely two completely
different skill sets so just make sure your tutor’s specialized ask them questions ask
for a test class beforehand ask them what experience they've got ask them if they've
got about past results you know what’s your success rates with other students things like
this the other reason why I dislike language academies is because if you're in a place
like Australia or the UK then in your class there's probably going to be a Chinese student
Saudi Arabian student a Polish student a French student and you're not going to get much exposure
to English you're going to hear their pronunciation which is probably not that good otherwise
they wouldn't be in a class so you're just going to get this all the time and then maybe
your tutor will speak but they can't speak all the time otherwise it's just boring so
and when the tutor’s not speaking and you're not speaking you're listening to a non-native
English speaker which of course isn’t going to destroy your English abilities but it's
probably not going to be so beneficial is it and likewise if you're in a country like
India and you're in these test centers and you're doing a speaking class and you're surrounded
by six other Indians you know why not just reinforce everybody's bad habit all together
in one super concentrated session so you can see why I'm not a big fan of these test centers
I think one on one is the ideal way next one it's more expensive these language preparation
centers are more expensive than doing something like an online course and also you've got
to think where you're spending your money okay like so you're preparing for the writing
class you sit down it's a one-hour class teacher gives you writing task 2 you spend 40 minutes
writing it and you're like I could be at home doing this why on earth am I spending my time
here in silence writing this is crazy okay so just be aware if you do insist on going
to these preparation centers be aware that this could happen likewise the teacher decides
to practice speaking and like I said before you get to hear another non-native English
speaker practice their speaking you can hear all the bad habits you can hear how they can
fail the test what's the point in that next you might be doing practice in a listening
exam isn't that fantastic you walk in sit down and for 10-20 minutes you just listen
to a CD you could do that at home but instead you're paying for it to sit you four or five
of the students are paying for this it's just crazy it's just a way to waste time your time
and your money so yeah I just don't think it's the best way to prepare I mean it's your
choice ask for a test class but another final point is do not confuse this this is like
I said before do not confuse with buying a I don't know five-week intensive IELTS test
preparation course don't confuse that with actually preparing for IELTS of course you're
going to be a little bit more disciplined with your approach but if you are disciplined
enough you don't have to pay that $500 secondly just because you've bought that course do
not assume that you're going to pass the test I know a lot of students myself included I've
done this obviously not for IELTS but for other exams just by buying the course I thought
in my mind okay that's it my test preparation is done you still have to do the course you
still have to work and from my experience a lot of students they pass because they put
the work not because they attended the course with five other students not because they
did the intensive course but they passed because they did a course probably online and then
did all the work as well okay so if you've got any questions don't hesitate to ask me
all the best with your IELTS preparation and yeah good luck with this thank you for watching