I did a little survey (more like a straw poll really) to find out about IELTS students’ habits in IELTS reading as I was a little surprised that so many students seem to get stuck and despite their efforts don’t seem to make any headway.
One thing I learnt about how students work on reading really surprised me and it absolutely echoed the same point that I discovered about 18 years ago with an IELTS writing class I had and I am shocked that this is still the norm. This one thing, if you do, it can turn your IELTS reading around really quickly but it seems that many students just don’t.
What is it? I hear you ask.
It’s very simple – it is making sure you revise each IELTS reading passage you do after checking your scores to find out why you got some answers wrong!
Oh that – I hear you say – of course I do that!
Well if you do you are in the minority and I actually wonder if you really do.
- Do you spend time analysing the question again to find out what you missed?
- Do you go back to the text and see how you managed to miss this answer?
- Do you really make sure that you fully understand how you can avoid this mistake in future?
- And do you then apply this new-found knowledge to the next set of similar questions you meet in an IELTS practice test?
Or, as most of the students I spoke to did, do you simply record your score, feel happy or sad, put it away and then move on to the next.
A few months ago I ran some IELTS Reading Workshops and I discovered in these sessions many of the typical errors that tripped students up in IELTS reading and it was so exciting for the students and me too – to discover these very simple errors that were causing those students to stay stuck at 6 and 6.5 in their exam and FIX them!
Two of those students took the exam a couple of weeks after these workshop sessions and both achieved Band 8.5 in the Reading! After just 3 hours and discovering these small things that they had both been overlooking in the questions for months!
So, don’t be one of those students who complete a test, sigh and put it away then move to the next.
Be one of those students who analyse all their errors and dig to find out exactly why they got the answer wrong – this is the way to IELTS success!!
