How to improve ielts listening

How to Improve IELTS Reading and Listening Skills

Students often ask me ‘How do I improve my reading and listening skills?’

The short answer is ‘Read and listen more.’ However, this is not a very good answer because you need to know HOW to practice and WHERE to get good sources of reading and listening material.

This article will help you:

How to Practice Listening and Reading

There are two kinds of listening and reading practice- passive and active.

One of them is the most common, but least effective, but the other will increase your skills dramatically in a much shorter period of time.

Passive listening is when you simply listen to a song, people talking, the news etc. and don’t do anything else. In other words, you do not actually think about what you are listening to.

Passive reading means you simply read something, but you do not take any steps to think about or learn from what you are reading.

Active Listening and Reading

When you actively listen to something, you listen to less information, but you think about it in a much deeper way. This deeper way of thinking about what you are listening to means you learn in a much more efficient and effective way.

For example, instead of listening to 30 minutes of the news, you might just listen to 3 minutes of the news but think about any new words or phrases you hear, guess what these mean and then note them down in a vocabulary notebook.

Active reading could mean that instead of reading a full chapter for 30 minutes, you simply read one paragraph, but think about the grammar and the function of each sentence. You would then try to use the same grammar and functions in your own writing.

Active listening and reading require you to think and do much more than simply sit back and hope that English will magically be downloaded to your brain, but it will cut your preparation time and also lead to huge improvements.

Examples of Active Listening

The most important things you can think about when active listening are:

I don’t recommend doing all four at once. It is just too much to think about. Instead, I would start by focusing on the area that you are weakest in. This is the best use of your time. So, if you really struggle with pronunciation, focus on that.

This will also improve your speaking because you will constantly be thinking about how native speakers talk.

Examples of Active Reading

The most important things you can think about when active reading are:

Again, don’t do all four at once; start with the one you need the most help with.

This will really help you with your writing. Normally, the more someone reads, the better they are at writing.

Vocabulary

When reading or listening you should do the following things:

Before too long you will have a large number of new words and phrases to use. Click this link for more help with IELTS vocabulary.

Grammar

When reading or listening you should do the following:

Pronunciation

Structure

Idea Development

Where to find the best sources

First of all, do NOT spend all of your time listening to and reading IELTS tests. They are boring and you will get sick and tired of them very quickly. You should practice doing IELTS tests, but I think that this should be only around 10-20% of your preparation time for reading and listening.

The other 90-80% should be spent listening or reading to something you find interesting or, even better, enjoy. If you like reading Harry Potter, read that. If you like watching Game of Thrones, listen to that. Prefer cartoons? They’re fine too. Anything in English that you enjoy is fine.

Google will help you out with finding the things you like, but here are a number of things I think are extremely useful for language learning:

Podcasts

Podcasts have taken over from radio and I absolutely love them. You can download them or stream them using lots of apps or websites. My personal favourite app is Stitcher.

There are millions of podcasts out there, you just have to search and find one you love. Once you find some podcasts you like, you can listen to them whenever and wherever you like. They are also perfect for active listening because you can pause and listen to them again and again.

YouTube

Just like radio has been replaced by podcasts, TV has been replaced by YouTube. Again, there are millions of channels and shows on YouTube, so all you have to do is search for something you like.

Ted Talks

These are short lectures about interesting topics. Luckily, they are often on the kind of topics you will find on the IELTS writing and speaking tests. Very good for idea development and vocabulary.

Audio Books

There are millions of free audio books available online.

Audible is my favourite app for listening to these.

Amazon Kindle

You don’t have to buy a Kindle device. You can download the Kindle app on any device and then you will have access to millions of free books. There are also millions of books you have to pay for, but they are not very expensive.

Your Local Book Shop

Most books stores in the world have an English section. Check out what’s on offer in your local shop.

How long should I practice for?

The answer to this question is different for every person because we all have different schedules and commitments.

A student with lots of free time and no family or work commitments is going to have much more time to practice than a busy person with a job and family.

The short answer to this is practice as much as possible.

Lots of people say that they have no time to practice, but there are many opportunities throughout the day. For example, you could listen or read when you get up in the morning before you get up, on your way to work, when you are exercising, during your lunch break, on your way home from school, before you go to bed and many many others.

What you should remember is that it is much more effective to practice a little every day than to leave everything to the last week before your test.

Extra Resources

If you need more help with IELTS Reading and Listening, please click the links below for lots more information:

Just starting to learn about IELTS? My IELTS Preparation Guide is what you need.

Here’s also a video summarising the information above:

IELTS Listening Practice

IELTS Listening Practice – What you NEED to know!

If you need to score a Band 7, 8 or 9 in IELTS Listening, you must PRACTICE properly.

Many people believe that ‘good practice’ means listening to IELTS Listening past papers over and over again… But in this video, I’ll explain why this is a TERRIBLE idea!

The methods I’ll teach you in this video are the same methods that I teach all my VIP students that need to improve their scores in IELTS Listening. They have helped thousands of my students get the scores they need to move to the country of their dreams – watch the video above to find out what they are for free!

How to improve your IELTS Listening practice skills from home

The post below is about IELTS listening practice and how you can improve your listening skills at home. First, let me tell you a story…

I was teaching a student recently who needed 7.5 in order to move to Canada and become a nurse. She was very good at writing, speaking and reading, but always failed to get the score she needed in listening. I was really surprised because she was one of the most focused and hard working students I have ever met. I was determined to find out what her problem was and fix it. After talking about the problem for only a minute, it was obvious what she was doing wrong.

She told me ‘I don’t think I can do any more IELTS listening practice, I have listened to every practice test so many times. I’m thinking of giving up’. Can you tell what she was doing wrong?

The only listening practice she did was IELTS listening past papers over and over again. You should listen to these before your test, but you should absolutely NOT listen to them all the time. It will take you a very long time to improve this way and more importantly it is really boring!

I tell my students to follow the 90/10 rule- 10% IELTS past papers, 90% real authentic listening practice. If you listen to just 20 or 30 minutes of English every day the right way, it is far more effective than listening to lots of pasts papers. It will not only improve your listening skills, but your overall level of English.

This post will focus on:

IELTS Listening Skills

Looking at the format of the IELTS listening test, we can break it down into several core skills. They are:

1. Prediction

You probably use prediction all the time in your native language, but you just don’t think about it. For instance, when listening to the news and you hear “Volcano in South Pacific’’ your brain automatically starts to predict what you are going to hear and that it will probably be something to do with a volcano erupting in one of the islands in that region. If it was about something else, it would be difficult or confusing to listen to, because you were not expecting it.

2. Synonyms and Paraphrasing

In many ways the listening test is not only a test of your listening skills, but also a vocabulary test. More often than not the answer will not be a direct match to the keywords in the question, but a synonym (words with the same or very similar meanings) or a paraphrase of those words. You therefore need to practice thinking about how words you see in the question might be represented by different words that have the same meaning.

For example, the question could ask ‘How did the education system improve from 1990-1999?’, but the recording may describe how ‘Schools got better in the ‘90s’.

3. Connected Speech

Lots of English teachers speak clearly and slowly to their students and this actually harms their progress sometimes. When you hear how native speakers actually talk, it is often very difficult to hear what is being said. This is mainly to do with connected speech. Connected Speech is the linking of words and sounds together in a sentence. For example, ‘I have to go to the doctor, I have an ear ache.’, might sound more like ‘Ivtegote the doctor, Ivenearake.’

Other sounds may appear ‘weak’ or change when put into a sentence. For instance ‘Do you want to go?’ might sound more like ‘De ye want te go?’

4. Recognising Sign Posting Language

In two of the four parts of the IELTS listening test you will have to listen to someone speaking by themselves, one in a social context and one in a lecture style. When someone talks in this way they often use what is referred to as ‘sign posting’. For example, when you give a lecture you might say ‘This lecture is divided into three parts’ and then you will say things like ‘First of all…’, ‘Secondly…’, ‘After that…’ and ‘Finally…’. These phrases tell the listener what stage of the talk they are listening to and what they are going to say next. If we know how to interpret these signals we are more likely to understand and follow the whole thing.

5. Listening to Two People Talking

Listening to two people talking at the same time is a very difficult skill to master even in your native language. In two of the four parts of the listening test you be listening to two people having a discussion. The people might have different accents, different styles of speaking and they might agree or disagree with each other. It makes up 50% of the IELTS listening test so it’s one you have to master.

6. Note Taking

Most people who take the IELTS test do so because they hope to go to an English speaking university. One of the main things you will have to do there is to take notes in a lecture and IELTS therefore tests this skill. When you take notes, the lecturer will not slow down for you or care that English is not your first language, so you must learn how to take short notes and then transcribe them into more comprehensive notes after the lecture is over (with correct spelling).

For example, a chemistry lecturer might say ‘Mix with 20 milliliters of hydrochloric acid.’ You won’t have time to write all of this so you could just write ‘Mx w 20ml of HCl’.

Are you an active or passive listener?

IELTS listening practice should always be active and never passive. Passive listening is when you listen and do just that. You don’t think about what you are listening to and you might ‘tune out’ for large periods of time. Lots of students I have taught tell me they listen to English all the time and they are frustrated that they are not improving. This is because they are not actually doing anything to improve their skills when they are listening.

Active listening involves setting yourself small tasks when you are listening and actually doing something when you are listening, just like you will be in the IELTS listening exam. This might sound like hard work, but it actually saves you lots of time because 20 minutes of active listening is much more effective listening practice than many hours of passive listening.

Practicing Skills and Resources

Below I will take each of the skills discussed above and suggest some tasks you could set yourself to help improve these skills and some free online resources you can use for IELTS listening practice at home.

Prediction

Practicing this skill is quite easy. You simply read the title and any other information you can find on the talk or conversation you are going to listen to and predict some of the things you might hear. Write them down and then listen to check if your answers were correct.

An even better way to practice this skill is to predict the answer to specific questions before you listen to the recording.

A good site to do this on is the TED Ed site. Here you will find thousands of videos, all with questions.

The British Council’s ‘Listen and Watch’ series of videos also have questions you can use to predict the answers and then listen to check.

Synonyms and Paraphrasing

Practicing this skill allows you to improve your listening and vocabulary at the same time.

A good listening resource to help you improve your vocabulary whilst listening is FluentU. This website has a huge range of English videos and bilingual subtitles for most of them. It also has a ‘hover-over’ dictionary for any words you don’t know. Finally, it has a ‘’learning centre’’ where you can study and review the vocabulary that came up in the video.

My suggestion for FluentU would be to listen to any videos you like and note down any words you don’t know. Try to guess the meaning from the context of the listening first because this is a useful skill to develop for the IELTS test and then use the ‘hover-over’ tool to confirm the meaning. Even if you just watch one video a day, your vocabulary will expand quickly.

A good way to practice synonyms and paraphrasing is to listen to a short video and think about how each sentence or phrase could be paraphrased. If you do this regularly, over time you will get used to common synonyms and this will really help you in all parts of the IELTS test.

Connected Speech

We can practice this by doing something called ‘micro-listening’. It involves pausing a sentence you don’t understand and replaying it until you have understood all the words. Don’t worry about how many times you have to do this, focus on hearing every word and breaking connected speech down into individual words.

Over time you will get used to how words link together and listening to native speakers will become much easier.

Podcasts are perfect for this because you can easily pause them and replay them. Podcasts are like individual radio shows that you can download and listen to whenever you like. I personally listen to them every day because there are literally millions of them on every topic you can think of. Whatever your interest; there will be a podcast about it.

Websites like Podbay and apps like Stitcher are great for accessing and searching podcasts. They are also available on iTunes,

Recognising Sign Posting

To practice this you can listen to a lecture and simply listen for any signposting language. When you hear some, pause and think about the meaning of the language and predict what you are going to hear next. Continue this until you get to the end of the recording.

The IELTS listening test is very long and it is impossible, even for native speakers, to concentrate fully 100% of the time. Recognising sign posting allows you to prioritise and focus on the important parts of the listening that contain the answers.

There are several great sources that have thousands of online lectures including:

Listening to Two People

When people are talking together they will agree and disagree with each other. The task I set my students when they are listening to two people is simply: when do they agree and when do they disagree? They listen actively to what is being said and when someone agrees and disagrees they should pause and think about what has been agreed or disagreed. For further practice they can then try to paraphrase this.

Often in the IELTS listening test, one person will be giving another a set of instructions, making an order or telling a story. When you are listening to two people talking and this happens, try to take on the role of the person listening and try to note down the important details of the story or instructions.

To find conversations between two people check out the podcast resources above. Some podcasts are just one person talking, but most are two or more people having a conversation in either a social or academic context.

Note Taking

To practice this skill you should go to one of the websites I recommended above that contain lectures. Watch them and pretend you are actually in the lecture and take notes on what is being said. Everyone has a very personal style of note taking, so it is up to you how you do this, but it should be a system that allows you to quickly note the important points, but not so short that you can’t understand it after the lecture.

Finally, you should look at your notes and see if you can spell the important points you shortened. Spelling is also an important skill because it is exactly the same thing you will do at the end of the IELTS listening test.

I hope you have found this article useful and if you have any questions or suggestions please let me know below in the comments section. Next time you are doing IELTS listening practice try using the techniques in this article and you will see much better results than simply using past IELTS papers.

Finally I should say, when you are doing listening practice try to listen to something you are interested in. The internet has provided us with limitless resources to listen to, so why not listen to something you are passionate about?

IELTS Practice Tests

You’ll find a full list of practice study materials here on our resource guide and here on our practice guide.

IELTS listening tips

These tips are divided into IELTS listening exam-specific skills/tips and then general English language listening skills.

A lot of students over-focus on the IELTS exam skills and forget that language skills will always come before exam skills.

Exam Skills

Five-step method for improving your listening skills for IELTS

Language Skills

14 Listening tips for your IELTS exam

IELTS listening tips to predict answers in the listening exam

Different prepositions will dictate different answers.

Here are some examples:

Possible answer: Time, Part of Day, Place

Examples: 9 pm, dawn, the restaurant

Possible answer: Period of Time, Month, Year, Season

Examples: 2 days/hour/minutes, April, 2018, Winter

Possible answer: Day, Date

Examples: Monday, January 15th (or 15th of January)

Preposition: no preposition

Possible answer: Person other

Examples: Emily now, at once, tomorrow, next year, this afternoon, person

What happens on the listening test?

The IELTS listening test is designed to assess how well you can:

IELTS listening test structure

— The recordings and questions get more difficult as the test progresses:

— Section 1 is two speakers having an everyday conversation. They might be making plans for the weekend or discussing where to get dinner that evening.

— Section 2 is a monologue (one person talking) about an everyday situation. It may be a speech or a talk about making plans for something.

— Section 3 is an academic conversation between up to 4 people.

— Section 4 is a monologue on an academic topic.

— The recordings include a range of accents, probably British and Australian, so try to get familiar with these. In this recording we can hear an examiner for the speaking section, but with a Scottish accent.

You can find more info about the listening test on the IELTS website.

Sound overwhelming? Don’t stress. We’re going to break down the main skills needed to score well on this section exam and outline some tips for you.

Keep track of your results and improvement

For the reading and listening, take practice tests to see where you’re losing points.

Practice tests are great because they will show what areas of English are giving you trouble and where to focus your attention in order to improve.

Focus on your weak spots at first before branching out in a new direction!

IELTS writing and listening simultaneously (a key skill!)

Writing while listening is hard if you aim to capture everything.

The key here is that it’s not always possible throughout the entire exam so don’t let this tactic take up too much time.

This will require you to develop your concentration skills and limit distractions even more so than before because you are now using both of these skills simultaneously.

Concentration skills can be improved through meditation and practice.

Reverse engineer the reading and listening tests

We also mention this tip in the IELTS Preparation guide.

Find official IELTS exams. Cambridge is the best because they are usually slightly harder than the real test. Make sure you have the answer key. Some people sell it separately.

The Cambridge practice tests are also written by the same professionals who write the official exams.

Sit down with an exam paper and look at the answers first, and then look at the questions.

Work out how the questions are asked, what they ask and how.

This strategy for the IELTS listening test makes it far easier to find answers when you do the real test.

Our IELTS Reading online preparation course is for people who want to score high on the reading test the first time. It has video lessons on how to answer each specific question style. LINK

This is just one of the courses that we offer to help you improve and prepare.

How is the IELTS listening score calculated?

The IELTS listening exam tests English comprehension skills. The examiner looks to see whether you can listen to a piece of information and successfully answer questions.

The listening scores are out of 40 and are calculated based on the number of correct answers. Points are not taken away for incorrect answers.

Once you have completed the listening test you will be graded according to the following bandwidth ranging from a score of 4 to 9.

Five-step method for improving your listening skills for IELTS

Improving your listening skills requires active (not passive) listening practice. Focusing on understanding what you are listening to is important when you practice listening.

The best method to develop this skill is by combining listening and reading. Find audio examples with a text transcript to check your comprehension after listening.

Step 1: Listen to the audio clip (no reading)

See how much you can understand the general gist and start to pick out keywords.

Step 2: Repeat and repeat again (still no reading!)

Listen to the clip again. Based on what you understood the first time, is there now more that you can pick out?

Continue to listen to the clip several times to see if you can comprehend a little bit more each time.

Only move to step 3 when you’re not comprehending anything more from the audio. Your goal should be to understand as much as possible from the audio!

Step 3: Read the text

Check your understanding and identify any new vocabulary. See if you can guess the meaning of any new words based on the context before looking them up.

Step 4: Listen with the text

Listen to the pronunciation of phrases and groups of words.

Step 5: Listen a few more times without the text

At this point, you should be able to understand the majority of the clip. Repetition makes it easier to understand the words and phrases when you hear them again.

As Ben W says: REPETITION IS THE MOTHER OF ALL LEARNING.

These steps were adapted from Benny’s great blog: FluentIn3Months.

Where can I find IELTS listening exercises?

Listening Resources (authentic native English speaker material)

Below are different resources to help you prepare for the IELTS Listening exam.

How to improve your listening skills

The IELTS listening test requires you to exhibit your comprehension skills. Listening is a skill and the best way to improve your listening, is immersion in the language.

The IELTS exam tests your active listening skills, i.e your ability to extract meaning from conversations or speeches. You also need to improve your focus levels in order to improve your listening skills.

An ability to visualise the words you heard is another skill worth developing. The ability to hold information and construct answers in your mind are two other skills.

On IELTSPodcast, Ben often tells his listeners to grab a pen and take notes, this is another form of active listening.

Stronger Vocabulary

Another first step for improving your listening score is by building a stronger vocabulary.

Flashcards

When using flashcards make sure that the word is on the front and how to pronounce it is on the back. If you are a visual learner, try making your own flashcards instead of using ones that have already been made. You can upload our vocabulary lists into Quizlet and start practising today. LINK

Passive Vocabulary

Constantly build your passive vocabulary by reading and listening.

Reading

Another strategy to improve your listening score is by reading more. Reading improves vocabulary and also helps you understand sentence structures better.

Personally, I find addictive turn pager novels boost my reading time. Native speakers will read books with a higher vocabulary too, so it is worth the effort.

Listening to the news in English

It may seem like an obvious step given that you are listening for your IELTS test but this can be very useful and helpful. The news is always being broadcast in English and often includes topic-specific vocabulary or phrases. The BBC has a wide range of band score-improving podcasts available here.

How to understand native English speakers

Understanding a native English speaker can be a challenge (especially with all the northern accents!).

Recordings and podcasts can definitely help but English pronunciation is complex.

There are over 20 different vowel sounds and they can difficult to tell apart.

It gets harder with fast speech.

Two words may differ by a single sound but have a very different meaning (minimal pairs). The words van and fan are minimal pairs.

Training your ear to distinguish between the sounds is an important foundational skill.

You can find lots of minimal pairs listening exercises online. English Club has a good one.

Why do native speakers sound like a block of sound!

Native speakers have speech patterns that sound unique to learners. It’s different from textbook or written English.

If you learn what these patterns are, it will be easier to understand them.

Pattern 1: Contractions

Using contractions is the normal method of speech.

Example: “I am” becomes “I’m,” ”did not” becomes “didn’t” etc.

Pattern 2: Weak forms

Structural words in sentences are often pronounced as their “weak form.”

Example: “to” and “you” on their own are pronounced with a long u: sounds. As a part of sentences though, they are usually pronounced in their weak form with short uh sounds. For more on weak forms and their pronunciation, check out the video below.

Pattern 3: Phonetic links

Any word that starts with a vowel gets linked to a previous word which makes it hard to hear each word distinctly.

Example: “She is interested in it” all runs together and sounds like one word “shezinterestedinit”.

In this IELTS podcast, we give out a few IELTS listening tips on how to perform better on your IELTS listening exam.

Listen to the podcast here: Watch on Youtube

IELTS listening test audio and answer sheet downloads

Now take the IELTS listening sample test online from the British Council, click here.

Here are some tutorials to help you with your IELTS listening preparation

Eight Ways to Improve Your IELTS Listening Score

“What did she just say? Oh no, I totally missed that!” Does this sound like you? Do you need to improve your score on the IELTS listening test? If you said yes, then this blog is for you. Below are eight ways to improve your listening skills.

1. No Surprises: Know the Test

As you might already know, all IELTS listening tests are the same. They are the same format. They are thirty minutes long. The academic and general tests are exactly the same. In terms of each part of the test, check the table below:

2. YOLO! (You Only Listen Once)

It’s like real life. You only have one chance to listen. Many of us would love the chance to listen again, but IELTS won’t give you that. Here are a few tips to doing well with just one listening:

3. Follow Your Heart

When practicing, choose interesting topics. Interesting for YOU. If you love professional tennis, listen to podcasts about professional tennis. If you love Roman history, listen to stories about Roman history. It is well known that we listen better to things we want to or enjoy hearing. If you really want to motivate yourself and get the best out of each and every listening practice, try this approach. You might even have fun doing it!

4. Audio Scripts

When choosing or searching for practice tests, try and find ones with scripts. Scripts are the word-for-word written texts of the audio you listen to. There are many activities you can do with scripts. Here are a few:

5. Synonyms

Have you tried an IELTS preparation class? If yes, you probably know that synonyms are important in all parts of the exam. In the speaking and writing exam, you have to show you know how to use synonyms. In the reading and listening exam, many of the questions use synonyms in the questions. For example:

Listening text: “Duchess, who is the only King’s daughter...”

Listening test question:

6. Get Real – Real Life Listening

English isn’t just a test. It is a language. IELTS tests you on your knowledge and skill of this language. One of the best ways to learn a language well and to do well on the test is to use English in real life. Every day you don’t have a conversation is a missed opportunity. So next chance you have… chat, text, call, email, discuss, and laugh in English!

7. Check It Twice, Be Precise!

Little mistakes can count big. A few silly mistakes can be the difference between scoring a 5.5 and a 6. The following are just a few examples of how small errors can cost you:

8. Think In English

Many language experts agree about one key rule. Thinking in a specific language helps you learn that language. Many students of English often try and translate everything in their heads.

Translating has two main problems. First, it is slower. Second, you remember your language and forget the English.

On the listening exam you won’t have time to translate. Also, you’ll have to remember key English words. So, when you’re practicing English… think in English!

IELTS Listening Tips

10 Top Tips for a High Score

All the lessons in this section of the website are packed full of IELTS Listening tips, strategies and advice but here are 10 things I especially want to highlight.

1) Listen to English every day

The only way to improve your listening skills is to listen to English every day. It doesn’t matter if it’s just 10 or 15 minutes here and there as you’re travelling on a bus, eating lunch or cooking the tea, just listen to something.

You need to hear English used naturally in many different contexts and spoken with a range of accents. In your test, you could hear speakers from the UK (including different regional accents), Ireland, the US, Canada, New Zealand, Australia or South Africa.

2) Listen to a range of things

The test will include two monologues (one person speaking) and two conversations, so you must practice listening to both. You’ll find all the practice material you need online. Podcasts and TED Talks are great for listening to monologues, and radio broadcasts and interviews on YouTube ideal for conversations.

You’ll find more resource ideas here: How To Improve IELTS Listening

3) Improve your vocabulary

The third of my IELTS Listening tips might seem obvious but many students don’t know the most effective way to improve their vocabulary. Just memorising lists of new words will achieve very little. You won’t fully understand the words – what they mean and how they’re used in context – and you’ll quickly forget them.

When you listen to spoken English, listen actively, that is, note down words you hear that are unfamiliar or you don’t fully understand. Then, check them out in a dictionary. Note the meaning, pronunciation, how the word is used in a sentence, common synonyms, antonyms and collocations. Record all this information in your vocabulary notebook.

Yes, this takes time, but it’s time well spent. Every time you do this, you will have added one more word to your vocabulary that you’ll remember and be able to use confidently in all parts of the IELTS exam.

For more help with what vocabulary to learn and how to learn it, study the lessons in the Vocabulary section of the website.

4) Have a strategy

To score highly in the Listening test, you need to understand the 10 different types of questions and have a strategy for answering them. Click the links below to learn how to answer each type:

Also, study these important lessons. Each contains invaluable IELTS Listening tips and advice.

Listening Strategies – Learn 3 essential listening strategies – question analysis, answer prediction & how to use keyword clues.

Listening Skills – Learn the 4 key listening skills needed for a high score highly. Examples from real questions.

5) Identify your weaknesses

Throughout the website, you will hear me say, ‘Practice, Practice, Practice’. This is true, of course, but practice wisely. Just completing practice test after practice test isn’t necessarily going to improve your score. Take time to analyse your results and determine what mistakes you are regularly making. Then, work on improving these.

Extra IELTS Listening Tip 1:

Check your spelling. If it’s wrong you’ll lose the mark.

Is it grammar that’s letting you down, a limited range of vocabulary or do you find it hard to follow conversations? Identify your greatest challenges and focus on them.

The Cambridge English books of authentic test papers (and some online tests) include transcripts of the recordings. These will help you to understand why you got a particular answer wrong.

6) The introduction

My next two IELTS Listening tips relate to the test itself. First, the introduction.

Before the first speaker begins talking, there will be an introduction by a narrator in which you’ll be told what the recording is about, e.g.

You will hear a part of a seminar entitled Understanding the World’s Oceans given by a climate scientist.

The speaker will then begin the talk or conversation by introducing themselves and, often, the subject or purpose of the talk, e.g.

Thanks to all of you for coming along today to hear about how the robotic float project is helping with ocean research.

These introductions give important information that will help you to understand the recording, So, listen carefully right from the start.

7) Signpost language

As the speaker(s) talk, listen out for signpost language. We use signposting to connect ideas and indicate to the listeners that we’re moving on to a new idea. Signpost language includes words such as,

In a map or plan labelling question, you might hear phrases such as,

Extra IELTS Listening Tip 2:

Synonyms and paraphrasing will be used. Listen for the keywords in the questions but also, different words and phrases that have the same meaning.

These also indicate progression.

Recognising signpost language will help you to follow the recording more easily and better understand what is being said.

8) Capital letters

My next IELTS Listening tip concerns a grammar issue. Remember to use capital letters for proper nouns. If you forget, your answer will be marked wrong.

A proper noun is the name given to something to make it more specific. For example,