How to Prepare for IELTS If You Have One Month?

Last week I had a class with a new student, Upper-intermediate level, who needs IELTS 6 in all modules. After assessing her writing and speaking, I was quite satisfied and told her that she could go and take the exam that same day. Nonetheless, it would seem wise to spend one month and prepare for IELTS format in order to feel absolutely confident and to secure the result.

We worked out a plan for about 2 hours of preparation every day.

Monday

1) Do one Listening test

(from Cambridge IELTS 9,8,7 and Official Practice Materials 2 and 1) – 40 min + 20 min analysis

1.1 Print the materials and the Answer Sheet

1.2 Do the test

1.3 Check your answers and analyse incorrect ones using tape scripts

2) Speaking preparation – 60 min

2.1. Use my website for practices 1-2, record yourself

2.2. Listen to yourself and improve your speaking with nice vocabulary (fillers, cohesive devices, idioms)

2.3. Speak again

2.4. Analyse other IELTS topics and prepare your ideas

Tuesday

1) Do one Reading test – 60 min + 20 min for analysis

1.1 Print the materials and Answer Sheet

1.2 Do the test in 60 minutes

1.3 Check your answers and analyse incorrect ones

2) Writing preparation – 60 minutes

Read and analyse sample answers for Task 1 from Ielts-simon and dcielts

2.1. Try to understand the task

2.2. Print sample answers

2.3. Write a plan for each sample answer on the margin, using bullet points

2.4. Highlight cohesive devices, paraphrase and cliches (use different colours)

2.5. Prepare your own list of paraphrase and cohesive devices (you can use some ideas from the file)

Wednesday

1) Writing preparation – 60 min

Read and analyse sample answers for Task 2 from Ielts-simon and dcielts

1.1. Try to understand the task

1.2. Print sample answers

1.3. Write a plan for each sample answer on the margin, using bullet points

1.4. Highlight cohesive devices, paraphrase and cliches (use different colours)

1.5. Prepare your own list of paraphrase, introductions and cohesive devices (you can use some ideas from the file)

1.6. Practice planning – just create 3-4 plans, trying to use 3 minutes for each of them

2) Speaking preparation – 60 min

2.1. Use my website for practices 3-4, record yourself

2.2. Listen to yourself and improve your speaking with nice vocabulary (fillers, cohesive devices, idioms)

2.3. Speak again

2.4. Analyse other IELTS topics and prepare your ideas

Thursday

1) Do one Listening test

(from Cambridge IELTS 9,8,7 and Official Practice Materials 2 and 1) – 40 min + 20 min analysis

1.1 Print the materials and Answer Sheet

1.2 Do the test

1.3 Check your answers and analyse incorrect ones using tape scripts

2) Speaking preparation – 60 min

2.1. Use my website for practices 5-6, record yourself

2.2. Listen to yourself and improve your speaking with nice vocabulary (fillers, cohesive devices, idioms)

2.3. Speak again

2.4. Analyse other IELTS topics and prepare your ideas

Friday

1) Do one Reading test – 60 min + 20 min for analysis

1.1 Print the materials and Answer Sheet

1.2 Do the test in 60 minutes

1.3 Check your answers and analyse incorrect ones

2) Writing preparation – 60 minutes

2.1.Write a complete test (Part 1 and Part 2) in 60 minutes, use a real Answer sheet and a pencil.

2.2. Count the number of words for each part.

2.3. Have your writing checked by a professional IELTS tutor.

Saturday

1) Writing preparation

Read and analyse sample answers from Ielts-simon and Dcielts

1.1. Try to understand the task

1.2. Print sample answers

1.3. Write a plan for each sample answer on the margin, using bullet points

1.4. Highlight cohesive devices, paraphrase and cliches (use different colours)

1.5. Build up your own list of paraphrase and cohesive devices (you can use some ideas from the file).

2) Speaking preparation – 60 min

2.1. Use my website for practices 7-8, record yourself

2.2. Listen to yourself and improve your speaking with nice vocabulary (fillers, cohesive devices, idioms)

2.3. Speak again

2.4. Analyse other IELTS topics and prepare your ideas

For the next week, Writing will include less analysis and more practice. At the same time, the student will have more feedback to improve the writing skill. Spleaking will include different practices from the website. This way it will be possible to develop all the four skills and to feel confident during the exam.