“How to teach IELTS to beginners?” is an important issue for IELTS tutors. As an IELTS tutor, you have encountered beginner learners who are looking for ways to prepare for the IELTS exam. Most of the time, you provide them with some general guidelines that get them started. However, you may not know the systematic approach to how to tutor someone for IELTS. This article aims to introduce ten essential tips for IELTS tutors to help you prepare your students for the exam. These tips include:
- Identifying learners’ English proficiency level
- Conducting needs analysis
- Explaining different parts of the IELTS exam
- Building grammatical competence
- Developing vocabulary skills
- Devising effective IELTS exam strategies
- Monitoring the students’ learning progress
- Assigning regular homework
- Providing students with critical and constructive feedback
- Assessing the students’ performance in simulated IELTS examinations
How to Start IELTS Preparation for Beginners
To prepare beginners for the IELTS exam, you first need to have extensive knowledge of what the exam incorporates. It helps you decide what language skills you need to promote for your students to succeed in the IELTS exam. On the other hand, you should consider your students’ background information and their purpose in taking the exam. The remainder of the article walks you through some necessary steps in how to tutor IELTS.
Need more information about the IELTS exam itself? Check out IELTS, the world’s most trusted English test.
How to plan for IELTS teaching
The essence of effective IELTS instruction lies in the thoughtful integration of diverse teaching strategies personalized to students’ needs and preferences. Using real-world examples, interactive activities, technology, and multimedia resources can significantly enhance student engagement and comprehension. Incorporating regular practice and providing constructive feedback ensures students are adequately prepared for the unique demands of each IELTS section. While the process requires diligence and adaptability, the reward is in empowering students to attain their desired IELTS score, opening the doors to their future academic and professional pursuits.
Read more on how to make an IELTS lesson plan for teachers and IELTS tutors.
1. dentifying learners’ proficiency level
Before providing the learners with any guidelines or learning materials, you should measure the learners’ current language skills. In doing so, you can use various placement tests. Such tests can objectively gauge the students’ proficiency level and indicate an estimated starting point for them. Moreover, you can interview the students by asking easy-to-hard questions and find out their strengths and weaknesses in each of the four main language skills. The latter is more favorable for tutoring since it gives the learner and the teacher a chance to discuss what they will cover in the tutoring sessions.
2. Conducting needs analysis
Another necessary step before tutoring an IELTS course is to perform a needs analysis. Through needs analysis, you can understand learners’ expectations, set objectives, and select the appropriate teaching material to work with. Of course, an important part of needs analysis is identifying learners’ proficiency level, which we discussed above. We should also note that needs analysis is an initial step in tutoring IELTS courses, but it does not mean that the process can stop once the tutor conducts it. That is, you should continue to analyze the learners’ needs and frequently adjust the course pace based on the learners’ performances.
Needs analysis allows the tutors to understand students’ purpose in taking the IELTS test. Do the students aim to take the test for educational motives, business communication, job promotion, or immigration? How much time do they have before participating in the IELTS exam? Based on their purpose and time constraints, tutors can set the context for the course, i.e., they can decide on choosing suitable vocabulary topics and grammatical structures. In addition, needs analysis helps tutors to know their students’ age, culture, and background leading to the selection of relevant and engaging materials.
3. Explaining different parts of the IELTS exam
Before going through different parts of the IELTS exam, let’s briefly describe the two IELTS exam modules. The General Training module is designed to assess the English proficiency level of the candidates hoping to migrate to English-speaking countries, such as the U.K., the U.S., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. On the other hand, the Academic module measures the candidates’ language abilities in academic and professional contexts, making it suitable for those who wish to continue their education in the countries mentioned earlier. The table below summarizes different sections of the IELTS exam.
You cand also read Cambridge’s guide to IELTS test format.
4. Building grammatical competence
Knowledge of English grammatical structures plays a vital role in any of the four components of the IELTS exam, especially writing and speaking. Based on the previously conducted needs analysis, IELTS tutors need to explain the grammatical structures clearly and boost the learning process by setting an authentic and relevant context and bringing sufficient examples of the uses of a given structure. In addition, tutors should provide the students with grammar exercises and drills to reinforce their understanding of the grammatical structures.
Some learners think of learning grammar as a difficult and tedious task. As tutors, you should try to dispel this stereotype by making the learning process engaging. Thanks to technology, learners can use different apps and interactive websites to enjoy the learning process more.
5. Developing vocabulary skills
Like grammar, vocabulary is a crucial skill to accomplish all four components of the IELTS exam. you should decide on the material for the vocabulary skill depending on the candidates’ purpose of taking the exam. It is a bright idea to teach vocabulary on a thematic basis. That is, you can teach vocabulary based on the common themes used in the exam, including education, technology, environment, and health. Moreover, teaching vocabulary effectively requires explaining the vocabulary items in the right context.
You can also introduce widely used vocabulary learning methods such as using flashcards, vocabulary games, word puzzles, and vocabulary lists. It is also a good idea to explain different parts of speech (word classes) in English and describe the prefixes and suffixes used in word formation. Knowing the affixes and their uses significantly increases the learners’ lexicon.
6. Devising effective IELTS exam strategies
Achieving a high IELTS band score is not just a matter of grammar and vocabulary. Learners should know what each task involves and develop strategies to handle each task successfully. One of the important strategies for taking the IELTS exam is time management. If the test takers cannot accomplish the task within the time limit, they may lose focus, and consequently, their performance weakens. Moreover, you should remind your students about their weaknesses in any of the four exam components and introduce complementary exercises to address these weaknesses.
The next important strategy is to guess the answers when the participants are not certain about the correct response. Since there are no penalties for incorrect answers, learners should not leave the questions unanswered even if they are not sure.
In order to maximize the candidates’ readiness for the exam, you should describe the exam day events for your students. Tell them about what they should expect at the test center. For example, you can advise the candidates to arrive ten minutes early at the test center and warn them against late arrival. Candidates must prove their identity before entering the exam session, so remind them about bringing the required ID documents with them. You should also note that there are no breaks in the middle of the exam for listening, reading, and writing components. The speaking part may be covered on the same day as the exam day or on a different date, according to the test center’s schedule.
Besides the above tips and strategies, there are several component-specific strategies that tutors can teach their learners.
Strategies for teaching IELTS listening to beginners
The audio tracks in the listening section of the IELTS exam come in a variety of accents. Therefore, it is helpful to expose your students to audio tracks of different accents, including British, American, Australian, and Canadian. Another effective strategy you can teach your students is to tell them to quickly survey the listening questions before the examiner plays the tracks. It allows the candidates to know what information to look for as they listen to the tracks. Furthermore, you can teach your students how to take notes that will later help them to choose or write the correct answer. Finally, explain that the listening questions might be paraphrased and that they should be able to locate the related information in the listening track accordingly.
Click for mor information on How can I teach IELTS listening? Tips for IELTS tutors.
Strategies for teaching IELTS reading to beginners
The primary strategies concerning the IELTS reading sections are scanning and skimming. You should explain each skill and how they should be used according to the nature of reading questions. A challenging aspect of the reading section is the use of unknown vocabulary. Candidates have a good chance to face some unfamiliar terms in the reading section. As tutors, you should tell them how they can figure out the meaning from context or disregard the term if it does not contribute to understanding the excerpt. Also, you should explain how the candidates should treat different kinds of reading questions, e.g., identifying information (true/false/not given), identifying writer’s views (yes/no/not given), and the like.
Read more on How can I teach IELTS reading? Tips for IELTS tutors.
Strategies for teaching IELTS writing to beginners
First, elaborate on the differences between task 1 and task 2. Let the students know how they should fulfill each task. Second, remind them that they must not deviate from the issue mentioned in each task and that they should unify their thoughts in favor of supporting the thesis statement. Beginners should know that grammar and vocabulary are necessary skills, but the essence of IELTS writing is coherence and cohesion. Third, teach the candidates different text structures and how they can use them for comparison, contrast, argumentation, problem-solving, etc. Lastly, emphasize the importance of planning and proofreading and, if possible, simulate the IELTS writing tasks in tutoring sessions.
See full article on How can I teach IELTS writing? Tips for IELTS tutors.
Strategies for teaching IELTS speaking to beginners
The last and shortest section of the IELTS exam is the speaking component. The most important factors to IELTS examiners regarding the speaking task are fluency and coherence. Thus, you should expose your students to common IELTS speaking topics so they can adequately respond to the questions and extend their responses if needed. Moreover, candidates may take stress and intonation for granted, so you should remind them how considering these factors can contribute to their band score.
Read more tips: How can I teach IELTS speaking? Tips for IELTS tutors
7. Monitoring the students’ learning progress
Monitoring is an integral part of any teaching process. You should monitor your learner’s progress and identify their flaws through tutoring sessions. You can monitor your students by administrating scheduled IELTS-style practices and keeping track of your learners’ progress. Monitoring also allows you to understand the efficiency of the teaching materials and your tutoring method. Besides, it conveys to your students that you are actually concerned about their progress. It’s also a good idea to encourage the learners to do the monitoring themselves and correct their mistakes without your help to foster learners’ autonomy.
8. Assigning regular homework
A significant part of the beginners’ learning process takes place in the tutoring sessions. However, you should make plans to continue the learning outside these sessions. Assigning homework keeps your students engaged with the learning process. You should maintain a balance in providing different homework to reinforce the students’ abilities for each of the four components of the IELTS exam. Through needs analysis, you figure out which areas require more homework. Moreover, you can get help from websites such as All ESL, English Practice, and All Things Grammar to provide learners with engaging and interactive homework.
9. Providing students with critical and constructive feedback
Your feedback on the students’ performances can help them focus on their deficiencies and invest more time and energy in them. Other than performance feedback, you should also offer strategic feedback, which concerns test-taking strategies like time management and understanding what each IELTS task requires.
When giving feedback, try to do it on time. That is, if there is a problem with an exercise in your students’ homework, do not postpone your feedback to other sessions and remind them of the problem immediately after the exercise. Also, be specific about what needs modification. General feedback can be confusing and ineffective for the learners. Your feedback can be written or oral regarding the nature of the nature of the problem. But in either case, it is a good idea to record the feedback for future reflections on your learners’ progress. We should note that your feedback must be constructive and motivational, so do not try reverse psychology methods on your students.
10. Assessing the students’ performance in simulated IELTS examinations
Mock IELTS tests simulate the real exam session for the students. All you have taught your students boils down to how they perform during the exam sessions. Therefore, you should advise your students to participate in mock tests and use test results to provide them with corrective feedback. IELTS simulations give learners a chance to examine their performances and strategies in conditions closely similar to that of the real exam. Mock IELTS tests also help candidates familiarize themselves with the real exam session and reduce their stress and anxiety during the real test.
How to Teach IELTS Skills to Beginners; Final Words
Before deciding on the method and teaching materials to tutor IELTS skills to beginners you should analyze their needs and objectives. Needs analysis indicates the starting point of your course. During the course, you should teach your students different sections of the IELTS exam and clarify what each IELTS task requires. IELTS tutoring also involves teaching test-taking strategies that help the candidates use their resources effectively. Of course, regardless of the IELTS exam components, you should constantly devise plans to improve your students’ vocabulary and grammar skills. Moreover, you should monitor your learners’ progress and provide them with concise and useful feedback. By observing all the ten tips explained in this article, your learners have a good chance of achieving high score bands.
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FAQs:
What makes a good IELTS teacher?
Prior IELTS test-taking and teaching experience are the most important factors that clients consider before choosing an IELTS tutor.
How can I teach IELTS for the first time?
As a novice IELTS tutor, you need to understand the differences between IELTS exam modules and have intensive knowledge about the various IELTS tasks and their requirements and specifications.
How can I teach IELTS online at home?
The Ostado platform has provided a professional environment for both well-versed and novice IETLS tutors. You can sign up as an online IELTS tutor, and after a couple of steps, you can start tutoring IELTS courses.
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Looking for ways to start IELTS preparation for beginners? Here are ten essential tips for IELTS tutors to start IELTS preparation at home for beginners.
