 So many students worry about how to introduce themselves to the examiner and what's actually going to happen on test day when you're doing your IELTS speaking test. And this can actually cause many students to get a lower score than they deserve. So what I'm going to do in this video is take you from leaving your home all the way to part one of the speaking test. Exactly what is going to happen, how to introduce yourself, what's going to happen at the test centre and a few vital pieces of information that will help you perform to the best of your ability. So this is the examiner on test day and this is your home. I am much better at teaching IELTS than I am at drawing. I'm terrible at drawing so forgive the drawings. So really your preparation starts about 48 hours before your test. So about 48 hours before your test the first thing is do not cram. What does cram mean? It means do not try and study as much as possible in the days leading up to your speaking test. You are not going to improve your speaking ability whatsoever in the days leading up to your speaking test. If you cram and you're sitting up all night studying and trying to frantically find out how to improve your speaking score it will actually lower your speaking score because you will get desperate and you will go onto YouTube and be looking for tips and tricks and hacks and shortcuts and most of the stuff about the speaking test online is totally false and will lower your score so do not do this. What you can do instead is something that we call an English warm up. So just like an athlete would warm up before a big event what you can do is you know watch some English movies or English TV shows or listen to some podcasts in English or read an English book something like that nothing too strenuous nothing too difficult but just to warm yourself up if you want to do something before your test day. Also you might not consider this but sleep and diet are really important. We've had students who really deserve a band eight or a band nine and they've got a 6.5 because they didn't sleep very well the night before or they didn't eat that morning and they got to the test center and they just couldn't do anything because if you don't sleep well and you don't have anything in your stomach you're not going to have the focus and the energy to actually perform at your best so make sure that you're getting enough sleep in the days leading up to your test and you're just eating a healthy diet. So 24 hours before your test so the day before your test it's really important that you plan your journey. You wouldn't believe the number of students that show up late to their speaking test and if you show up late you're going to be very sweaty, you're going to be very stressed and again if you deserve a band seven and you show up late and you're very stressed you're probably going to get a 6.5 or a 6. That's not the fault of the examiner that's your fault. It doesn't matter if there was bad traffic that's your fault for not planning your journey or the bus was late or the train was late or whatever it is your responsibility to get to the test center on time so plan your journey how are you going to get there are you going to use public transport are you going to use your own transport are you relying on someone else to bring you to the test center do they know how important it is that you get there on time make sure that you get there at least 30 minutes before your actual test starts because when you get there it's going to be extremely busy there's going to be a lot of people who don't know what they're doing who are very stressed out often the staff at the exam centers are not very good at their jobs and they're stressed out so if you get there very early and get through the whole registration process relatively stress-free then you can perform to the best of your ability and make sure that you you know pack your id and water and if you need food if you need you know medication whatever i don't know whatever you need in order to perform to the best of your ability pack that into a bag the day before so it's just one less thing to worry about okay so on the day of the test you want to get to the test center at least 30 minutes before you need to register and you're going to go in and the staff at the test center will register you they'll also allow you to you know if you have a bag if you have any belongings they will give you a locker or a key or somewhere to keep your belongings keep your your your bag safe so don't worry about bringing all this stuff you don't have to bring it into the exam room you'll then be asked to go to some kind of a waiting room where you will wait outside the test room and wait for the examiner to call you so make sure you use the toilet if you need to use the toilet again it's very it sounds very funny but this has led to people failing their test where they are very nervous they don't know where the toilet is they don't go to the toilet and then they're focused on not peeing themselves rather than answering the questions it sounds ridiculous but it does happen and you need to do something while you're waiting outside this room to relax that could be breathing that could be some kind of meditation whatever works for you but if you sit outside the exam room and just think about how terrible your speaking is and you're going to fail and you're just thinking of very very negative thoughts that is going to influence your performance so you need something to take your mind off those negative thoughts and what I would do is what we advise our students to do is tell yourself how much preparation you've done think about how good you are at speaking the English language you deserve to get the score that you need because you've put in the work right and also accept that nerves so being nervous being anxious this is normal this is your body preparing you physiologically for a stressful situation so it's going to dump adrenaline into your system and that is why you feel nervous so just observe that as something that is good because it's going to help you focus so be aware that that is happening to you it will happen to you but use it in a positive way and then the examiner is going to come out of this door and they're going to invite you in to the test room now I haven't put a smiley face here for a reason many students think that if the examiner is not friendly or the examiner is not smiling that it means that the examiner is going to give them a low score or the examiner doesn't like them or the examiner is in a bad mood and they're going to automatically give you a lower score the examiner is doing their job some of them are friendly some of them are not so friendly that has no influence over your performance and over your score what influences your score is your performance not the mood or whether the examiner has a big smile on their face or not so how do you greet the examiner that's the title of this video and many of the videos that you'll find on youtube and blogs and stuff like that will tell you to greet the examiner in a very specific way and if you greet the examiner in a certain way you will improve your score that is total BS it does not matter how you greet them it simply does not matter they're not even thinking about your score right now the test only begins after they ask the first question in part one any teacher or youtuber or so-called expert that is teaching you that if you greet the examiner in a certain way you'll get a higher score they have never been an examiner and they don't know what they're doing because anyone who has been an examiner knows that you do not score the student until you ask the first question in part one but one thing that you should do is speak to them like they are human the examiner is not special they are not more intelligent than you are they are not more important than you are if they were very intelligent or very important they wouldn't be an IELTS examiner in a foreign country listening to you on a Saturday morning they are a human being this is not going to influence your score speaking to them like a human being but it's going to help you relax and if you're relaxed and just speaking to them like you would a normal human then your pronunciation your fluency your grammar your vocabulary is all going to naturally be better because our brains operate more fluidly more effectively when we're not stressed when we're not nervous if you think that the examiner is this really important person and you need to speak to them like they are you know the president of the country that you're currently in that is nonsense and you're going to speak to them in a very robotic unnatural academic formal way IELTS are not judging your ability to speak in that way they're judging your ability to speak just normally to normal people so speak to them like they're a human being that's going to help you relax and everything will be much better if you do that so they'll ask you to sit down and you'll sit down opposite them and they will be recording what you are saying already even though they're recording what you're saying already they don't use this to judge your score your score doesn't begin until they ask you the first question in part one but don't be put off by this also they might make some notes don't worry about what notes they make so it's a very common thing that the examiner will write numbers so it might be a number like the timing or something like that and you will look at it and think oh my god they wrote down five I'm out of band five or they might write down nine and you think that you've got a band nine these have nothing to do with your score so ignore the notes that they're making they'll then ask you if they can like double check their ID your ID hand it to them don't have to worry about this and then they'll ask you two questions what's your name just tell them your name there is no special way of telling and then tell them your name that's that's not that complicated and then they'll say what can I call you and you just say you can call me whatever whatever your name is whatever you want to be called again there's no special way of saying this just tell them you're not being judged yet then part one will begin and they will ask you about some common topics so home home time work or study a very common mistake that many students make is because they're anticipating these topics they will memorize answers for these topics do not do this if you do this what you will do is you will indicate to the examiner that you don't know how to speak English because memorization and communication are two very very different things and you're basically giving the examiner the first impression that you were trying to cheat the test and what will happen is you will give a very long memorized answer for one of these common topics with lots of great vocabulary and lots of great grammar and you're very fluent then they'll ask you about some unusual topics why do you think they do that why do you think they'll say do you like hats or when was the last time you bought a birthday cake they will ask you about these more unusual topics because they know that you're not expecting these you don't have memorized answers for these and they will judge you on your answer for the more unusual topics in other words they answer that you did not memorize so just again speak to them like they're a human if a human asked you do you work or do you study or tell me about your hometown you would just answer naturally and it's also important to realize that the first few questions in part one are just a warm-up they're a warm-up for you because just like again like an athlete you need to relax into the test the examiner is considering what you're saying but they're not judging you too harshly at the beginning of part one because they know they're just warming up this also gives the examiner a chance to warm up and get used to your accent your style of speaking your pronunciation and focus in on what's actually happening so that's it hope that you enjoyed this video and if you want more information about the isle speaking test go to isleadvantage.com you'll find a huge amount of information or you'll find lots of other speaking videos on this youtube channel if you click below in the comment or sorry in the description you will find a free speaking course it's a three-day course that will show you exactly what you need to do in part one part two and part three of the speaking test but because you're watching this video your test is probably tomorrow so you probably won't have time to do the test or do the course if that is the case good luck and remember speak to the examiner like they are a human