 Hi friends, welcome to my channel, I am Arpita Karwa and in this video I am going to be giving you tips on how you can improve your IELTS band score and just get a 9 band score in a matter of few days. Now I know that preparing for IELTS is a very very stressful thing, especially when you are not so good at English and you want to quickly improve your English communication. In this video we are going to look at the 4 sections of IELTS namely listening, reading, writing and speaking and I am going to give you simple tips on each of these sections and how you can improve your band score in each of them. Now there are some bonus tips waiting for you at the end of the video wherein I am going to talk about the common silly mistakes that students make on the day of the exam while they are solving MCQs which actually lower down their score by 1 or at times by 2 bands. Sad right? But worry not I am going to talk about those mistakes at the end of the video and will also give you some simple hacks to avoid making such mistakes. So do watch this video till the end. If you want to do this channel then please hit the subscribe button and press the bell icon so that every Sunday as soon as I upload a new video you are the first one to know about it. So let us first begin by looking at the reading section. Now there are 3 passages that you have to complete in just 60 minutes. The blunder which most of the students in IELTS make is that they read the passage first then move on to look at the questions. This wastes a lot of time. I will now tell you what you should actually be doing. So first you will quickly stream through the passage and then read the questions properly to understand what exactly is asked from you. Now I will give you a very scientific reason behind this. Let us do an activity. Pause this video right now and look around you for 30 seconds. Now look at the screen and answer this question. Name all the white things that you saw around you. Most of you will not be able to answer this question accurately. Now let us do the same exercise in a different way. Before pausing the video I am telling you what you have to look for. You have to tell me all the red things that you see around you. Now pause the video. Look for the red things and then start the video again. Difference dekhakya? Because your brain had registered that it was supposed to look for red things. When you were looking around you, you only looked for red things and discarded all the other colors. This helped you to come up with the answer much more quickly. This is exactly what you have to do for the reading passages as well. If you know the question, if you know exactly what you are looking for in the passage, you will read the passage quickly looking for the keyboard which is asked in the question and quickly answer the question. Now there are two more tips for the reading section. First, please don't apply your own knowledge when you are answering the question. For example, we all know that sun rises from the east. But let's say, the passage says that sun rises from the west and they give a lot of controversial details about this. We know it's wrong. Whatever is written in the passage is wrong. But that is what they have stated in the passage. Now if they ask a question that from which side sun rises and you will say it rises from east and the passage says it rises from west, this will make your answer incorrect. Because sun rises from the west is written in the passage. This gives a hint to the examiner that you didn't understand the passage. Your English is weak. That's why you gave the wrong answer. So while solving the passage, keep your knowledge in your room and then solve the passage. Another tip I would like to give you is that whenever you are filling the blanks, there are questions filled in the blanks kind of questions. Now whenever you are attempting such questions, please check the passage for the spellings. Spellings, recheck, do it. If your answer is right but your spelling, the spelling that you have written in the blanks is wrong, you won't get any marks. That would be extremely sad. Rather you will be marked negatively for this. So keep your knowledge clear from spelling mistakes. Avoid spelling mistakes. Check the spellings again and again in the passage. Keep our study tips, free study material on our Facebook and Insta pages. Moreover every Wednesday we also share quick revision reels on these pages which will help you revise important topics in less than 60 seconds. So let's talk about the speaking section. The most important tip that I would want to give you here is to speak slowly. Speak at a speed 50% lower than your normal speed. The speed at which we think is much lower than the speed at which we speak. And as Indians we think in Hindi, then we translate the content in English and then speak. So in this process if you go fast, you will be using a lot of filler words like, you know, definitely, basically, etc. So when you are speaking slowly, your mind will get enough time to think about the next line. Form sentences better and then proceed. So keep your speed in control. Now a lot of students think that accents carry separate marks. So they start speaking in American accent. Friends, there is no special marks, no extra marks for accent. Speak in a normal way with no accent, neutralized way. But ensure that your content should have coherence, that is, logical flow and your sentences should be structured correctly. Okay, one more tip. A lot of students, what they do is, they keep repeating the same lines again and again. For example, your topic is discipline. You have to speak on discipline. Now you have to speak on this topic for let's say three minutes. You can't say again and again that discipline is a good trait and you should apply it in your life. Now you will say that I don't have much to say. I don't know what else to say. In such case, ensure that you use examples. Support your statement with numerous examples. Like you can talk about top leaders in the world who are disciplined or you can talk about someone in your life. You take inspiration from and is very disciplined or a story from your own life on how you have struggled with discipline and how you were trying to build this good habit. So in this way, elaborate your answer. Another important concern of students is that sometimes they get a topic which they have zero information or knowledge about. For example, you get to speak on a topic let's say Colosseum in a cleave, which is a monument. Basically, it is one of the seven wonders of the world. Now let's say you have no knowledge about it. In this case, there is a technique that I'm going to share with you and it is called KEA, Keyword Explanation Approach. Now what is this? You know that Colosseum is in Italy. So you can speak one, two lines about Italy. Then you know that Italy is in Europe. So you can speak two, three lines about Europe. Then you know that Colosseum is a monument. So you can give one or two line about how it is one of the most important heritage sites in the world. Whatever you can gather around the topic, you gather it and speak about it. Basically, you have to beat around the bush. They are not testing your knowledge. They are testing your English. So you should know that communication is more important than the information you are supplying to them. Friends, you should also note that in the speaking section, the examiner will also pay attention to your vocabulary. I'll suggest you one thing. Very simple. Make a list of some good vocabulary words, which you can fit in anywhere. Like plethora is a good word. Now make a list of some good English words of this type. You can make a list of idioms and phrases also, just like this. And when you practice speaking every day, try using some of these words from the list when you speak. This way, it will give an impression to the examiner that you have an enriched vocabulary. Don't read too much from your list. But if there are 50 words in that list, try to use 3-4 words every time. Friends, the most important tip in the speaking section is practice. Give yourself 2 topics each day. Set a time of about 2-3 minutes and speak on that topic. Record yourself when you speak. We are often very conscious when we have to speak in front of an examiner. So practice from now on. Speak in front of camera. Camera, start and then record yourself. And this consciousness that you will face when you speak in front of camera will help you to not face the same consciousness on the day of the exam. Practicing will give you that confidence. Remember that you will be evaluated on the basis of your fluency, grammar, pronunciation, vocabulary and sentence structuring. Record a video when you speak. Send that video to a friend or a mentor. Take the feedback. Make a note of all these feedback and then work on your weak areas. Before moving on, if you found the information that I have shared so far in this video and you found that information helpful, then please like this video by giving it a big thumbs up and also share it with other aspirants who are struggling with similar kind of questions. Let's talk about the listening section now. The most important problem in the listening section is the accent. I don't understand what is going on in the listening tape. Students always script that they are unable to understand the accent. So friends, before appearing for your IELTS exam, you need to familiarize yourself with different accents like Australian, American, British. For that, I would recommend you a couple of things. First one in the list is listening to podcasts. My personal favorite podcast is On Purpose by Jay Shetty. It's a motivational podcast and he invites different people from around the world. So a lot of different accents get covered in every episode of On Purpose. So develop this habit of listening to podcasts. Secondly, you can listen to songs from different countries. Start with reading the lyrics along when you listen to the song. And then once you learn the lyrics, you can even sing along. That will help you to understand what pronunciation is. Thirdly, you can familiarize yourself with accents by watching vlogs or YouTube videos or even movies. Or I would say even web series. Remember that they should be in English. It's not like you start watching your Bollywood web series. And secondly, the things that you are watching should be of your interest. If you pick up history channel or geography channel and you have no interest about history or geography, you will lose interest. So, pick anything that interests you. Otherwise, you will not be able to sustain it for more than 2-3 days. And we have to do it every day until your IELTS exam happens. It's not like you listen to it one day and go for the rest of the day. By the way, comment down below your favorite web series or movie that you recently saw to get acquainted with different accents. I would really love to know and let's see if we have something in common. Next step for the listening section is to do the same listening exercise prescribed in your IELTS preparation book at least 2-3 times. If today you did not understand the listening audio and you think you didn't understand what to do. Don't lose hope. Do it again tomorrow. Listen to the same audio again tomorrow. And then try to understand what you didn't understand. And gradually you will see that if you listen to the same listening tape you will understand the tape more with every passing day. Practice makes a man perfect and such is the case with even IELTS exam. Another very important tip is to always write in capitals or caps lock when you are filling the answers. If you don't make the first alphabet capital in your answer sheet then your marks will be deducted when you are answering filling the blanks for the questions. So to avoid any error develop the habit of writing the entire word in capital letters. Also friends you have to be extremely attentive throughout the listening section. If you get distracted you will lose track and miss out on 2-3 questions. So be super duper duper duper attentive. Let's now talk about the writing section. Friends whenever you write your essay please evaluate it. I know comparison is not a good practice in general. We should not compare ourselves with others. But when it comes to IELTS preparation I would ask you to compare your essays with those off the toppers to understand how they have used words they have structured their sentences. Like I asked you in speaking that when you are speaking make a list of good words similarly in the writing section also develop this habit of making a list of good words, idioms, phrases, adjectives which you can use in your essays and try using words from that list every time you are writing a sample essay. You don't have to use flowery language while writing answers. You have to write in simple words but if you use some good word here and there it will definitely increase your band score. Next up friends please, please don't repeat the same thing again and again while writing. If you keep on writing the same thing again and again it won't fetch you good marks. Elaborate your answer with the help of example. Try not to repeat the same words rather try to use synonyms. Also please use proper punctuation. Use full stop comma exclamation mark question marks were never necessary. Don't skip them. In KB marks hang. A lot of students write in long paragraphs. Cholo your habit. Break your content into 3-4 paragraphs. Write an introduction paragraph. Then 2-3 short paragraphs and then a separate concluding paragraph. The last tip for the writing section is to adhere to the word limit. If the word limit is 120 words the maths you can exceed is 130-140 words. That's it. Not more than that. Writing more won't get you more marks. IELTS rules are like traffic rules. If you follow them it means that you're a good citizen. You're a good student. Stick to the word limit. Remember the traffic rule. 120 words means 120 words. Don't write too much. Friends now as promised let's move on to the bonus tips on how to solve the NCQs. The first bonus tip that I would want to talk about is elimination. It is one of my favourite tips as I derive it from the fictional character of Sherlock Holmes created by Sir Arthur Connell Doyle in the 19th century. So Doyle in his work The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes says a very famous line. And I quote, When you have eliminated all which is possible whatever remains however improbable must be the truth. You can apply these words to the four options and get the right answer. After you have eliminated the wrong options the one which remains shall be the correct one. Hence whenever you are confused between the options use the elimination technique to solve the question. Rather than being under confident and taking a shot in the dark the elimination technique will come handy as a smart guesswork and make your answers more probable. The next important tip is to never get attached to a question. Sometimes you get a difficult question and we keep on spending time on it. We spend more than 10 minutes on it and are unable to complete the entire paper. Assume you did this mistake. Now because of spending so much time on that one difficult question you could not finish the last 10 questions which were very very easy. All those 10 questions were very easy. Now you feel sad that you could have solved those 10 questions with so many marks. That's why please note that all the questions should be equally important to you. You should know in your mind the time you have to solve each question. And if you are unable to solve that question in that particular time move on. You cannot keep sticking to one question. The next important tip is to read the instructions very very very carefully. Friends sometimes a question asks you to answer in number or word. In this case let's assume that the answer is 4. Now if you want you can write numeric 4 or F or UR. Whichever way you write your answer is correct. But suppose you missed out on the instruction and if in the instruction it was mentioned that the question specifically has to be answered only in number. And now without reading the instruction if you write F or UR instead of numeric 4 you won't get any marks. So this is the reason why I keep on saying that read the instructions carefully. So this is it. I hope you like the tips that I have given in the four sections as well as the three bonus tips. I hope you secure a band 9 score in dials exam. I'm quite eager to know how you felt about this video. Did you like it? Did you not like it? Did you find it helpful? Please share your views in the comments below. Also if you have any questions, any doubt or if you want me to make any other video on any other topic feel free to put that in the comment section as well. So with that note I would like to take your leave. That's it from my side for this video lecture. I'll meet you very very soon in the next video lecture. Till the time we meet next, happy learning. Keep loving literature and stay tuned to ArpitaKarwa.com.