Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

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lchazl
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Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by lchazl »

Hi there,

I am teaching English at a University in Shanghai and the faculty has asked me to give four 2-hour lectures on IELTS to a group of freshman students, one lecture for each section: Listening, Reading, Writing, and Speaking. They said it will be about 30 students (could be a bit more) and it sounds like I could have some discussion. I have no previous knowledge of what the IELTS is other than standardized testing around the world.

To lecture "on" IELTS, it seems a little odd to me, what should my goals be?

What resources do you recommend? I have searched this forum and found http://www.teacherjoe.us/StudyAbroad.html and http://www.aippg.com/ielts/ielts-downloads.htm Would this type of thing be useful for me?

How deep should I go with my teaching in each of the sections?

Thanks so much!

Charles
Alex Case
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Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by Alex Case »

Hi Charles

If it is really a lecture, in 2 hours all you could really do is give an introduction to what needs to be done in each part of the paper with some exam tips. For what is in each paper the best resource is obviously the official IELTS one:

http://www.ielts.org/pdf/IELTS_Handbook_2007.pdf

For exam tips you'll need to spend some time with IELTS textbooks or googling "IELTS writing tips" etc, but please note that there are some very inaccurate statements online.

Here's what I came up with from doing that for Writing, but it was easier for me as I know the exam and so could easily see what statements weren't true:

http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/teaching/t ... nt-page-1/


To liven things up, you could also do a few multiple choice questions with students putting up their hands for each answer
lchazl
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Joined: 27 Sep 2009, 09:48
Status: New Teacher

Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by lchazl »

Thank you very much! I am getting to see what you mean with the structure of the lecture. Give tips on that section for each respective lecture. I looked at one of your links and there are many writing tips so that section looks fairly easy to do.

I also like the idea of having multiple choice questions for the class.

I am looking through the handbook and I see a lot of flowchart and diagrams, and it looks like they want the student to make sense of it all. What would bean efficient way of lecturing on this - doing a full example in the lecture?

Thanks
lchazl
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Posts: 4
Joined: 27 Sep 2009, 09:48
Status: New Teacher

Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by lchazl »

Thanks for your reply, I tried to post a reply earlier but it did not show, hopefully I won't double post.

Anyway I hope you read my situation right, I am doing a 2 hour lecture on each section, not 2 hours total. Should I do anything else than tips and sample questions? Do you recommend me going through a full example with the class?

Thanks
Alex Case
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Joined: 17 Aug 2007, 01:53
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Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by Alex Case »

Yes, I did understand 2 hrs each. I'm not sure what you mean by going through a full example, but I imagine it is what I meant by a sample paper, i.e. running through one paper section by section explaining what they have to do and what things they should look out for while trying to do so.

Other things you could mention:
- Planning writing (paragraphing)
- Useful phrases for writing and speaking
- Typical and less typical but still possible questions for the speaking (the latter in case they get the idea that they can predict and prepare for a majority of the questions- they can't!)
- The range of tenses that are likely to come up in the speaking
- Skimming and scanning
- Efficient reading the questions before listening
- Time management for all papers
- Eliminating obviously wrong answers
- Writing numbers, addresses etc in the listening
- Students try to grade writing and compare with the mark it really got
- Students try to spot errors in a sample writing answer
- Explain why the other options are incorrect in multiple choice
- Get them to take the part of examiner and candidate and do a speaking test
- Get them to plan a writing task in 5 minutes
- True and false statements about the exam and how to approach it
- Reading and listening texts about the exam with IELTS style questions
- Short grammar and vocabulary explanations of typical mistakes in the exam, e.g. Chinglish
- Run through a paper with the answers written in and find the mistakes

Again, a lot depends on class size, how likely they are to respond to elicitation, if they will do pairwork etc.
lchazl
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Posts: 4
Joined: 27 Sep 2009, 09:48
Status: New Teacher

Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by lchazl »

Thank you thank you thank you, this is exactly what I was looking for!

I appreciate this VERY much
systematic
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Joined: 21 Apr 2008, 12:38
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Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by systematic »

I will just add - to Alex's excellent advice - that in my experience of preparing students for IELTS for well over 10 years, that it is imperative that students already have the required level of English before attempting to familiarise and prepare themselves for the exam. Generally an absolute minumum of 30 hours intensive study and practice of the exam technique will be required.

Based on the points that Alex has listed, you could focus part of each lecture on describing and demonstrating practice tasks they can do for homework individually, in pairs, or in groups, and how they can best organise themselves to do it.

If they are serious about the exam, maybe you could motivate them into investing in one of the better practice manuals.
I offer any information or advice 'as is' and hope that it has been of help. I am not an admin of this board, and my postings do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the board management.
systematic
Top Contributor
Posts: 525
Joined: 21 Apr 2008, 12:38
Status: Other

Re: Doing 4 Lectures on IELTS - Input Please

Unread post by systematic »

I will just add - to Alex's excellent advice - that in my experience of preparing students for IELTS for well over 10 years, that it is imperative that students already have the required level of English before attempting to familiarise and prepare themselves for the exam. Generally an absolute minumum of 30 hours intensive study and practice of the exam technique will be required.

Based on the points that Alex has listed, you could focus part of each lecture on describing and demonstrating practice tasks they can do for homework individually, in pairs, or in groups, and how they can best organise themselves to do it.

If they are serious about the exam, maybe you could motivate them into investing in one of the better practice manuals
I offer any information or advice 'as is' and hope that it has been of help. I am not an admin of this board, and my postings do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the board management.
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