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IELTS Reading Preparation

Written by  Rachit Agrawal, MBA

Published on Tue, November 14, 2017 11:29 AM   Updated on Mon, December 16, 2019 6:39 AM   4 mins read

IELTS reading preparation: Have you prepared well?

Have you started your preparation for IELTS reading section? In this post, we are going to list out what all you need to know about IELTS reading preparation.

How to prepare for IELTS Reading?

In IELTS reading, there are 40 questions and 1 hour.

Reading Sections:

There are three sections in the IELTS reading. Sections get increasingly difficult. Sections one and two might have more than one more text.

Section 1: This section is based on one, two or three texts about English life.

Section 2: This section consists of more than one text.

Section 3: The final section is one text which is quite long and the hardest.

Each section in the academic test is usually long. These are usually taken from magazines, books and newspapers and authentic in nature. Most of the times, they contain difficult language, academic vocabulary and some kinds of illustration.

IELTS reading preparation tips:-

Here are some IELTS reading tips for you to score well:

  1. Make your reading smart Ideally, you should be able to get an idea of a passage in 2 to 3 minutes. For this, it is not necessary to read the whole passage. Instead of reading, you need to practice skimming and scanning. For this you are required to practice with many reading passages and reading samples. Gradually, you will be able to gain speed in reading only relevant information.
  2. Words, Words, Words Are you familiar with many words? How do you learn a new word? Learning only the meaning of word? This is where your vocabulary building goes wrong! Because when you learn vocabulary, you need to understand where you can, and you can’t use a word. It is always better to improve your vocabulary by reading many passages
  3. Find Keywords Each question will be having some clues in keywords which will help you to locate answer from passage. So, practice to spot keywords from passages. Some can be spotted very easily whereas other will be subtle. Sometimes, you may not be able to find keywords as it is in the passage and questions. So, it is required for you to learn synonyms when you learn a word.
  4. Don’t neglect Grammar Grammar is important for all sections. In reading section, knowing grammar will help you to solve summary completion and sentence completion questions
  5. Time Management Like every other exam, IELTS has strict time limit which is a challenge. So, speed reading is necessary for you to understand questions well and answer all questions in time.
  6. Familiarize with all types of questions In IELTS reading section, you may expect around 14 types of questions. It is important to know how to tackle each of them. It will help you to save time and give right answers.
  7. Don’t run away from Difficult passages Sometimes, when you read the BBC news or The Economist or The Hindu, you may come across difficult passages and usually tend to avoid them. But it is important to widen your reading skills for IELTS to get good score. So, try to read complicated passages in a range of topics. Else, you will get tensed on the day of exam, if you get difficult passages.
  8. Plan and Prepare Above, I have given many tips and you may be confused which one to follow. But it is important to you need to plan well to improve all factors, not only one. Like, you need to develop vocabulary, practice types of questions, develop speed in identifying answers within passage, do reading practice test under exam conditions and non-exam conditions. You need to do all these things in parallel so that you will not gain necessary skills.
  9. Understand your weakness When you start practicing, you need to analyse where you are making mistakes and how you can improve. Because, after reviewing you will be able to understand the areas you need to put more effort on. Else, your preparation may not seem effective as you tend to make same mistake again and again.

You can score well in reading section if you prepare in the right way. Develop your English language reading skills by following reading tips and practicing tests as many as possible. So, plan and prepare well for your IELTS exam. In case you may require our expertise’ help in resolving any query regarding your IELTS test, always feel free to reach out to us @ [email protected] or +91-120-653-3966.

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About the Author & Expert

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Rachit Agrawal

Author • MBA • 20 Years

Rachit believes in the power of education and has studied from the top institutes of IIIT Allahabad, IIM Calcutta, and Francois Rabelias in France. He has worked as Software Developer with Microsoft and Adobe. Post his MBA, he worked with the world's # 1 consulting firm, The Boston Consulting Group across multiple geographies US, South-East Asia and Europe.

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