This is a really really useful passage to read because of how it can help your WRITING.

The passage itself is not difficult, but it is jam-packed full of excellent examples of Formal Academic Writing so if you have this reading at home, go through it carefully.

- 'PEEL' paragraphs

- Hedging

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/12/hedging-in-academic-writing/

- Linking words

https://ieltsetc.com/2019/07/ielts-complex-sentences/

- Noun forms

- Conditionals

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/03/ielts-conditionals/

- Critical Thinking

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This is an extremely difficult Academic Reading Passage 3.

It took me 30 minutes to find the answers even with the answer sheet in front of me.

What can we learn from a text like this?

1) affect vs effect

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/12/affect-vs-effect/

2) factor vs reason 

https://members.ieltsetc.com/factor-vs-reason/

Add these synonyms to your list:

Want to support my podcast? Please click on the link below:

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/fionawattam

Many thanks

Fiona

In this lesson you'll learn the 9 main ways of hedging - an essential feature of sophisticated academic writing.

Get the full lesson and more practice on the blog:

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/12/hedging-in-academic-writing/

This is Day 17 of the Advent Challenge - catch up on anything you've missed by going to this page:

https://ieltsetc.com/ielts-advent-adventure/

Enjoying the podcasts, challenges, lessons and videos?

Help support my work by buying me a coffee here:

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Thanks!

Is this Listening more difficult than usual? I got a special request from Elango in my Members Academy, and yes I think it is a tricky one!

I had to read the tapescript very carefully to figure out the answer to Question 27, and it even required a bit of background knowledge (possibly true of Question 28 too!).

Apart from that, this is a really good one to practise listening for:

- Signals and Signposts:

https://ieltsetc.com/2019/09/ielts-listening-how-to-recognise-signals-and-signposts/

- Synonyms (fascinating = interesting; amazed = surprised; type = genre)

- Grammar (not many = few)

- Language of hedging (comics can serve a really useful purpose = comics have the potential for being useful)

- Pronunciation of key words (ballet)

Catch up on the Free Writing Task 2 Challenge here:

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/03/ielts-writing-workouts/

This is Day 1 of the November Writing Task 2 Challenge.

Join us in the Facebook group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ieltsAtoZ/

And on YouTube (this is the first video)

https://youtu.be/Eo8y8ygcgcI

And on my website

https://ieltsetc.com/2020/03/ielts-writing-workouts/

I had a special request from Isabella on Instagram today 👋🇧🇷. She asked me to look at a really difficult text (yes, this one's 9/10!).

It's an Academic Passage 3 and it follows the Reading Type 2 structure (discursive) which goes like this -

Title: asks a question (Why? The answer is not what everyone thinks).

1. Old theory: Everyone thinks fairy tales have endured because the STORIES give us WARNINGS about life e.g. Little Red Riding Hood.

2. New theory: Everyone is wrong. There's another reason.

3. Test to prove the old theory is wrong: Is the STORY important? 'NO'. Is the WARNING important? Answer: 'NO'.

4. Results of the test: The reason why fairy tales have endured is just that people enjoy scary stories.

5. Althernative theory (instantly proved wrong): The stories remain relevant because they're about women as victims.

6. Conclusion: Everyone likes scary stories because they build up our resistance to negative emotions, so the first theory is probably right.

You can find similar 'discursive' structures here:

My updated guide to Time Management in the Reading Test gives you 8 techniques to help you improve your Reading Speed for the #ielts test.

Do you have a bike-sharing scheme where you live? In London there are the so-called 'Boris bikes' (named after Boris Johnson, who launched them in 2010 after being inspired by the success of a similar scheme in Paris, which is mentioned in this reading).

This is a Section 2 Academic Text with 3 types of questions: Matching Statements, Choosing from a List and Gapfill.

So whenever there's a lot to do, the text is slightly easier. This is a chronological text (in order of time) and is suitable for General Training practice too.

It has some fantastic language that you can use in your writing e.g.

Get all my 10-minute lessons on my website www.ieltsetc.com.

Join the Members Academy www.members.ieltsetc.com/academy/.

See you next weekend,

All the best

Fiona

This is a difficult Section 4, but if you listen to my podcast regularly, you will be very familiar with this common IELTS topic!

It's about marine archaeology, the use of technology to find ancient shipwrecks and building under the sea, and the lessons researchers can learn about how ancient civilisations lived.

In this episode I refer to similar IELTS Reading/Listening texts, so you can see how important it is to learn the vocabulary that is relevant to so many IELTS texts.

Find the Modals of Deduction Grammar here [e.g. Atlit-Yam MAY HAVE BEEN DESTROYED by a tsunami, climate change MAY HAVE CAUSED glaciers to melt.

Find the Reading about the Lapita [Beyond the Blue Horizon] here.

Get all my lessons in one place in the Members Academy.