IE 2: What Happens on IELTS Exam Day?
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This is an IELTS Energy Podcast Episode 2. What happens on IELTS exam day? You are listening to the IELTS Energy Podcast from All Ears English. We believe in connection, not perfection, and we are here to show you how to get the seven that you need on your next IELTS exam. Subscribe to our show and join Jessica Beck, the examiner of

and Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, coming to you from Portland, Oregon, and Boston, Massachusetts, USA. In today's episode, you'll find out what to bring to the IELTS exam, when to go, and what to watch out for on IELTS exam day. ♪

I want to say a huge welcome to the dozens of new students who just enrolled in our B2 fluency course. Welcome to Luan, Oksana, Vanessa, Ana Maria, Daiki, Ahmed, and so many more. It's inspiring to see so many of our listeners committing to this B2 study plan. And I can't wait to meet you at our live speaking events like the weekly open conversation club. If you still haven't joined, this is your last chance.

Join the B2 English Fluency course before Sunday at midnight. Go to allearsenglish.com slash B2. That's allearsenglish.com slash letter B number two. And I can't wait to see you inside the course. See you there. Hey, Jessica. How's it going today? Hey.

How are you doing today? I'm feeling good. I'm feeling good. And I think some of our listeners have the IELTS exam coming up one of these weekends here. Yeah. And I bet they're wondering what their day is going to look like. So I bet it would be really cool if we could talk about what to expect on test day in today's episode. Sure. Yeah, that's a great idea. I think a lot of people don't really know what's going to happen before they get there. And it might be different.

in some countries. Some countries split up the test depending on the center. But in most IELTS test centers, you have to do all four sections in one day. So it's a really long day. And what sections are in the morning generally?

So you will have the reading, listening and writing in the morning. It usually starts at nine. So the test starts at nine and I would get there at least half an hour before that. I'd say 45 minutes before that. Yeah, because the worst thing that could happen would be arriving late and missing the beginning of the first section, right? Right.

Yeah. And you can't just go in. I mean, if you arrive late, you're, well, forget it. You're not, you can't take, you can't take that section. You're going to have to miss the whole listening thing. You have to wait until the next section starts. And then, I mean, why even do it? You know what I mean? You're going to get a zero on the one section so that will bring your whole average down.

And this test is not cheap, is it, Jessica? It's quite expensive to take this. So guys, give yourself that extra time. Give yourself, you know, plan to arrive 45 minutes ahead of time. You never know what could happen on the road.

For sure. Yeah. And sometimes the test center may have problems too. They have a lot of technology to balance now. They're taking pictures. They're taking fingerprints. They're checking passports. They're taking all the belongings of the candidates and organizing it with name tags and stuff. I mean, like these test centers are super busy when you get there. So they're taking fingerprints. Fingerprints?

Fingerprints. Is that right? Wow. So I think, yeah, I think that just started this year actually. But yeah, you have to, you have to be fingerprinted. I think there, there have been some issues in the past of people paying others to take the test for them. So not good. Not good. We don't recommend that guys. We don't endorse that. Obviously. Yeah. And you, well, even if you tried, it's not going to work now. No. Right. Good. Okay. Well, that's good. Yeah.

Good. We want to do things in a legitimate way here. Good. So, well, regarding security, that's one thing to know. What would our listeners need to bring to the test center on test day? Like, do they need their passport? Yeah. So you must have your passport or you cannot take

the exam. You need to have your identification with you. And usually that identification is going to be a passport. So you have to bring that. You are allowed to bring some water in with you to the exam room, but it has to be a water bottle without a label. So you have to rip the label off if you want to take water in with you. You can ask for a bathroom break, but only at like really specific times.

And only one person can go at once. I mean, they are so, so careful about everything. I mean, which is good because you can trust the test. You can trust the results.

Nobody can cheat. But in order to make this test valid and honest, they do have to be really careful. So, yeah, they're going to take your belongings also and put them in a separate room. And that all happens when you arrive in the morning. And then you sit in your assigned seat, which will have your candidate information on the desk.

And it'll have your picture and your candidate number on a piece of paper on your desk and

And then throughout the exam, the proctors or the invigilators, whatever you want to call them, they're going to be walking around the room and checking your face with the picture on the desk and checking your passport with the information. So just to make sure you are who you are. Okay. So there's serious security there. And how much time do we have between each section? So we said we have the reading, the listening, and the writing in the morning. Okay.

And how much time do we have to take a break when we finish one section? Yeah, the morning is tough. So usually there is no break. They're doing this between like 9 and noon. They try and fit in these three sections. So the listening test lasts for 30 minutes and then you have 10 minutes to transfer your answers.

And then, of course, on either side of that, you have the proctor or the invigilator giving you instructions and telling you what to do on the exam and handing out all the test booklets. One question. What do you mean transfer your answers? What does that mean? I'm confused about that.

Yeah. So on the listening test, you get a test booklet and a separate piece of paper. That's your answer sheet. So you can write in the test booklet and most students do just write their answers in the test booklet because that's the easiest thing to do. And then you have an extra 10 minutes to

to transfer all of your answers from the test booklet to the answer sheet. So the answer sheet is like a Scantron, you know, the A, B, C, D. Oh, sorry. It's not a Scantron like that. You have to write in the words and then sometimes they're letter answers. You have to write the letter and sometimes there's word answers. You have to write the word or phrase. So that's the transferring. Okay.

Oh, I see. Okay. Yeah, that's important to know. So during that time, you know, when it comes to that last 10 minutes, we might be really exhausted, but that's really important to make sure we stay centered and stay present because that's a really important time so we don't do that incorrectly, right? Yeah, if you mix up one number and throw like all the other numbers off, like that's terrible. Oh, no.

Having said that, honestly, 10 minutes is a really long time to transfer your answers. I've, I've never,

seen anybody like not finish in time. Usually people are done in like five minutes and then they just kind of sit there and wait. So yeah, don't stress out about that. You have plenty of time to transfer your answers. So as soon as that 10 minutes is up, the proctor will come around and pick up the listening booklets and give you the reading booklet. Or if it's in the same booklet, then you just turn to the reading test website.

And then you have an hour for the reading test. Okay. So you're staying in the same place. You're sitting in the same desk all morning. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It's a long, stressful morning, I think. And like I said, I mean, of course you can go to the bathroom, but it's only during very specific times. And the proctors will tell you when they're giving you the instructions, they'll say, you can have...

you are allowed to go to the bathroom at this point, but you must raise your hand. And it's, you have to like give them your test booklet and they have to follow you to the bathroom. And it's all, it's all very careful. Okay. Serious. So, so when we go into the morning, we should be ready to be in a semi stressful situation for most of the morning. But if we know what to expect, we'll be okay. And what is the, is there any break then, you know, between the morning and the afternoon before we move into the speaking section?

Yes. Yeah. A long break in most cases. So you have the listening and then the reading. And then immediately after the reading, you have the writing test, which is also an hour. So like I said, all in all, including all the directions and the test, the whole morning takes about three hours. And

And that's the listening, the reading, and the writing. And then you can go to lunch and you can have a break. And most centers try to schedule all of their candidates in the afternoon. So what happens is you have to check the schedule and see what time you have to be there for the listening test. I'm sorry, for the speaking test. Okay.

So, I mean, for some people, like they don't have their speaking test scheduled till six o'clock that night. So, Oh, what do you do during that block of time? I mean, you want to be careful if you go home, you might not get back on time. Oh yeah. Yeah. So be, be careful there. I would,

I would come prepared because you, in most cases, you do not know what time your speaking test is until that day. So if you have like three or four hours to wait, come prepared. Bring your computer so you could relax and watch a movie in a coffee shop or look at your Google Maps and make sure there's a park nearby so you can go for a little walk. Like, you know, be prepared for whatever break you're going to have.

Hey guys, do you want to know exactly what the examiner wants on the IELTS speaking section? You can find out the four things that the examiner is going to evaluate you on during the speaking section. Go to allearsenglish.com slash evaluation and download our free cheat sheet. That's allearsenglish.com slash E-V-A-L-U-A-T-I-O-N.

What's the latest time that they'll schedule a speaking exam for someone? Is it six o'clock? Is that the last slot? You know, I think it depends on the center. Both of the centers in Portland, they go up until, let's see, the latest I've seen is like 6.30, I guess, at the centers here. But it depends on a number of factors. It depends on how many examiners they have that day, how late the center can stay open.

how many candidates they have. So it depends on a lot of different things. So it's going to vary from center to center. And you should ask because a lot of centers are scheduling tests during the weekdays too now. So you can have your speaking test either the week before or maybe

the week after, but I think mostly it's the week before. So that's an option too. Oh, very good. So, you know, it seems like this is insignificant, but I think it's really important to know what to expect. You know, for our listeners, when they're going into this day, you guys want to be able to put all of your brain power into the exam. You don't want to waste any energy worrying about, oh, how do I get my lunch? Or when is my speaking exam? You know, you want to have all of these things really...

set up in your mind beforehand so that you can really focus on the exam. Right, Jessica? Yeah. I really like the idea of planning your day ahead of time and just being really ready. So like you said, you don't have to make any other decisions besides how to answer the test questions. So maybe, yeah, like the week before, you know where you're going to eat lunch. You know where you're going to take a walk. You know where you're going to get coffee in the afternoon. Maybe have

those things already taken care of. Choose your outfit the day before, you know, just be completely ready. That's right. That's right. In a previous episode, we were talking about how to dress for the exam. And that's another example of this, you know, give yourself every opportunity to succeed, every possible variable that you can control beforehand, control that so that then you have that space in your mind to do well on this exam.

And we know you guys can because you're at the right level to get those sevens. Right, Jessica? Exactly. Sevens, eights, nines. It's up to you. Woohoo!

All right. This has been great. Thanks so much for this awesome information. Again, super helpful. And guys, the moral of the story is plan out your day. Yeah. Just be prepared. And that's why we're here to help you be prepared. So any other questions you have that maybe we didn't get to today or in previous podcasts, please let us know. Yeah. Thank you so much. Perfect. Have a good one, Jessica. Take care. Thanks. You too, Lindsay. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Thanks so much for listening to the IELTS Energy Podcast from All Ears English. And if you want to get tips from Lindsay and Jessica every week on how to get a 7 on your next IELTS exam, be sure to subscribe to our podcast on your computer or on your smartphone. Thanks again and see you soon.

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