IELTS Energy 1440: Sate the Examiner’s Vocabulary Thirst
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This is an IELTS Energy Podcast, Episode 1440, Sate the Examiner's Vocabulary Thirst.

Welcome to the IELTS Energy Podcast from All Ears English, downloaded more than 22 million times with former IELTS examiner Jessica Beck and Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz. If you are stuck with a low score, our insider method will help you get the score you need to unlock your dreams. Get your estimated band score now with our two-minute quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com

forward slash my score. Today, you'll learn eight amply impressive vocabulary phrases that mean enough and not enough. Two ideas that you will express a lot in speaking and writing. With today's words and phrases, you'll impress the IELTS examiner with your wide range of vocabulary and get that high score that you need.

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I am so excited about today's vocabulary. Guys, we have so many great words to teach you today. Yes, insatiable and satiate came up in the last episode. If you missed it, scroll up. Don't miss 1439, How to Speak Longer on IELTS Speaking. Such great vocab, and it inspired us to give you more ways to say this today. Exactly.

Exactly. Because this vocabulary guys talking, it's basically, it's such a simple meaning that we're conveying. Something is enough or a lot, right? An amount or not enough, a small amount. And think about

how many places on the IELTS exam that you use these ideas, right? In IELTS task one, IELTS task two, writing, and then all three parts of the speaking test. So guys, we are going to teach you the vocabulary today that you can use

over the exam. So get out a pen and paper and make sure you're taking notes. Yes, that's such a good point that you know this idea of something being not enough or enough is going to come up. So this is where you want to spend the time to learn some band nine vocab that you know you can sneak into so many speaking answers and essays.

Exactly. So we are going to not only teach you the vocabulary, but we will also use the new vocabulary in sentences that you could really say on the IELTS exam. So remember to scroll up to the last episode, 1439, How to Speak Longer on IELTS Speaking, because that is what inspired today's episode, just like Aubrey said. And make sure to hit follow right now so you never miss an amazing episode.

All right, let's dive in here. Our first word is ample, which means like more than enough. But I don't think I've heard a student use this, band nine, because it's just less common and pretty easy, easy to say, easy to learn. So, for example, if on part three you're asked about crime in your city, you could say there is ample police presence in my town. So I think that helps cut down on criminal activity.

Nice. Yeah. So ample. Yeah. Usually it's used in a positive way like this, right? It's more than enough, but we want that. Yes. Plenty. We want this more than enough amount.

And then the next phrase is an abundance of, which just simply means a lot. That's it, right? It means a lot. So you can use this in part two. If you have to describe a vacation, let's say, you can say, my preference is to visit places that have an abundance of activity. That's why I love cruises. There's something for everyone. Did you write that example just for me, Aubrey? Yes.

I thought you might be reading that one. I also agree, though. I love a cruise because there's an abundance. There are ample activities. There's an abundance of everything on cruises. You know, that's really what it comes down to. Activities, food, drinks, people, everything.

It's the best. All right. This next phrase I absolutely love and I actually used in one of my model answers in Tuesday's episode. Again, scroll up if you missed it. "Quenched my thirst for." Now, this is quite a poetic phrase and I can guarantee you the examiner will not hear this from other students.

It's not a phrase that is so rare that it's weird. It's not that. It is poetic, but somehow like I still hear it, right? Like, do you say this? Yes, I do. I say it. And it's interesting because the literal meaning is like you drink water that quenches your thirst, right? It means you, it satisfies your thirst for something, but we use it idiomatically. Like, you know, if you're asked about books, for example, on part one,

And you could say like, I found a thriller series that quenched my thirst for mysteries. It's amazing because you're saying that you were craving something, you had a thirst for something and it satisfied that.

Right, exactly. And how idiomatic is this? We are using this in a figurative way that is very high level. So again, guys, just to break this down a little bit, quench means to satisfy. Band 9 verb right there, but then we have it in this phrase, in this language chunk, quench my thirst for. So a thirst, again, literally, I'm thirsty for water, right?

It's not just for water. Figuratively, it's like I have been wanting this, whatever this is. Like, I just watched The Penguin on HBO Max, and it quenched my thirst for some real quality-level prestige television. Okay, good to know I saw The Penguin, and I wondered. It looks good. I need to watch it. It's so good!

I love it so much. But think of all the answers you could use this for, food, books, TV, anything that you might be craving or like, instead of just say, "I was wanting to check that out, so I did." Right? It quenched my thirst. Totally. Boost your vocabulary by using this idiom. Right. Instead of just saying, "Yeah, it was great. I liked it a lot."

Okay, so here's our some more band nine phrases. Okay, so the verb satiated. I say say you could say it both ways. Because I hear satiate, but also I say she ate. Yes, she ate. I do sometimes. I hear it both ways. But then also, I actually

actually choose this verb more, sate, because while it's shorter, it's easier to say, but it's also less common and it means exactly the same thing. So to satiate or to sate means to fulfill, right? To satisfy. So we can say like sate one's desire for or sate my

my need for, sate my thirst for. It just means like satisfy this want that I had. Okay. It has the same meaning as quench in the other phrase, right? Quench my thirst, sate my thirst. And again, like you said, very like you, the examiner will know what you're saying and they will be impressed because students do not use these words.

I use sate a lot because it sounds so fancy. I don't know. It's just become part of my daily vernacular. I love that. Instead of satisfy or saying like, "I'm good," or like, "I ate enough food," I'd be like, "I am sated. Thank you very much." Oh, that's really fun. I was sated at that restaurant. That's really fun. All right.

right. But on IELTS, Aubrey, how can we use these phrases? Yeah. So if you are asked about a restaurant, you could say, I've been craving jalapeno poppers and I found a new hole in the wall sushi spot that sated my desire for these delicious morsels. I'm obsessed with jalapeno poppers. I love it. So much great vocab in there, but also brings up some questions. Why do

Why do they have jalapeno poppers at a sushi restaurant? That doesn't seem. Yeah, it's like an app at a lot of sushi places, at least in the States. I don't know if in Asia this is an app, but it's just like a little, it's like half a jalapeno that has like crab or some kind of fish in it with like cream cheese maybe. And then they usually deep fry them or grill them.

delicious okay that is a hundred percent american right there like anything that is like stuffed with cheese and deep fried aubry that's very americanized sushi but you know what there's nothing wrong with it because jalapeno poppers are delicious scrumptious seriously

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at the antithesis of enough being not enough or a small amount. Also with the connotation of not just not enough, but like disappointing, you know? - Right, less than you want. - Right, so here's a very fun slang word, guys, dinky.

Dinky is slang and it's very cute and it's just like tiny. That's all it means. So Aubrey, what if you're asked about your home and you live in a small apartment? How can we use the word dinky? I could say, to be honest, my apartment is kind of dinky. It's actually just a studio. I can literally wash a dish in the kitchen sink while I sit on my bed. This was my apartment in New York City. We had our bed in the living room.

And then like the kitchen table was right next to it. So tiny. Oh,

lived in places like this. I had a, I had a studio, a couple studio apartments in Cambodia that were like this, where it was, yeah, just, just dinky, teeny tiny. You can also say this about like food servings. I've seen this before when you like order an app in a French restaurant and it's super dinky. It's like one tiny bite. You're like, oh, totally. It's like a morsel, right? I loved how you used morsel in that last answer. So a morsel is like

a bite of food, right? It is signifying like an amount, which is like a bite, like a tiny little piece of food, a morsel, but also morsel connotes like something yummy also. Yes, I agree. That's true. I wouldn't say this is a little morsel if it was something disgusting.

All right. Insufficient. So insufficient is probably the most common of the words we're teaching you today, but it is extremely useful and still very impressive because it is high level. And even though I would hear natives say this, I

I don't hear students say this, you know? So it's an adjective that means not enough. And you do need lots of options, right? Because this idea of something like not enough of something could come up multiple times in the same answer or definitely on the same speaking test. You don't want to be repeating yourself. So you do need lots of ways to say this.

These are very high level phrases, guys. Yes, we're teaching them to you in the framework of speaking, but remember that these are, except for dinky, all of these words can be used in writing as well. Think about advantage/disadvantage essays. Think about problem/solution essays, right? The government's efforts in this case have been insufficient thus far, right? Like this is all useful for all over. Okay, so if I,

If I live in a small town, a dinky little town, and in part one I'm asked about where I live, I could say, "My town has an insufficient amount of grocery stores. There are really only two and they're both expensive."

Yeah, that's what I don't like about small towns, right? Not having the choice of the options. Exactly right. That well, of all of the things I don't like about rural, I also grew up in a small town and there are a lot of disadvantages. That was a huge one, right? Like you have the one dinky little grocery store and that's your only option.

- So they can charge whatever they want, right? There's no competition. - Nope, exactly. - All right, last word for today, guys, inadequate. So it's also like insufficient. It's an adjective, which just means not enough, an unsatisfactory amount. So how can we use this on IELTS Speaking, Aubrey?

Yeah, maybe for part one, you could say, "My company offers inadequate perks and benefits. We don't even have any paid time off." No, it's not good. It's definitely like you're saying there's not enough of this. It's insufficient. All of these would work. Adequate is the opposite. It's like, "Yeah, there's enough, but not too much, not an extreme amount." Adequate is just enough, and then inadequate, not nearly enough.

Yeah, we use adequate to like be polite sometimes when really like it's not satisfactory. You'd be like, yeah, like how's your room? Like it's adequate. It will suffice. It will serve. But really you're saying like, oh, it's not great. Right.

Yes, exactly. Which I love this because all of this vocab that you're learning today, this is the way to make your answers better than adequate, right? Without this kind of vocab, the examiner could be like, those answers were adequate. That's like Ben's six, right? Adequate is a six.

Exactly. Yes. You want more. You want ample vocabulary, right? You want these. You want the examiner to be using this kind of vocab to like show that they were impressed. And then you can score band eight, band nine for your vocab score. I love it. Way to bring it back. I love that as the takeaway. That was perfect. All right, guys. Thank you for listening today. Make sure to hit follow right now and make sure to join us next Tuesday for our next episode. Yes. Awesome. See you guys next week. Bye.

Thanks for listening to IELTS Energy. Hit subscribe now and don't forget to find your estimated band score at allearsenglish.com slash myscore.

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