What do IELTS candidates have to do?

Candidates must do all four test modules: Listening Reading Writing Speaking

Test Format

Listening 30 minutes, 4 sections, 40 items

General Training Reading

60 minutes, 3 sections, 40 items

Academic Reading 60 minutes, 3 sections, 40 items

General Training Writing

60 minutes, 2 tasks

Academic Writing 60 minutes, 2 tasks

Speaking 11 - 14 minutes, 3 parts

Listening Module

Tests: specific and overall comprehension inference salient information

Same for Academic and General Training candidates

Variety of contexts (general and study) Variety of formats (dialogues and mini-lectures) Tape played only once

Reading Module

Tests detailed and general comprehension Academic and General Training Modules Academic Module: academic texts General Training module: general and study-

related texts

Writing Module Academic and General Training Modules Tests:

ability to write English appropriate to context and task

use of language in a variety of contexts and topics

skills at sentence, paragraph and whole text level

Candidates rated on: task fulfilment coherence and cohesion communicative quality vocabulary and sentence structure

Speaking Module

Same for Academic and General Training candidates

Tests ability to communicate through speech in general English contexts

One-to-one interview Range of topics and contexts Range of skills and patterns of interaction 3 parts:

question and answer on personal topics unassisted short talk on a given topic two-way discussion on more abstract issues

What do the bands mean?

9 band scale 9 - expert user 8 - very good user 7 - good user 6 - competent user 5 - modest user 4 - limited user 3 - extremely limited user 2 - intermittent user 1 - non-user