My IELTS Journey - an honest review and some advice

Finally, I got my IELTS certificate. Even though I got a normal result (6.5), but I guess this is a fun journey to share.

Preparation

First step for every exam is preparation, but I didn’t register to learn at any English center. I feel like it’s actually a scam. So I got my self-study plan.

Prepare for the exam itself

In my mind, English is always a language. We study it to communicate not to do exam. So I don’t want to or don’t have time to try hard for the exam. But you have to realize that, you enter a game, you must get the rules.

So to grab the requirements and format of the exam, I learn from 2 main sources:

Fastrack IELTS: An English course from a 8.5 teacher, even though I didn’t finish all the courses but I think it’s an actually good one.
The Official Cambridge Guide to IELTS Student’s Book: A book that everyone deserves!

Beside, I recommend IELTS Advantage Youtube channel. They have a lot of useful tips and tricks.

Speaking Preparation

This is my most weakness skill. I only got 5.5 for Speaking . So maybe my advice for this one won’t be so legit. I have a lot of pronunciation problems. Here are my resources:

Elsa Speak: This app is already very popular. And its quality worth that.
Playlist The Sound of English by BBC.

On another hand, you can join some foreign Discord servers to improve your real life English communication.

Writing & Reading Preparation

To be honest I didn’t prepare much for 3 left skills, but I guess I can give some recommendations.

Write & Improve from Cambridge: There are topic tasks for you to do, the website will score and give advice. But if you want to do IELTS tasks, you have do to some payments, I guess so.
Oxford Learner’s Pocket Phrasal Verbs And Idioms and related books: Offer a wide range of elegant words, but need to know how to use them with other tools to maximize the effiency.
Grammar - British Council: Too legit to introduce anything.
Vocabulary: a kinda advanced page about vocabulary.

Listening Preparation

Maybe we only need to watch Youtube a lot for this skill? I will introduce some channels have short and meaningful videos.

Project Better Self: self help and self improvement channel
Crash Course: medium-length videos, have a lot of knowledge to entertain your brain
TedED: I guess you already know this channel

If you love listening, you can check out Cal Newport in your free time. I love his books a lot. I don’t recommend TED because their topics recently focus on social sciences or politics, which I hate with a passion.

Exam Day

I took the test on 26th Dec which is in my endterm exam period. So I feel really exhausted and don’t really motivated to do the exam. I register to take the exam at IDP Hai Ba Trung.

In case of unwanted accidents, I go to the site pretty early. I took the Speaking exam in the morning and the rest in the afternoon.

I am done with my sharing, if you have any questions, don’t mind to ask!