Before The Audio Begins # Strategies

Listening section often becomes quite difficult because you need not to simply hear to what the voice is speaking, but also look for dates, names or places. Even more you need to connect ideas, organise information, generalise and infer.
Now, this section, like all others, require your full attention, beginning from the time before the audio has started, to the time when the audio is running and even when it is finished.
Now let us have a look at the strategies required before the audio begins.

Read the instructions carefully
This is one of the most important and often the most neglected task in the listening section. Remember, no matter how many times you have solved such questions, you need to read the instructions yet again. This is not because there is a rule associated with it, but the point is, often in the listening section you are given word limit. And this word limit includes all the articles and the prepositions. Make sure that your answer is not above the word limit, or else it will be marked incorrect.
Strategies

Before The Audio Begins

Read the questions properly and get an idea of what the talk might be
This is yet another important thing to do. To get the right information from the monologue or the conversation, you must be mentally prepared while listening to the audio, what the audio will be about. Make sure you question yourself the following questions –

  • Who is talking?
  • What are they talking about?
  • What is the entire atmosphere of the talk?
Eliminate the options
To do this, you are required to analyse the question properly. Find out what is its requirements. Does it wants you to give price or name or date or number of days? Then, figure out the relation between the option and the question. Often it so happens that the option may be correct but the question is not related to it. So, when you are sure that the option is incorrect, mark it/ cross it.
Underline the keywords
Remember, the paper is not set to fail you, it is rather set, to judge you thoroughly. So, they make sure that they put some keywords in the question that will help you to find out the correct answer. Keywords such as first, next, important etc. mark them and listen carefully to the audio.

These are some of the essential strategies that can help in scoring high in IELTS. Even more, if you forget things often, speak slowly to yourself the options or speak out the notes in your words. This will surely help you in finding the correct answers.
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