Dear Zafar

It is only a standard exam, not necessarily perfect one to judge about the potential of someone.

Parisa

I think you do not necessarily need to take an exam to develop your English.

Dear Zafar

It is only a standard exam, not necessarily perfect one to judge about the potential of someone.

Parisa

In fact I think this question is on the practical basis, means the persons who have attended the IELTS Exam, they will realize, otherwise not ! People who take preparation in the yearlong, can do better in the exam only. On the otherhand, are they get the development in English ? No? Simply they learn how to get a good scope by longterm practice is IELTS ! There are a lot of examples around the world, PhD in English language got 5.5 without practice where a school boy of class nine got 7.5 after 6 months practice ! Seleucus !!!

Yes, I agree with you.

Regards

Its surprising more that, the cost of IELTS Exam sometimes beyond the means , Why this should be ? Will the British people get 9.0 out of 9.0 in all parts of IELTS ! I think not if they have not a good practice even !!

I totally agree with you since ielts exam cannot be a good way for evaluation.there are some vivid techniques for finding answer without understanding the context.on the other hand,some people are prefect in english ,but they may face with some problems during their exam that can have a detrimental effect on their result.from my point of view, ielts is not international english language testing system although it is international English language torturing system.

Even some of my students have scored 7.5 whereas their performance in the class is not good. Even more, hardly they can perfectly write a correct sentence! !!Believe me I have been on Research about IELTS and this is my findings

I do not think that IELTS is a perfect standard to evaluate English skills of a person.

Disagree. It's not standard.

Ragad moufaq Tawafak Karan Sotoodeh

Yes, I do agree with you. You can read my previous answers for this .

thanks

Interesting revelations here

Thank you! Following! Best regards: Julia Doncheva

I have taught IELTS and it is a difficult, academic exam which yes few native speakers would pass well. It requires the learning of several techniques that can cause problems if not understood. So far, it is probably the best as it restricts cheating by students.

Nevertheless, I have come across many strange marks that do not reflect the level of the student's English, and students that achieve above 7 seem often to really be around 5.

Stanley Wilkin ,

Than you for your informative and analytical answer here. We the people who are involved with IELTS , teaching and its exams, we know very well that it is simply caring some tips only which are not measured as skills . Thats why actual measurement of Language can not measure, which is faraway for the reality.

Regards

I am currently appearing for the IELTS. I am taking this test to understand how tutors teach.

I am a researcher and have visited Private teachers and attended classes. I documented all of it

and now IELTS.

i Am not migrating or seeking jobs abroad but interested in the teaching methodology of the private tutors

OH MY GOSH !!!

it’s plain simple hell where private individuals make money they charge more than IELTS fee and give nothing in return I documented one such private class. Give sheets to students to be photocopied which is unethical.

in fact my essays were taken as examples for others students to learn from it

i am shell shocked

I’m still writing the test to check the speed versus time versus interpretation..

i don’t need any help and I am bored by the test.

its not a creative way of testing the language. I’m not keen on my result anything is fine but I’m interested in the process a student has to undergo and the private tutors

Interesting discussion, following.

Poornima, it does concern academic writing and therefore is, it seems to me, necessary for say doctors and nurses. The marking of the tests is another matter even though it has to be remembered that speaking and listening play an important part. Poorly written English receiving a 7 or more is rediculous even with greater marks in the other tests.

I used to double check job candidates and found that many given level 7 outside of the UK barely received more than 5 once all the scores were added up.

Keeping following.

Not standard

Nirmala S.V.S.G

I am a person from English Literature & Languages with my academic degrees from other disciplines. I was instructor of IELTS for day in a reputed organization and observed some lope holes in the system. Respecting all about IELTS, its experts and other supporters , I realized about its very poor structure of English Grammar and sentence constructions. YES, Emphasis has given in the day to day matters, scientific events and inventions, history as passage in the Reading and some in the Listening which appreciable.

I have been following on-line tutorials on YouTube they recommend “don’t read the passage fully” “find key words” etc

when A passage is given why not let the candidate read it full ?

Why apply a pack of tricks?

what are the objectives ?-To test how much a candidate has understood or get good scores by using tricks ?

i have never appeared for an interview IELTS speaking test would be my first interview

what Is ‘one minute preparing time ?’

this is exactly my research I have found out that students scoring very good marks in competitive exams also have misconceptions in concepts learnt.

English language is growing By adding words like Pyjama, Loot, Aiyyo borrowed from other languages

which bring me to the fundamental question of are we testing quality of knowledge the students have ?

Poornima Sajive Nair

Because English is the global communicative language. Thats why , we must learn it as the connecting language. Mastering in English is not required as it is not so easy in fact. For vast vocabulary and strict grammar rules, English is the most toughest language in the world though it is well taught in everywhere in the world. So, there is inertia inside. On the other hand, as its a global language, most of the learned person know it even a little bit which makes the problem. We are alert about using English fearing the possibility of mistakes. And thats why, English is caused the failure in many cases. So, I think, go ahead with your style.

Thanks

I only advocate qualitative methodology And I find this method of using tricks to read a passage and answer is not okay

I’m interested in the teaching methodology which I’m documenting and comparing

Agree with previous comments.

Poornima, the point about the reading method is because the test is time/limited and to answer the questions you are expected to assimilate the important elements in the text quickly. Any sentence anyway can actually be understood simply by looking at first, middle and last word.If it was a literary exam that would be different as scanning a text would not be recommended.

Stanley Wilkin

Yes, Exactly and this is the procedure and skimming in the text is a skilled which must be developed by reading and practicing more.

Thanks

Agree its trick.

Having taught IELTS for a number of years, I can now myself read documents in speed and demonstrate immediate understanding. Even with literature I can pick up salient words and phrases with ease. Some trick! A good trick!

Stanley Wilkin please tell me how would you like if a GP read first word scanned and read the middle and the last word and determined a treatment for an illness ?

l am an engineer and have worked with hospitals as a Biomedical engineer before I changed my profession to design and now an educator

I’m trying to understand the testing methodology, objective and teaching methodology

how to filter students

I’ll upload my thesis after my final defence

I have determined how children learn and now I’m looking at international testing

i Have developed a unique grading system

im not trying to prove you wrong inasmuch to understand the process as a researcher

Poornima,

I am not trying to prove myself right either, simply present what I know.

Your assessment of physician practices actually does not reflect the material they write nor much of what they read. Their information is set within technical processes that has limited verb and adjective use, tending to slip from description to directive. Accurate not deep cognisance is required. Physicians do not tend to handle abstracts.

Well thanks for The insights !

So, What the should IELTS authority to do? I think they should go for a new invention to assess the language skills of the incumbents.

Agree.

Stanley Wilkin my IELTS test date is today

after all these skeptical thoughts I quite enjoyed the journey

i was told by a friend yesterday, that giving exams as IELTS delays probable dementia.in older people.

i am fully convinced about the advantages of writing competitive exams as they have no age restrictions.

i will be writing all the other exams to check the content and teaching methodologies employed.

i Wish to use some techniques and material to improve english language ‘teaching-learning‘ in rural education in my country which is purely voluntary in my case.

I am planning to design flash cards.

maps is another enjoyable listening segment

i wish to design ‘estimation‘ and ‘approximation‘ along with maps because when one asks someone in a rural area for directions they say just 10 steps and then it is almost a KM walk !

i have grown to love the system of testing with IELTS.

thank you all for brainstorming I appreciate all valuable feedback Contained herein.

RE: "I appeared IELTS and have a good score , I am MA in English with an outstanding result. After my appearing , now I am thinking IELTS can't be a global standard to assess one' Rather IT IS A PACK OF BRITISH Colonial people to earn money!!!!"

Sorry, but this does not look like the prose of someone who ought to have a good score. It seems more like an off-kilter google-translation from something in another language. So Stanley Wilkin must be correct when he says "I have come across many strange marks that do not reflect the level of the student's English, and students that achieve above 7 seem often to really be around 5."

Karl Pfeifer

This is not the place for personal attack. Please read the feedback of the other language experts have given till today . Would you mind to write up a review the system of IELTS from now onward? There are a lot of grammatical mistakes in many materials even from the countries where the mother language is English !!!

Everyone can make a mistake . But this is not the procedure and the system of outcomes from a scientist !

Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan

Your question begins, "IS IELTS a perfect standard for assessing a person's skills in English Language ?" My answer to that, relying on the text under your question as data, is "obviously not, if that represents the proficiency of someone with a good score."

You regard that as a personal attack, whereas I regard your question together with its underlying text as ironical and partly self-refuting.

RE: "There are a lot of grammatical mistakes in many materials even from the countries where the mother language is English !!!"

I certainly agree with that. In fact I have encountered many nonnative speakers whose English is better than that of native speakers; the poor showing of many native speakers is a consequence of an education system that stopped teaching grammar, on the mistaken assumption that native speakers already had an adequate understanding of their own language.

Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan

Yes, going over some of your previous answers, I see a huge problem.

I quote you (via copy-and-paste):

"I was instructor of IELTS for day in a reputed organization and observed some lope holes in the system. Respecting all about IELTS, its experts and other supporters , I realized about its very poor structure of English Grammar and sentence constructions. YES, Emphasis has given in the day to day matters, scientific events and inventions, history as passage in the Reading and some in the Listening which appreciable."

Given the numerous infelicities in this passage (and in other answers of yours), I am flabbergasted that you present yourself as a judge of "poor structure of English Grammar and sentence constructions" when you don't even recognize your own grammatical and idiomatic infelicities. And you say you were an instructor of IELTS? Well, if IELTS permitted that, then that would indeed be a huge black mark for IELTS.

You previously defended yourself saying "Everyone can make a mistake". Of course. We all do. But your mistakes are not simply "a mistake". They are systematic. You have no credibility as an English-language critic, and if you regard that as a personal attack, then so be it.

Tricks of the trade.

There are tricks and there are tricks.

Stanley Wilkin has pointed out some very useful tricks (= skills) he acquired while teaching IELTS. But there are also some unsalutory tricks that can be associated with IELTS.

IELTS probably gives a reasonable measure of where an “untutored” (i.e. without preparation beforehand) student stands relative to other untutored students taking the test for the first time. But I also think unsalutary tricks can figure in preparing for IELTS. Students may be taught to recognize and respond to question patterns and types with formulaic answers without true understanding — a kind of rote learning. My own experience of this phenomenon came with STEM students from a certain country who were taking my introduction to symbolic logic course, which my college had misguidedly allowed to satisfy both a humanities and an English-writing course requirement; these students sought to avoid any course with a significant writing component that could lower their grade. They were intelligent and hardworking, but their English was poor and they often did not fully understand the meaning of questions and explanations. So they studied by learning to recognize large numbers of formulaic question-types and answers. The trouble was that when the question patterns and wording were different from what they expected — i.e. when their studying tricks weren’t applicable — they had to resort to guesswork. I think something similar may be at play with IELTS tutoring, leading to scores that are at variance with true proficiency and comprehension.

Karl Pfeifer

Once again you committed the mistake here. Again and again you are going for the personal attack ! Only I am not saying your system is full of flawed but some others as well. You are native to English . Could you please can communicate through Bangla with me as I do? If it is not possible by you, why you are giving me the challenge and using the off-tracking words here? How can a senior professor like you can write like this?

' I am flabbergasted that you present yourself as a judge of "poor structure of English Grammar and sentence constructions" when you don't even recognize your own grammatical and idiomatic infelicities. And you say you were an instructor of IELTS? Well, if IELTS permitted that, then that would indeed be a huge black mark for IELTS '. !!!! Not from me but , some people around the world are against the system. I am not as like you to dishonor a professor ! Pls be cool sir and you should not press to cool the volcano inside .

Thanks .

Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan

You've made some general assertions about grammar and structure in IELTS without giving specific examples and your words undermine your authority or believability regarding grammar and structure. That is my issue here. Why should anyone believe those assertions? You previously referred me to the feedback of the other responders, but none of them has given examples of the grammatical or structural misconceptions you allege are there.

Notice I have not questioned any claims about variability in the scores, possible cultural issues pertaining thereto, or their inherent unsuitability or unfairness; indeed, in my last answer I suggested one possible factor.

Also, I am not a grammar-Nazi*, but I found one of your remarks so ungrammatical or unidiomatic as to be incomprehensible. As for my being "native to English", I suppose that's a grey area, since my first language was German and I only learned English when I started school; but it's my best language for sure.

__________

* Some of my views on prescriptive grammar are expressed here: Article Review – Correct English: Reality or Myth?

I agree with Dr. @Karl Pfeifer

I can deepen his statement. Of course, there is a correlation between grades and the actual level of training (this applies not only to the IELTS exam). But this can be identified at the level of statistics. In individual cases, very significant fluctuations are known. For example, when I was at university, there were two excellent students in my group who “competed” with each other. Now, many years later, first of them is one of the most cited and respected scientists in Russia, and the second is a speech writer for lowest-level politicians ...

Students do not always master the course, but usually learn to take exams. Many act on the principle "pass-and-forget." I think IELTS is no exception.

From my own experience, it was easier for me in the US to talk on professional topics (I hadn't any additional courses besides standard Russian school and university) than to communicate in a store, or in a bank and at a gas station (even considering the minimum level of such communication). At the same time, the English language of "Russian" immigrants amused me very much (like their remnants of Russian one).

Karl's understanding is a good one and he visibly presents through his Essay the advantages of studying Philosophy where clear English writing is concerned. It is, as Karl would recognise, excellent English of a sort applied to a particular topic and discipline. And, yes, native English students have through a belief in the essentiality of creative English have not been taught grammar over many decades . It is indeed not imperative that in order to acquire higher marks a student should write perfect or even near perfect English.

English is a changing language and needs to be in order to absorb the many cultures now learning and speaking it. Grammar is changing, reflecting the above, and becoming less fixed. The common pedantic pre-World War 2 approach was affected by previous generations' instruction in a kind of Latinate English, of the sort encouraged by reading Milton and evident in much Victorian writing. That style was no more good English than many examples of English in newspapers and magazines.

Modern examples of 'good English' can in fact be dull at times or certainly without surface vitality. I suggest that Kingsley Amis and George Orwell, although not recent but still often taught as examples of the best or most assured English writing, while they gain in concision lose in terms of holding onto the reader's interest. Does Dicken's write good grammar? At times, no, at least to modern educators.

I do agree on the weirdness of the scores some people get in IELTS. However, I think that there is much critical thinking as well as linguistic skills encouraged to be developed on the part of those who are required to sit for the test. I'm talking from a personal experience of a non-native who taught both IELTS and TOEFL, sat for both tests in addition to taking the GRE. While I understand the frustration professor Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan feels, I believe IELTS is the best of these standardized tests in spite of its limitations. Sometimes the journey matters more than getting at the destination.

Thank you very much The sincere and hard standard of any kind may contribute to high productivity in the measurement, I see so ...

One of the problems not raised here, but essential in the construction of IELTS, is cheating, which many other English language tests are subject to. I helped expose a case of industrial cheating for more simplified global tests in East London in 2012 (See BBC Panorama). IELTS has been formed to guard against many kinds of cheating, which in fact it does far better than other forms of academic testing. It is not impervious as cheating itself describes a degree and kind of cunning that academics tend to lack.

Muthana Makki Mohammedali

My concern is about the weirdness as you described. Only by practicing a person may score good from IELTS whereas, a person with a good academic English background may there be have a poor score . My concern is if , IELTS can decide the English language ability , why there should be others degrees in English ? Why there should be MA in English language ? For IELTS , any one can sit whereas for MA in English Language can anybody enroll ? No. So why IELTS is superior to MA in English ?

I didn't get answer yet.

Thanks

Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan RE: "My concern is if , IELTS can decide the English language ability , why there should be others degrees in English ? Why there should be MA in English language ? For IELTS, any one can sit whereas for MA in English Language can anybody enroll ? No. So why IELTS is superior to MA in English ?"

IELTS is a test to determine whether you have what a university deems to be an acceptable level of English proficiency to pursue its degree programs in which the medium of instruction is English (different universities and different departments set different minimum scores, and may revise them based on their experience). If the area of the degree is itself English, the subject matter will be literature or linguistics, and not the basic skills tested for by IELTS. The medium of instruction for an MA in English may not even be English (e.g. at some universities in France or Quebec). However, if the medium of instruction for an MA in English is itself English, but the MA is from a country in which the national, official, or dominant language is not English, the level of proficiency manifested in the MA thesis may often be substandard. As a former director of a graduate program in philosophy, I have seen MA course papers or thesis chapters submitted as part of an application for graduate studies that were in substandard English, as well as similarly substandard letters of reference from the applicants' professors. Despite the fact that IELTS sometimes yields weird results it is often a better indicator of English proficiency than the mere possession of an MA in English.

Yes, Karl Pfeifer

Dear Md Zafar Alam Bhuiyan , IELTS is a little genius with some imperfections which are due to test makers' human nature. The design of the questions and how they are "engineered" to measure test taker's skills is marvelous. After all, I believe that the philosophy of the test is to "tame" a test taker's mind in order to make it yield to the requirements of studying at an academic institution in the medium of English. Not all of these requirements are related to language proficiency (most of them are); but there is stamina, critical thinking, time management...etc. Sorry if this is not the answer you're looking for, I wish to hear more about this from other colleagues.

Cheers

Follower

Muthana Makki Mohammedali

Thank for your impartial , honest and serious answer . There are exact my point which skipped or was unable to identify the positivity of the system. Still I believe , the assessment for the students basically from English language and literature should be waved off.

Thanks

Interesting.

Stanley Wilkin

i did write the IELTS day before. The experience of writing the Actual is way different from the mock

the questions were different too there was a conditional flow chart based on a paragraph

these type of questions would help me to develop material for children in rural areas I could probably design infographics

Any inputs are welcome

many students have a problem with English language at least in my country except the metros

I believe that testing is essential to prove that one has the capacity to communicate in a certain language.

i Am questioning the mode of conducting classes by ‘private teachers‘

Poornima,

An IELTS teacher who is authorised by the British Council or who teaches in a college certificated by the BC is probably the answer. But learning the exam and taking it can be different as youve discovered. Time pressures are important and students need to learn and respond quickly.

Following

It's not perfect, but probably the best available so far

Seriously not effect.

Its practice which may be highly scored by practicing .We doubt to consider the scale of English proficiency.

Stanley Wilkin

Sir,

English is a huge language regarding its vocabulary and rules of grammar. Only few months practice , a man cannot be an expert in English. On the other hand, by practicing few months , a person may have a good score in IELTS! Is it mean only IELTS is the measuring score for the scale of expertness in English rather Honours, Masters and PhD in English ? I think ''No'' ! There are huge examples a PhD is English had scored band 5.0 . So, How did he secured his PhD for the same ? Is the PhD from English is inferior to IELTS 6 or 7 ?