PTE: FIVE easy-to-follow steps to write PTE Essays (200-300 words)
How do you produce a decent piece of essay within 20 minutes to achieve your target band? Just follow the steps below:
Step 1: Understand the Question Type. (1 minutes)
Read the question (Is it Agree/Disagree, Advantage & Disadvantage, Describe a Situation, Describe a Case study, Discuss both issues, or a Double Question?)
Paraphrase the topic accordingly based on the question type and take your Positionn
Step 2: Brainstorming. (1-2 minutes)
Think of a couple of main points / specific reasons based on your taken position to be developed into full body paragraphs (of 80-100 words each) .
Step 3: Planning. (1-2 minutes)
Now use a mind mapping, flowcharting or tabling technique to expand the main points. Add specific related details. Think of what example/s (from your experience, observation or knowledge) to use?
Step 4: Writing. (25 minutes)
a. Introduction – (3 sentences of 30-40 words in total, consisting of Background General statement + expansion + Position / Thesis Statement).
b. 2-3 Body paragraphs – 1 sentence of Main Point, 2-3 detailed explanations, 1-2 example sentences AND 1 final Recap to relate back to your Main Point.\
c. Conclusion – 2 sentences of 20-30 words in total, summary / conclusion of your essay + a general reason / prediction / condition / position of the subject matter.
(Timing: Intro 2-3 min + Body 5×2 min + Conclusion 2 min)
Step 5: Checking (2 minutes)
Proofread your essay for Grammar, Vocabulary, Spelling, Punctuation and Relevance / Consistency of Content.
Practise your typing skills too so that you can manage 250-270 words to get Score >=65-79+!
Good luck!
26 September 2017
Telaga
PTE: Five Tips on How to excel in PTE Writing
While many students would agree that the Writing section is the hardest to pass in IELTS, they find that, to their amazement, PTE Writing is the ‘easiest’ skill to score high. That’s right, if only you know these secrets!
- Know how to write the essay.
The structure of the introduction and body paragraphs depend on what type of question it is. There are six (6) types in PTE, including two types unseen in IELTS. - Know what to include in summaries.
In Summarise Written Text, you have to know where the main points are usually placed, when the text has 1, 2 or 3-5 paragraphs, - Know how to take notes.
In Summarise Spoken Text, what and how much do you need to take down and how do you ‘transfer’ these bullet points into interconnected academic sentences? - Know what phrases to use.
Yes, you’re right. You can memorise and copy some phrases from our resources and the computer won’t penalise you! - Know what topics wil be examined.
Yes, you can know what the essay questions may be, so you can brainstorm ideas and prepare how to explain the points and what examples to use BEFORE the exam!
Okay! Once you are familiar with these ‘secrets’, the PTE Writing section will just taste like a piece of cake!
Enjoy!
27 March 2017
Telaga
PTE: Five Secrets to Pass
By now, some of you may have realized that it’s ‘easier’ to pass some skills than the others. Most students can pass, say. Listening and Writing, fairly more readily than say, Reading and Speaking. So, what does it take to pass ALL skills? Here are five (5) PTE secrets revealed!
1. Really get to know the Score Guide. Seriously, some students lose valuable marks just because they misunderstand the scoring system. You want to earn as many marks as possible, while avoiding losing as few marks as possible.
2. Devise appropriate strategies and stick to them. Once you know what criteria each test item is based on, practise to improve that criterion. For example, good fluency without undue gaps in all speaking item types will not only help boost your score in Fluency, but a high fluency mark can compensate for a lower Pronunciation mark, pushing you across the threshold of your target score.
3. Focus and maintain. You need to devote more hours to address your weaknesses, yet still practise on those areas you have passed. Your scores for each skill may go up or down by 10 or even 20 points. Do NOT ignore any part altogether.
4. Allow yourself ample time to prepare for the test. Students who have average scores of around 65 would need roughly 3-4 months of concentrated efforts and at least three trials of the test before achieving over 79 in all bands. PTE is not a ‘trial and error’ or ‘just in case I’m lucky this time’ test!
5. Understand the score. Some students may achieve, say around >80 in enabling skills, but only get 70 in communicative skills. The reverse can happen too. Lower enabling skill scores but 10 point higher communicative skill score! Weird! The secret? The Main Points! So, make sure you practise taking notes of main points in writing and listening too!
25 January 2017
Telaga
PTE TIP!
Many students find the reading section the hardest section of the test because it relies on your fast high level reading skills, wide vocabulary, and strong familiarity with written expressions and collocations. So from now until you pass your test read for at least one hour everyday, in quiet, without stopping to use a dictionary. Choose a book with a good story so you want to read, and use your finger or a pen as a guide to force you to read at a good speed. If you’re not used to reading then this takes practice, but it won’t take long to get your reading speed and comprehension up to 300+ words per minute. We don’t need luck 😉
PTE: Five Roads to Success
Like many, you may have heard that the PTE test is ‘easier’ to pass than IELTS, and the good news is, you may be right! Our students have been passing this test regularly every month. Yet, still many find this test another hurdle for them. So, whether you’re aiming for 79, 65 or ‘only’ 50, we are here to help you achieve your target band. Just follow these five (5) easy steps:
- Take one of our courses. This will give you all-round familiarity and understanding of the test. This option will save you plenty of time of self research into the test because we are qualified trainers and assessors in exam preps, including the PTE.
- Get a book. It’s worthwhile to run that extra mile of practice to score higher, and pick a suitable one for your level of English.
- Free practice on the moodle. We’ve designed numerous online practices so that you can apply the tips, strategies and language you’ve learned in class to boost your test-taking confidence.
- Buy the Pearson mock tests. For one thing, you can experiment on your speaking style to maximise your score. Many students pass the test after they know how to approach the mock test and then replicate this strategy in the real exam.
- Book a tutor. Tutors will help push you across the finish line by giving you expert personalised coaching to identify and work on your weaknesses.
FINAL TIPS: Plan and book your favourite test centre 2-3 months in advance and prepare accordingly. Good luck!
19 December 2016
Telaga
OET Writing – Making subjects and verbs agree Part 2: Compound Subjects
The word “compound” means made up of two or more parts. Here are some examples of compound subjects:
- “diet and exercise”
- “blood pressure, glucose level and mental state”
- “food or medication”
- “condition, complication or concern”
When more than one noun or pronoun is the subject of one verb, each of them still needs to agree with the verb. There are certain rules that must be followed:
Joined by AND:
Rule #1: Two or more singular or plural nouns joined by “and” act as a plural compound subject, and a plural verb is used.
e.g. The venlafaxine and aspirin are being continued.
Joined by OR/NOR:
Rule #2: When two or more singular or plural nouns are joined by “or/nor”, the verb agrees with the noun closest to it.
e.g. Neither the mother nor the baby had any postnatal issues.
e.g. Mr Jones or his relatives are collecting his medication.
Try the exercise below to practice your subject-verb agreement skills! J
Best of luck,
Anna Brzeska (OET Teacher)
Exercise : Circle the correct verb (singular or plural) in the following sentences:
- The date and time of the accident is/are not certain.
- Physical therapy and acupuncture is/are recommended by the orthopedist.
- Neither the patient nor the doctor was/were prepared for the tumor found in the patient’s brain on MRI last Tuesday.
- Dietary changes or insulin commencement is/are
Answers: 1. are, 2. are, 3. was, 4. is.
– Anna Brzeska, OET Teacher
Japanese Diary of Mrs. Toshiko Jackson – 5
National disaster: South Korea’s ferry victims
For Koreans, May used to be a happy and pleasant month spending time with families due to the nice weather and great holidays such as Children’s day and Parents’ day. However, this time has changed for Koreans to be depressed and miserable since last month after a ferry sank.
More than 240 people lost their lives and 54 people are missing from the ferry sinking on 16, April 2014 in Jindo, South Korea. Of the 429 passengers on board, more than 300 were students travelling from a high school to Jeju island, Korea. The high school organised a school trip for students in their first and second years who were 16 or 17 years old. Among those, 78 students were rescued, however most students in the ferry followed the captain’s initial order to remain in their seats, triggering a terrible but avoidable tragedy.
Several rescued passengers said they had not realised the ferry was sinking until the ferry suddenly tilted on its side. The cause of the accident has not yet been identified, although rescued passengers stated the ferry came to a sudden, shuddering halt, which may indicate a tight turn may have triggered the accident.
The captain of the ferry, Lee Joon Seok and 10 crew members have been arrested on charges ranging from criminal negligence to abandoning passengers and escaping the ferry immediately, violating the marinetime law of securing the safety of passengers first.
Although all hope of finding survivors has been extinguished due to the delayed salvage operations, there is still considerable anger and frustration among family members of the missing and this feeling has been spreading to all Koreans.
Lily Woo (Korean Teacher)
Japanese Diary of Mrs. Toshiko Jackson – 3
Hi everyone, 皆さん、こんにちは。
My Japanese classes/lessons included practices to develop skills of speaking/talking, reading, listening, writing, interacting, and constructing/performing students’ own dialogues by pairs/groups. As for the main textbooks and materials, the Beginner 1 usedTraining Manual and other handouts for vocab, grammar etc. From Beginners 2 onwards, Genki Book 1 was used for the main textbook.
Also, apart from Japanese magazines (e.g. Jenta, Nichigo Press), Japanese newspapers, The Australian (esp. for news/current affairs on Japan), Daily Telegraph (its travel magazines and pictures of cute animals etc to make sentences/application of grammar in Japanese) were used. At the end of courses of 10 weeks, the students had an exam or open-exam which included features of vocab., grammar, dialogues construction, translation and script. – One of Beginners 1 classes did so well with dialogues making and performing, i.e. linguistically and in making creative/interesting contexts of the dialogues and performing them in the front of classroom, that was delightful.
In a lesson for a 6-year-old girl, I taught her shuuji (calligraphy) (more formal name is shodo) to practise Hiragana in caligraphy, learn vocab and enjoy the special, peaceful (mind/heart calming and clarifying activitity). Beforehand, I prepared small, pretty pictures which were cut out from magazines and flyers; in the lesson, I sticked them to the bottom corner of each white sheet so that her Hiragana writing of Japanese words in the middle of the sheets will reflect the pictures. The words/pictures included ones of Mt. Fuji (in front of big beautiful green tea leaves fields), cherry blossoms, sushi dish etc apart from her name. She enjoyed that activity. She has mastered stroke orders of many Hiragana letters, so her hiragana words in calligraphy was just like a native speaker’s calligraphy and very good. It was very worthwhile exercise. I plan to do similar activity with adult classes too once in a course. I recall that many years ago I taught shuuji as extra activity in a pilot program of Japanese course at a primary school in Melbourne for half a year. It had about 7 pupils (both boys and girls) in class. When the pupils were doing shuuji, the whole classroom was amazingly “so” quiet for about 20 minutes. Shuuji or calligraphy are good for any ages.
In my last month’s Blog, I reported about the Tokyo Motor Show this month (Dec. ’13) and the major Japanese car makers’ models at the Show which were tiny electric cars, esp. all-electric tandem-seat three-wheelers. Recently I found an Japanese newspaper article (Nihon-keizai-shimbun, 21.10.13, p. 33, “Denki-jidoosha, ritoo –de koohasshin”) on the increasing sales of such electric car/vehicle (EV) esp. in small islands which are away from the major islands, such as Honshuu and Kyuushuu. The article informs great merits of use of such very small electric cars. (The articles particularly report about Nissan and Toyota’s models.) That is, the drivers can go through narrow roads with great versatility (compared to use of conventional cars), energy cost for driving such cars is less than half of the cost paid for driving fuel based, conventional cars.
Those EVs can’t be driven for a long distance. One EV can run for 299km at maximum after charging battery each time. Those EV have different models. Some of them can accommodate 4 people in the car; some others can 3, 2 or 1 person. Apart from individuals (including people who are older people), business groups, esp. those of tourism based ones, and public offices, like City Councils, bought or rented such EV and use them for business, tourism and daily life. There are even daily rental cars of such are increasingly used. e.g. in a small island near to Kagoshima prefecture (located the south of Kyuushuu Island) and an island near to Kagawa prefecture, they have rental EV cars especially for tourists. The latter’s rental EV cars cost ¥8400/day. For that, there are clients who wait for those cars as “kyanseru-machi” (waiting for the car cancelled by someone else). Another amazing and inspiring innovation for people’s better life and such society!
Japanese Teacher, Toshiko Jackson
3.2.14
How to deal with long listening tasks when you take TOPIK
여러분 안녕하세요. 애슐리 입니다.
If you have ever taken TOPIK (Test of proficiency in Korean: i.e. an official Korean language proficiency test) before, you may have come across the situation where you did not have enough time to finish listening test or you had problems to remember what the listening contents were about.
Actually, it is very common to have those problems in relation to the listening module since human’s brain has limited capacity to keep the contents what you listened to (especially when it is very new things) due to the limitation to the short term memory.
So what should you do? Here are some tips to overcome your listening issues when you deal with long listening passages. All tips were tested by me when I learned English and Japanese.
1. Do not waste the recording breaks
Did you know that you have at least 4-5 seconds between each group of questions? 4seconds seem very short but actually it is critical since you can prepare for your listening and pre-read the key words.
2. Write tiny memo on the test paper’s empty spaces
When you listen to the passages, you must write the key words, important information such as time and date that they say. It could be the simple solutions when you forgot the information
3. Oops, you missed it! Then just let it go.
It is very frustrated when you missed the contents. However, it happens to everyone. Just let it go and focus on the next passage because if you keep thinking about your mistakes that you have missed already and cannot focus on the following contents, you may lose the rest of the questions.
Good luck with your TOPIK!
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