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本文作者为山东大学学府雅思特别为网广大网友奉献的外教Patrick Tan文章。
Taming the IELTS Speaking section Part 2
Last week, I spoke about the necessity of being “international” in the way you think in order to be successful in the IELTS. Today, I will delve further into this idea by speaking about the band scores. By nature, westerners like to categorize and classify the phenomenon that we observe around us. And it is important to note that human beings are not exempt from this Euclidian analysis of all things. In the ordered placidity of the information age, numbers very often define our abilities and sometimes our futures. Take for example, the IQ test, which claims to measure the human intellect to the omnipresent university GPA score that students hang their lives on. As such, it is vital that we fully understand the criteria that put us within the category that we wish to be in.
As I am sure you already know, IELTS band scale is from 1 to 9. Unlike the Reading and Listening sections, the Speaking section is only reported in whole band scores. Most students in China receive band scores ranging from a low of band 4 to high of band 7. In addition, a Band 8 or 9 implies native speaker or at least near native speaker proficiency. To the hardened campaigners of the IELTS, these facts are all but unfamiliar. However, what is more important is to gain a proper realization of your own English levels as pertains to the IELTS and then improve the areas required for a higher score.
Allow me to give an example to properly illustrate my point. Let us imagine that a hypothetical candidate who can speak English but has no IELTS training attempts the Speaking exam. Say that he gets a Band 5. Now, based on the Band Descriptors, he is a “Modest User”. He is believed to have “partial command of the language, coping with the overall meaning in most situations, though is likely to make many mistakes”, but he “should be able to handle basic communication in his own field.” Assuming that the student wishes to raise his English level, the next logical step up would be to a band 6.
Returning to the Band descriptors as given by the British Council and UCLES, we will see that in order to achieve a band 6, he must be a “Competent user” of English. This means he should have a “generally effective command of the language despite some inaccuracies, inappropriacies and misunderstandings.” However, he “can use and understand fairly complex language, particularly in familiar situations.”
If we carefully dissect the two band scores, we will discover several distinct similarities as well as dissimilarities. Firstly, both bands state that the candidate must be familiar with his own field. On one hand, this implies the need for a clear ability in communicating thoughts and ideas closely related to one’s present circumstances. On the other hand, it means that the candidate need not memorize special vocabulary. It is important to be aware of this fact because learning new vocabulary is a painstaking task. Being a student of Chinese, I recognize how demoralizing it is to face words that you do not understand.
However, seeing as the Speaking section focuses on communication and not regurgitation, I strongly recommend that students move their focus from blind memorization to usage. In so saying, I feel that the student should first ensue that he can make use of his existing vocabulary, how ever small he may think it to be. Having accomplished this, he should then, and only then, begin to digest new vocabulary. Even then, he should perform this task intelligently. First peruse though the available IELTS topics. Be sure to be familiar with all the questions that may be asked. When you are faced with a question that you cannot answer with the vocabulary you have, this signals the need to learn new words and ways of expression. And those are the words that will be invaluable in your English usage in the future. The others are just a waste of gray matter.
Patrick Tan
11th June 2003
Next week: Understanding the Band Descriptors (and Knowing yourself) continued.
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