Claire - IELTS

Read as much as possible outside of class, and from as many different sources as you can: novels, newspapers, magazines and more. Reading from a wide variety of sources will let you see lots of new vocabulary and a different selection of grammar structures to use, which will really help you in the writing part of your exam. Make sure you take a note of all the new words you find, as well as how to use them.

Alan - Cambridge (CAE)

In the Listening section of the exam, very often the frequency of words can be important as it tells us which parts of the extract address the question and which are just distractors. Repeated words in the same vocabulary area (e.g. socialising – go out, have a good time, pubs and clubs) show us that this topic is important and helps us to make sense of a kind of story. The more related keywords we have, the more we can fill in the gaps and make educated guesses. This is particularly helpful for those questions we perhaps aren’t sure about. Always write down a few simple keywords!

Jenny - Cambridge (FCE)

Don’t just routinely do past papers, this won’t help you learn. Explain your choice of answers to others and this will help you clarify things in your own head.

Mark - Cambridge (CPE)

Get your exam group to bond and study together every day. If necessary, delegate one of them to be responsible for the group. Hours of fun!

Georgina, Cambridge (FCE)

Get organised – get a folder that you can either slip important pieces of information into that the teacher gives you on grammar, vocabulary and the exam or buy a glue stick and put them into a book. This is so important as it means you have easy access to this information and you can review things easily when you get nearer the exam.

Renata - IELTS

When learning new words, don’t just look at a translation – they’re often used differently from your own language. Make sure you focus on meaning, and in what context you can use the word in; and pronunciation – especially word stress.