Biography
How long have you been teaching IELTS?
I first begun teaching IELTS more than 10 years ago at a language school in central London and have since taught IELTS preparation classes at Brunel University and King’s College London. I have also contributed to the Mindset for IELTS coursebook series, writing units for the Students’ Books, a Teachers’ book and additional online practice tasks.
What do you love about the English language?
I really love how there are so many different varieties of English – we can even use the plural form ‘Englishes’ to describe the different ways in which the language is spoken. I love meeting people who come from different parts of the world where English is spoken and noting the different words or grammatical structures that they use. I lived in Canada for a year, and I remember somebody asking me (on a very cold day) if I had a ‘tuque’. It turned out that tuque is the Canadian word for a warm winter hat – which is actually based on a French word from the 1870s!
What’s your favourite English word?
‘People carrier’ (another word for a 7-seater car). For some reason, it makes me think of a huge friendly giant carrying lots of people safely home in his arms!
What’s your top tip for those taking IELTS?
Firstly, I think it is really important to have a good understanding of how the test works and what to expect. In order to be really well-prepared for the exam, you will then need to identify the areas of the test that you find most challenging and do plenty of practice in these areas to help you improve. It can be tempting to just do a lot of practice tests, but you are likely to score better on these if you devote time to working on the subskills you will need to get a high score. For example, if you find IELTS writing the most challenging, try to identify the specific aspects of the task that you struggle with, for example, using a wide range of vocabulary, using correct sentence structure and so on, and make sure that you spend plenty of time on these. You will probably find that developing these skills will not only help you to achieve your target band score in the IELTS exam, but will also really help you to succeed in your future studies.
