IELTS & OET - Tips to increase your score
About IELTS
IELTS is the International English Language Testing System. It is the world's most popular English language test for higher education and global migration, with over 2.5 million IELTS tests taken in the last year. IELTS is accepted as evidence of English language proficiency by over 9,000 organizations worldwide. IELTS is recognized as a secure, valid and reliable indicator of true-to-life ability to communicate in English for education, immigration, and professional accreditation.
About OET
The Occupational English Test (also known as OET) is an international English language test for the healthcare sector. It assesses the language communication skills of healthcare professionals who wish to register and practice in an English-speaking environment.
OET is available for the following 12 professions: dentistry, dietetics, medicine, nursing, occupational therapy, optometry, pharmacy, physiotherapy, podiatry, radiography, speech pathology, and veterinary science.
Why are they necessary?
The IELTS Exam is recognize by universities, companies, professional bodies such as the GMC and NMC, immigration authorities, and government institution all around the world as a measure of English Language ability.
The Occupational English Test (OET) is used in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore among others to assess the Medical English skills of a wide range of international healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurses and AHPs.
How to prepare for the IELTS test
IELTS measures your reading, writing, listening and speaking skills, and assesses your ability to communicate for work, study or life in an English-speaking country.
The first step is to make sure you understand the IELTS test format. You need to know what will be expected of you on test day.
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Understand the IELTS test format
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Study the test format to make sure that you know what to expect.
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Look carefully at the content of each part of the IELTS test: listening, reading, writing and speaking.
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Get to know the different types of questions that you may be asked in each part.
How to prepare for the OET Exams
Knowing what to expect and having a plan is the first step toward success. The Occupational English Test (OET) consists of four different sub-tests:
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listening
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reading
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writing, and
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speaking
Each sub-test is scored independently. You will receive a grade of A, B, C, D, or E on each sub-test. "A" is the highest score; "E" is the lowest. Most employers expect a score of at least a "B".
IELTS Study Tips
You must focus on building your Core English Skills
A major mistake some IELTS candidates make when preparing for the test is focusing only on mock tests. Many think that the more mock tests they do, the better prepared they will be. This is a misconception. The test is skill-based, not knowledge-based. This means that each mock test you do will contain different content that you can’t study for. It’s about the quality of your skills and not the number of your mock tests.
Learn from your weaknesses
Learning from your mistakes and being conscious of your habits and weaknesses is an important step towards success.
Structure your essay writing
Develop your writing skills by learning how to structure an essay paragraph by paragraph. Practice reading and understanding essay questions. It is easy to go off-topic or not directly answer the question. Also, read many different sample essay questions and write sample responses.
OET Study Tips
Know About the Test
If you are a new test-taker, your first step is to get acquainted with the test. The more you know about the test, the easier it becomes to pass the test.
Accuracy Vs Length
As a part of testing your English language proficiency, OET tests will test your writing skills in addition to verbal skills. It is always important to learn to write more effectively than writing something to meet the stated word count in the exam. Though focusing on the word length is important while giving the written test, you should make sure that you talk about the concept that is asked for.
Improve your weaker areas
Know where you lack is a good thing as it will help you improve the weaker areas. Identify your weak areas and work harder to progress them. For example, if you believe you are weak at writing, start writing more. Similarly for the speaking section, speaking aloud and playing roles is a good strategy to improve your speaking skills for the test.
If you're looking for Family Medicine Jobs in the UK, you may already know that you first need to prove your ability with the English Level. GMC accepts both IELTS and OET Certificates as proofs that you have the required English Level to practice in the UK.