Preparing students for high-stakes exams brings many challenges, including the risk of over-testing. In this webinar, Allen Davenport focuses on the IELTS Speaking section, and provides techniques and practical activities that exploit authentic practice material.
This webinar carries on from parts 1-3 of Allen’s IELTS series, covering reading, writing and listening – this time with a focus on speaking. Allen emphasises that authentic practice testing can be used as more than just giving a test in class – it can be an impactful way to help your students get the IELTS score they want and need. The IELTS Speaking test brings particular challenges to a classroom, for example:
- time
- task
- feedback
- target language acquisition vs memorisation
To accommodate these challenges, Allen presents his ‘Triangle of Authenticity’ model, made up of the three authentic practice test (APT) ‘slices’. He suggests this is an effective formula for best utilising authentic materials when practicing the Speaking section, aiming for two out of any of the three ‘slices’ in lessons:
Watch the webinar recording below to hear Allen suggest a variety of useful lesson activities for these various slices, to help you exploit authentic practice material and encourage improved IELTS speaking test technique for your students.
After more exam practice materials? Why not check out practicemakesperfect.cambridge.org