IDIOMS QUIZ (ADVANCED LEVEL)

Idioms quiz (Advanced)

Test you and your friends advanced knowledge of English with our short Idioms Quiz. Loser has to buy the next drink :-)

Match the phrases 1-5 with their letter below:

1. to make all the difference
2. to give up the ghost
3. to live on the breadline
4. to be a money spinner
5. to be well-heeled


a. to be very poor
b. to have plenty of money
c. to working or stop trying to succeed because they know it's impossible
d. to have a good effect on something
e. to be a successful way of making money

Answers:
1-d; 2-c; 3-a; 4-e; 5-b

To find out more about this and for more IELTS and English learning tips study with CNR. http://www.ieltscnr.com

IELTS TIPS AND TRICKS

READING RESOURCE - THANH NIEN
VIETNAM'S BEST READING RESOURCE?

You don't have to only use sites like www.bbc.co.uk or www.cnn.com to get news stories to improve your English.
Thanh Nien is an excellent resource with some very good English language stories about Vietam and the world.
You can use this to develop ideas and vocabulary for your IELTS Task 2 Writing or the reading exam.

Here's the link :-)

http://www.thanhniennews.com

IELTS TIPS AND TRICKS

IELTS CNR PREDICTS TOPICS IN 28th MARCH EXAM

Several students have told us that in several of our courses they studied the questions they got in the exam.

One student said:
The IELTS Advanced course covered a unit on Space Exploration and in Saturday's reading exam we had exactly that!

Second student:
Ms Huong helped me practice the topics I had in the speaking exam! Sadly, I didn't revise them before.

Third student:
I discussed task 2 topic on children and TV and creative activities and exercise on Friday and on Saturday the Task 2 Writing was "Children are watching more TV and doing less creative activities - what are the causes and what solutions can you suggest?"

IELTS TIPS AND TRICKS

Studying collocation:

There are several ways to study collocation, the most common is using a collocation dictionary such as that produced by Oxford. However, it is not very efficient if you need to learn certain vocabulary sets for particular IELTS topics.

CNR recommends that you use reading material top study vocabulary sets and their collocations. Obviously, we all record new vocabulary but what students should be doing is writing down ALL vocabulary they need for a particular topic. But not just the vocab, also write down its verb, preposition, adjective, adverb etc. This is collocation and this will help you move toward a bandscore 7.0 in vocabulary for Task 2 writing.

For example: 
- Look at this paragraph and identify the topic vocabulary.
- Then highlight the 2 or 3+ word combinations that describe the topic (normally the nouns with some verbs and adjectives)
- Then highlight the general, academic vocabulary that can be used in many topics.
NB: pay careful attention to the prepositions and articles :-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------

MPs have quizzed the scientist at the centre of the "climategate" scandal, the first time he has been questioned in public since the row erupted.

Professor Phil Jones used his appearance before the science committee to say that he had done nothing wrong.

Earlier, critics told the MPs that the stolen e-mails, which appeared on the internet in November, raised questions about the integrity of climate science.

Lord Lawson called for scientists to be more open about their methodologies.

In November, more than 1,000 stolen messages between scientists at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU), based at the University of East Anglia (UEA), and their peers around the world were posted on the web, along with other documents.

Climate "sceptics" have claimed that the stolen data show that some researchers, including Professor Jones, have attempted to manipulate data in order to strengthen the argument that human activities are responsible for warming the planet.

FULL ARTICLE AT: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8543289.stm

IELTS TIPS AND TRICKS

Task 1 Process writing:

How to write an overview for a task 1 process? Easy...

Many students don't know what to write as an overview for these process. They will either write something about how popular a product is or how useful it is to society, or write something so general it has no meaning or importance except to increase the word count. However, it is actually quite easy...

DO NOT :(  Write the following. "Overall, there are many stages in the process."
DO WRITE :)  "Overall, the production of silk is complex and can be split into two main stages, from moth to cocoon and from selecting to weaving, in total there are 14 steps to this process."

So, all you need to do is divide the process up into parts and then find an approximate total for the steps within it. Then, using key words from the diagram, indicate the beginning and end. DONE! :-)