59. IELTS Tips (Pt.2): Interview with Jessica Beck

<p>Get more IELTS tips the second half of this special interview with ex-IELTS examiner Jessica Beck. You will learn if anxiety and being too nervous affects your test score (and also how to deal with your nerves), advice to handle tricky topics where you have no idea what to say, and lastly, some recommendations for materials to help you build your skills.</p> <ul><li><a href='https://realenglishconversations.com/58-ielts-exam-tips-with-jessica-beck-pt-1/'>Listen to Part 1 of the interview here</a> (recommended)</li> <li>Get access to the podcast transcription by <a href='https://realenglishconversations.com/courses/lp/free-member/'>creating your Free Member account here</a></li> </ul> <p> </p> <p>Transcription</p> <p>Amy: This is something that I wanted to talk about, it's one of the questions from our community and it was dealing with nervousness because this is something you go to this exam. It's a big deal. There's a cost to be able to take the exam. There's a date set. There's a lot of pressure to perform.</p> <p>Jessica: Totally.</p> <p>Amy: So do you have any insight about, number one, how do examiners interpret this or react or if it affects the score in any way? And any tips related to how students can maybe reduce their nervous feelings at the time of the exam?</p> <p>Jessica: Yeah. Oh, my gosh. That's that's a great question. How do examiners react to that? Well, so you're not graded on your level of nerves, right?</p> <p>Amy: Or confidence.</p> <p>Jessica: Yeah, totally. I have had candidates come in who were so nervous they could not make eye contact with me and maybe they just like stared at the wall behind me the whole time or they stared at their shoes the whole time. It didn't impact their score at all because that is what they had to do to be able to speak. And that's fine, guys, if as long as you're still talking, as long as you're not allowing that anxiety to get in the way of your communication.</p> <p>But that's a rare case, because if we think about someone who's anx