Welcome!
Hello and welcome to Understanding IELTS: Techniques for English language tests. Thank you for joining this course. We hope you enjoy the next six weeks.
How does the course work?
Over six weeks we’ll look at all aspects of the International English Language Testing System (IELTS). We’ll start each week by asking you to share your feelings about one of the four skills of English - reading, speaking, writing and listening. We’ll then look at how these skills are tested in the IELTS test before moving on to what you can do to improve your performance.
Our video tutor, Rob, will introduce each topic and give you some tips throughout the week. You’ll do some short quizzes to help you improve your test-taking techniques.
At almost every step you will be asked to share your opinions, ideas and questions with other learners. The best way to get the most out of the course is to be prepared to join in and say what you think.
If this is the first course you’ve taken on FutureLearn, you’ll find links at the bottom of this page that tell you how FutureLearn courses work and give you some ideas about how to get the most out of this course.
Meet the team
I’m Alister, the lead educator on Understanding IELTS. Working with me are a team of educators based in different countries. During the course, we’ll be working with you, reading your comments and answering your questions and perhaps asking new questions during our discussions.
If you’ve taken part in one of our other British Council courses, (like Exploring English: Language and Culture or Exploring English: Shakespeare), welcome back! You’ll be familiar with how FutureLearn courses work. You don’t need to follow the educators from those courses again but you should follow the new educators from the list below.
If this is your first British Council course, take a moment now to visit our FutureLearn educator profiles using the links below and click the Follow button. That will make it easier for you to see our comments during the course. We have a global team of educators waiting to answer your questions and join your conversations:
Alister Widdowson - Lead Educator (UK), Neil McLaren (Slovakia), Tina Pole (Italy), Neeraj Dhanani (Spain) and Karen Waterston (Spain).
Your turn to say ‘hello’
Now you have met us, we would like you to introduce yourself by posting a comment below. Tell us something about:
Who you are
Where you’re from
Why you’ve joined this course
Click the pink Comments link below to read what other learners have said, then post a short comment of your own to tell us about yourself.
Join the community
Understanding IELTS has a Facebook group with over 20,000 members - people who are doing the course now or who have done it in the past. It’s great place to ask questions, help each other out and get extra support with the exam. Why not join us there?
Need some help?
If you need help with anything, try posting your question in a comment, or click the Feedback button on the left of the page.
Mark as complete
Well done, you’ve reached the end of this step. Hopefully, you understood everything and are ready for the next step of the course.
Now click the pink Mark as complete button below, then click either the forward or back arrow to move on.