IELTS PREPARATION HOMEPAGE

SAMPLE PAPERS –READING, WRITING, SPEAKING

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 IELTS READING PAPER
Job satisfaction and personnel mobility

Europe, and indeed all the major industrialized nations, is currently going through a
recession. This obviously has serious implications for companies and personnel who find
themselves victims of the downturn. As Britain apparently eases out of recession, there are
also potentially equally serious implications for the companies who survive, associated with
the employment and recruitment market in general.
During a recession, voluntary staff turnover is bound to fall sharply. Staff who have been
with a company for some years will clearly not want to risk losing their accumulated
redundancy rights. Furthermore, they will be unwilling to go to a new organization where
they may well be joining on a ‘last in, first out’ basis. Consequently, even if there is little or
no job satisfaction in their current post, they are most likely to remain where they are,
quietly sitting it out and waiting for things to improve. In Britain, this situation has been
aggravated by the length and nature of the recession – as may also prove to be the case in
the rest of Europe and beyond.
In the past, companies used to take on staff at the lower levels and reward loyal employees
with internal promotions. This opportunity for a lifetime career with one company is no
longer available, owing to ‘downsizing’ of companies, structural reorganizations and
redundancy programmes, all of which have affected middle management as much as the
lower layers. This reduction in the layers of management has led to flatter hierarchies,
which, in turn, has reduced promotion prospects within most companies. Whereas
ambitious personnel had become used to regular promotion, they now find their progress is
blocked.
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 IELTS READING PAPER CONTD……

This situation is compounded by yet another factor. When staff at any level are
taken on, it is usually from outside and promotion is increasingly through career
moves between companies. Recession has created a new breed of bright young
graduates, much more self-interested and cynical than in the past. They tend to be
more wary, sceptical of what is on offer and consequently much tougher
negotiators. Those who joined companies directly from education feel the effects
most strongly and now feel uncertain and insecure in mid-life.
In many cases, this has resulted in staff dissatisfaction. Moreover, management
itself has contributed to this general ill-feeling and frustration. The caring image of
the recent past has gone and the fear of redundancy is often used as the prime
motivator. As a result of all these factors, when the recession eases and people find
more confidence, there will be an explosion of employees seeking new
opportunities to escape their current jobs. This will be led by younger, less-
experienced employees and the hard-headed young graduates

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 IELTS READING PAPER CONTD……
‘Headhunters’ confirm that older staff are still cautious, having seen so many good
companies ‘go to the wall’, and are reluctant to jeopardize their redundancy
entitlements. Past experience, however, suggests that, once triggered, the expansion
in recruitment will be very rapid.
The problem which faces many organizations is one of strategic planning; of not
knowing who will leave and who will stay. Often it is the best personnel who move on
whilst the worst cling to the little security they have. This is clearly a problem for
companies, who need a stable core on which to build strategies for future growth.
Whilst this expansion in the recruitment market is likely to happen soon in Britain,
most employers are simply not prepared. With the loss of middle management, in a
static marketplace, personnel management and recruitment are often conducted by
junior personnel. They have only known recession and lack the experience to plan
ahead and to implement strategies for growth. This is true of many other functions,
leaving companies without the skills, ability or vision to structure themselves for long-
term growth. Without this ability to recruit competitively for strategic planning, and
given the speed at which these changes are likely to occur, a real crisis seems
imminent.
According to the information in the reading passage, select the most appropriate of the
given options A-D.
Now complete each sentence by choosing from the list of possible endings the ones
which best reflect the information in the reading passage. Match the endings with the
sentences beginnings given.
Here is a summary of the last section of the reading passage. Complete the summary
by choosing no more than three words from the passage to fill each space.
Now choose the best answer to this question.
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 IELTS READING PAPER 2
The education gap

Education is the passport to modern life, and a pre-condition of national prosperity. But
more than a quarter of the world's adults - 900 million - cannot read or write, and more than
100 million young children are deprived of even a primary school education. In most
developing countries, after decades of educational expansion, spending on learning is
falling. The illiterate are virtually helpless in a world ruled by the written word, where
notices and official papers can seem a mass of meaningless hieroglyphics. People who
cannot decipher them are at the mercy of those who can; many, as a result, have been
cheated of their rights or their land.

Studies show that people with even a basic education are healthier and eat better. They are
more likely to plan their families and their children are more likely to survive. According to
the World Bank, just four years of primary education enables farmers to increase
productivity by ten per cent, often the difference between hunger and sufficiency. National
economic returns from education outstrip those from most other forms of investment.

Enrolment: rise and fall

As they became independent, most developing countries enthusiastically embraced
education. Two decades of astonishing expansion followed. Between 1960 and 1981, the
world’s thirty-two poorest countries (excluding India and China, which have long had good
records) increased the proportion of their children enrolled in primary school from thirty-
eight to seventy-two per cent. The thirty-eight next poorest achieved almost universal
primary school enrolment by 1980; up from about two-thirds in 1960. It seemed as if it
would not be long before every child alive could be sure of going to school.

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 IELTS READING PAPER 2 CONTD…….

By the end of the 1080s, that dream had turned to bitter disillusion. The decade brought
economic disaster to developing countries. They slumped when rich nations went into
recession at the beginning of the 1980s, the subsequent recovery passed them by and
they were hit again by the renewed recession in the late 1980s and early 1990s. By
1989, enrolment rates had dropped in one out of every five developing countries. In some
African countries, the number of children in primary schools declined by a third between
1980 and 1985. Tanzania’s universal primary school enrolment fell dramatically during
this period. Unesco’s Director-General, Federico Mayor, warns that this threatens to ‘set
back the countries of the South by a whole generation or even more’.

Declining expenditure
The proportion of national expenditure going to education declined in more than half of
developing countries over the 1980s. In the world’s thirty-seven poorest countries, the
average expenditure per head on education dropped by a quarter. In Africa as a whole,
says the World Bank, only $0.60 a year is spent on educational materials for each
student, whilst it estimates ‘minimum requirements’ at $5.00.

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 IELTS READING PAPER 2 CONTD…….

Illiteracy and the poor

In industrialized countries, absolute illiteracy was largely eradicated half a century

ago; they contain only two per cent of the world’s illiterate. ‘Functional illiteracy’,
however, remains; in Canada, the literacy of a quarter of all adults is seriously
inadequate; in the United States, estimates range from five to twenty-five per cent: in
France, the total numbers range from two to eight million people, depending on the
study. Most are among the poorest members of their societies.

Generally speaking, the poorer a country, the higher the number of illiterate; two-
thirds of adults in the very poorest countries cannot read or write. Furthermore, the
poorest individuals suffer most. The poorer a child’s family, the less likely he (or,
particularly, she) is to start school and the more likely it is that those who do start will
drop out.
The disadvantaged countryside
More people in the Third World live in the countryside, where schools and teachers
are always scarcer. But even in the cities, the poor miss out. In Calcutta, over sixty
per cent of children do not attend school because they have to work to keep the
family going, or look after younger siblings to enable their mothers to work. Two-
thirds of the children who either never start school or drop out early are girls. Two-
thirds of the world’s illiterates are women. Yet women’s education is particularly
important.
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 IELTS READING PAPER 2 CONTD…
The World Bank identifies it as ‘perhaps the single most important determinant of family
health and nutrition’, and its research shows that infant mortality rates fall steadily, and
dramatically, for every year women spend at school. But tradition, prejudices and the
burden of work to be done at home ensure that daughters are pulled out of school first. In
the first grade of Kampala’s primary schools, the sexes are evenly balanced; by the seventh
grade, there are more than twice as many boys as girls.

Primary education: the productive dollar

Every dollar invested in primary school education, according to another World Bank study, is
fifty per cent more productive than one invested in secondary schooling, and gives twice as
much as one spent on universities. Yet throughout the Third World, these spending
priorities are reversed.
A few countries have started to change their priorities, emphasizing primary
education. Zimbabwe doubled its number of primary schools in its first five years of
independence; the proportion of its budget spent on education is the fifth highest in the
world, and the curriculum has been re-oriented to meet local needs. Bangladesh has
opened more than 2,500 basic village primary schools with appropriate syllabuses since
1985, at an annual cost of just $15.00 per pupil. Only 1.5 per cent of the children drop out,
compared to sixty per cent of their peers in the ordinary primary schools. Moreover, ninety-
five per cent of all pupils, the majority girls, continue their education after leaving.
Nonetheless, all these countries are under harsh economic pressure. There is little hope for
the children of the Third World countries, even if their governments do change their
priorities, unless their countries are enabled to develop.
Complete this sentence about the passage.
Choose the best answer to summarise the purpose of the passage.
Match the data summarising some information from the passage.
Choose which answer best represents the information in the passage. 8
 SPEAKING PARTS 1 AND 2
In the first stage of the interview the examiner will ask you some general questions
about yourself and the subjects you know about, for example about your educational
background, work experience and leisure interests. When you go into the interview
room, the interviewer will greet you, exchange introductions, check your identification
and then start the interview. The questions on familiar topics will give you a chance to
convey a lot of information about yourself and your life, but will also allow you to relax
and ‘warm-up’. It is important that you try to give extended answers. Remember, the
purpose of the questions is to get you to talk. Questions may also focus on the culture
of your country (educational system, social customs etc) or on aspects of your lifestyle
(family life, city life, hobbies etc). These are all very broad areas in terms of the
number of questions that could be asked so this is another reason why you can’t
prepare specific answers.
Draw up a personal information form like the one below and be prepared to talk about
it for four minutes:
Your full name
Nationality
First language
Other languages
Educational background
Occupation and work experience
Personal interests
Family Features of your home culture

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 SPEAKING PARTS 1 AND 2
Part 2
In the second stage of the interview you will be given a card which tells you the topic you
should talk about for one to two minutes. It also gives you some prompts about what you
should include in your talk. You then have one minute to prepare your topic and you will be
allowed to make some notes. The examiner will tell you when to start and finish and may
ask you one or two questions. In this part it is important to try to keep talking for the
whole two minutes. It is not a conversation so do not expect the examiner to join in.
Here are some example cards. Use them to practise with your partner:
Describe a wedding you have been to or heard about.
You should say:
who got married
what they wore
what they did on the day
and explain how you felt about this wedding.
Describe a wild animal that can be found in your country.
You should say:
what it looks like
where it lives
what you like/don't like about it
and explain how people in your country generally feel about it.

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 SPEAKING PART 3
Part 3
In the third part of the speaking test you will be asked to discuss more general issues related to
the part 2 topic. This part will be much more abstract and the examiner will be interested in how
well you express your ideas and opinions about these issues.
As an example, look at the possible issues that could be linked to the topic given on one of the
cards in Part 2:

You can practise your fluency by imagining yourself in situations where you would need to
speak English. Practise asking questions and talking about any sort of topics. Pay
attention to accuracy too - note any special problems you have and try to avoid them in your
practice.
Summary
What you need to know:
how to talk fluently
how to anticipate content
how to use appropriate language
how to use strategies
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Remember:
SPEAKING PART 3
1. The format of the test is as follows:
In the first part of the interview you will be asked questions
about yourself and familiar topics.
In the second part you will be given a card with a topic and some
prompts. You will have one minute to prepare this topic and
then you will talk about it for one to two minutes.
In the last part the examiner will develop the topic into a more
abstract discussion. You will be asked for your opinions and
ideas on related issues.
2. Try to talk as much and as fluently as possible. In the actual
test, do not let concern about accuracy obstruct fluency.
3. Do not prepare specific answers: they will not be useful and
they will make it more difficult for you to do a good interview.
4. Relax, be confident and enjoy using your English.
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 WRITING SAMPLE PAPERS-1
Task 2 : Modern technology is transforming the way we work and is of benefit to all of
society.
It is true that modern technology is transforming the way we work but whether it benefits
all of society is less clear. It depends what we mean by society, whether we are thinking of
people as individuals or as a collective.
For example, the use of modern technology may cause a decrease in numbers of people
employed as some work is taken over by machines. This can lead to redundancy as jobs
disappear and there is an increase in unemployment. An additional problem is that the
jobs which disappear are often done by unskilled labour, while new positions created
frequently require skilled operators.
However, modern technology has the potential to transform all of society. For example, a
great deal more is produced on a farm with the aid of modern technology than the yields
which are achieved without this help. It is therefore clear that it provides benefit for us. On
the other hand, some countries in the Third World do not have access to the latest
technology. This can make the difference between the developing and developed worlds
bigger.
Modern technology used in medicine has two advantages. There are now improved drugs
to cure certain illnesses and technology has made it possible for greater precision in surgery
or better possibilities of recovering because intensive care treatment is more sophisticated.
This affects the way doctors and hospitals do their jobs. But not all countries or even all
people in some countries, can afford to take advantage of these improvements.
In conclusion, I agree that a transformation is taking place but I do not agree that this
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provides benefits to all of society. [272 words]
 WRITING SAMPLE PAPER-2
Task 2 : Higher mammals, especially monkeys, have rights and should not be used in
laboratory experiments

The first point to consider is whether or not animals have rights. I believe that all living
creatures have basic rights, and higher mammals especially as a result of their similarity to
people. I think we share over 98 per cent of our genes with them. It is therefore clearly
illogical to consider that we have rights and they have none.

People, or perhaps we can say ‘human kind’, use animals in laboratory experiments to test
medical drugs or make up and give us a sense of security while taking the drugs or using the
make up, knowing that they have been tested on animals. Nobody would be happy about
trying a new drug product that had not been tested in a lab to cure their disease, because it
would mean they were being used as ‘guinea pigs’. This may be necessary but nobody wants
to do it.

Higher mammals, such as monkeys, are the nearest to humans. They have got feelings,
emotions and are able to show what they want or not. They should not be killed or even
electrocuted, have their vital organs taken out or substances injected into their blood
streams, just for tests.

Unfortunately, present scientific techniques are still not able to change the situation totally.
However, with modifications to computer programs, it should be possible to do research to
help both humans and higher mammals, so we will no longer need to actually use them in
these ways to make our own lives safer. Let us hope that this day comes soon.
[ 257 words]
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