Episode 16
The art of predicting the answer in 30 seconds in OET Listening Part A
So, it’s been a while since ,I’ve done an episode and the reason for that is I’ve been busy launching my OET Success Membership, which started on 1st March. So, Monday to Thursday we focus on one sub test each day, Monday is reading, Tuesday is listening, Wednesday os speaking and Thursday is writing. Friday is a Q&A day where you can ask me questions and we go through any problems from the week’s work. Saturday and Sunday are implementation days where you practice the strategies you have learnt, catch up on homework or lessons you have missed from the week. If you would like to join, I have left the link in the show notes. It’s a pay monthly membership and costs just £24.99 per month and you can cancel at any time.
Now, I know there are lots of OET memberships out there so you’re probably thinking, what’s different about this one? Why should I join this one? The problem with other memberships is that there are too many students in it and you never really get any feedback or your questions answered. How do I know this? I’ve had so many students come to me that have left those memberships because they did not get the help they needed and wanted to train with me. Why? Because I try to keep my membership quite small so that I can help each and every one of you. This is important to me because , every student is different and needs to be helped differently and the one size fits all doesn’t really work.
So if you would like to join then you can find the link in the show notes.
Ok so let’s talk about the art of predicting the answer in OET listening Part A.
So Part A consists of two sets of case notes with missing information in them which you need to complete by listening to the consultation between the medical professional and the patient.
You are given 30 seconds to read the case notes before the audio begins and this is where the art of prediction begins. This is the key to scoring well in Part A.
You need to learn how to predict what the answer might be by using your vocabulary and grammar knowledge. Now, obviously you won’t be able to predict the exact answer and some you won’t be able to predict at all. However, if you practice this skill well, then you can predict about 95% of the answers and know, not the exact answer but roughly what type of answer you need to listen for.
This is a really powerful thing to be able to do because not only familiarises you with the case notes and what you’re about to hear, but it trains your ears, it gets you ready to listen for the answers.
So how do you predict and can you do it in 30 seconds?
Let’s talk about how to predict first.
So this is where your grammar knowledge and especially your vocabulary knowledge becomes very important…remember I KEEP SAYING THAT VOCABULARY IS THE KEY TO SUCCESS, it will help you in every sub test and it must be something you work on everyday! Please listen to podcast about vocabulary and the correct way to learn it. I’ll leave the link to that episode in the show notes.
So knowledge of grammar can help you to predict, let me give you two examples.
One case note says
Suffers from …. Then blank. This must be followed by a noun or a noun phrase backache, migraines etc
Works as an electrician/accountant/
Works as a builder/teacher
Also, the answers you need can be taken directly from the dialogue BUT you have to be careful because the language in the case notes will be different from what you hear in the audio. So this is where your vocabulary knowledge is so important using synonyms and paraphrasing to identify the answers and this is where a lot of students lose marks because they never prioritised vocabulary in their preparation or never practiced this skill for the listening test.
For example the notes may say Oral Medication….. and the audio will mention tablets or pills. You need to be able to quickly identify this.
Or the case notes will say Inability to….. and in the audio, the patient says I can’t .
You really need to focus on vocabulary and the language used by patients to describe symptoms and conditions. Really explore and learn the language, write it down and learn it.
Here are some examples to give you some ideas:
Persistent ………cough
Explore how a cough can be described dry/tickly/painful/chesty
What is another way of saying persistent? Non stop/continuous/can’t stop
Complains of lack of ……….
Another way of saying lack of is not enough
Not getting enough sleep = lack of sleep
Lack of appetite/ energy
These words go together
Undergone ………
Surgery/tests/scan/treatment
These words go together
Other powerful prediction methods are using the sub headings in the case notes. The case notes will sub headings like Background, Condition, Family history, Medication, Surgical history. These are usually in bold down the side of the case notes. These guide you through the audio and act like signposts so when the doctor says “ ok can I ask you a few questions about your diet?” You know exactly where you are in the case notes, so you don’t get lost.
The sub headings give you clues about the subject matter and together with the grammar and your vocabulary knowledge it can help you predict the type of answers.
So, as I mentioned before, just like with everything with OET….it all takes practice. Each skill you learn, each strategy, needs to be practiced individually, on it’s own before you can incorporate it into your main answer strategy for the test.
So in this case, you need to practice the skill of predicting. The way in which you do this is to get a few listening part a questions, give yourself 30 seconds (give yourself more time if you need to, remember to always start of slowly and reduce the time as you get more confident) and predict what the answer is likely to be. Remember the aim is not to predict the exact right answer, that’s not possible, but you are predicting the type of answer. Then either listen to the audio or read the transcript and check how close your predictions were. Keep doing this until you are able to predict the majority of the answers in 30 seconds.
Analyse the ones you weren’t able to predict or predicted incorrectly…why did you get it wrong? Was it due to vocabulary or grammar? You learn the most from your mistakes and analysing them so you don’t make those mistakes again.
Other really effective practice techniques are to look at medical/health related articles, look at the title and any sub headings and perhaps read the first sentence of each paragraph and try to predict what the article or even what each paragraph is about. This trains your brain to predict, the more you practice the stronger the skill will become just like a muscle. You can do the same for videos.
I hope you’ve found this useful and if you have any questions just email me englishwithitutor@gmail.com, you’ll find my email in the show notes along with links to my free OET training Planning for OET Success, and the link to join my OET Success Membership training.
Keep working hard.
Take care.