#observation
What really bugs me about this whole IELTS 'craze' is that everyone wants to get as high a score as possible. To what end? Really, why take on this huge undertaking when your university / job only requires Band 5.5-6.0? Everyone seems to think that this is a race of some sort. Well, guess what? It's not! While you are here trying a master a single language, there are much people out there dazzling the world with their contributions to the entire humanity rather than flex with their seemingly 'impressive' language skills.
Yes, I do acknowledge the perks that come with a high IELTS score; take it from me — IELTS 8.0 literally turned my life around. But that's not to say this is true for everyone now, is it?
Figure out what's important to YOU in life. University? Go! You need a Band 7.0 for that? Go! Then get this whole goddamn IELTS over with and move on with your life!
IELTS doesn't mean a bright future — it's only a means to what could potentially be a successful life.
@ieltsulugbeks
#observation#longread
At a time when we all need great stamina to get by in life, people's attention spans are shrinking so much that they can't even sit through a 3-minute video without skipping ahead. In fact, I bet half the people reading this seemingly long post will give in halfway through, if not completely ignore it.
Seriously, though, I just can't wrap my mind around why people these days have become so attuned to the idea of 'fun learning'. Granted, you want knowledge to be interesting and therefore easy to acquire, but God have we lost control! As an educator, I can no longer keep my students engaged in a material unless it's something that really grips them. The fact that I have over a decade of language learning experience doesn't mean squat to them if I can't have them paying undivided attention to my lesson. Gosh, I know I'm talking as if I am a 60-year-old grandpa... Maybe I am :)
Folks, you are not little kids anymore, who should be spoon-fed with round-the-clock juicy titbits. For God's sake, stop falling for every second 'free course' that all those supposedly 'professional' teachers are organizing — it's all a marketing scheme for crying out loud. Instead, grow up and start putting in the effort. You honestly can't expect to magically go from nay to A if you take this free course or that free course.
There's also what I like to call a 'hoarding disorder' within virtually every IELTS prep student out there: they want to have it all. Such people are obsessed with storing every shareable content there is in their 'saved messages' at the drop of a hat only to never glance at it ever again — the kind of content that is short and seemingly useful. I mean seriously — my posts stacked with links get 5 times as many shares as those featuring a long-winded explanation of something a thousand times more useful, such as this post. Another case in point is my ongoing Free IELTS Marathon, which garnered around 700 subs, only 1% of whom participated in the latest lesson. Mind you, the lesson was a blast: never in my life had I had that much fun explaining a one-page article for an entire hour.
I am not the biggest fan of expressing myself in what may appear to be a sledgehammer manner — after all, I also organize those "free courses". But I couldn't help taking this approach to helping you see the reality. At this point, I feel like I'm preaching to the converted, though, because of how often such messages as 'don't fall for free stuff' get thrown around. Anyway, enjoy your night / morning, fellow learners!
@ieltsulugbeks