IELTS resources and help. Tips for English language learners and students. English grammar resources and ideas. Downloads and tips including podcasts. Ideas for learning.
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IELTS format and structure
IELTS features formats speaking reading. The IELTS incorporates the following features: * A variety of accents and writing styles are presented in text materials in order to minimise linguistic bias. The test focuses on "International English", which includes British English, American English and other varieties. But the TOEFL only concerns North American English. The results are therefore considered more authoritative than TOEFL by some people and organizations (especially the ones outside the United States). * IELTS tests the ability to speak, read, listen and write in English. * Two test formats can be chosen from - Academic and General Training. * Band scores are used for each language sub-skill (Speaking, Listening, Reading and Writing). The Band Scale ranges from 1 ("Non User") to 9 ("Expert User")....
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A Common Language
Review of 'The Adventure of English', Melvyn Bragg, Hodder & Stoughton
For a good, highly readable overview of how English developed and where it may be going, Melvyn Bragg's book, based on the TV series of the same name, does the job. Bragg traces the roots of English back to the Frisian and other Germanic languages of those who invaded Britain from the 5th century onwards - the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes. He follows the growth of what have become the varied forms of modern English, not only through the familiar paths of the Norman invasion, Chaucer, Shakespeare and so on, but also through looking at other influences on English - the words of the Wild West in America, the Creole languages of the Caribbean, or the vocabulary the British brought from India. Indeed, the lists of words can become overwhelming at times.
His view of English is in some ways very democratic: the role of the ordinary people and particularly the oppressed is stressed, whether through the survival and transformation into Middle English of Anglo-Saxon under Norman French rule or the advance of Australian English. His account of Wycliffe...
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