This is how IU has BETTER ENGLISH than Taylor Swift

Today I'm going to rate celebrities’ English and assess their speaking ability.

If they were taking an IELTS speaking exam.

but also I'm going to give you some tips and advice

that you can use in your IELTS speaking exam to increase your score.

Tay Tay time.

a really good tip for practicing your IELTS speaking is actually listening

to very good speakers of English just talk.

But sometimes that's really, really boring.

So Instead choose your favorite celebrity answer questions in interviews.

they're doing the same thing that you're going to be doing in your IELTS speaking exam

and you'll get really interesting vocabulary from them.

“It's very Moodboard” Okay, first “Moodboard” That's this.

If you didn't know, But this is what I want to bring your attention to.

This structure right here.

It's very advanced and it's very modern, so it sounds very good.

when you describe something as being very noun, not adjective,

you're specifically talking about it's style, it's vibe.

Yeah, you won't learn this in school, especially if your teacher

is from an older generation because it's quite new.

Grammar, It's very good to use.

I use it a lot

and it shows you've had interaction with current English being spoken.

this is seen as a complex structure, because not everyone knows it.

And you definitely, like I said, won't learn it in school.

the pronunciation sounds off if your word stress is off.

stress the adjective or the word so

like this, “You're wearing those shoes!?

They’re so granddad!” they look like a granddad style of shoes.

great range of vocabulary.

“It has a ring to it”

here is why Taylor Swift might not get a 9

let's imagine her examiner is not familiar with the grammar structure.

“It's very + noun”, so they count that as a mistake.

Maybe they count the excessive use of “like” as repetition or hesitation.

the examiner might mark her down for that.

just to be clear, you can have hesitation in your answer.

If it's content-related. What does that mean?

for example, I really try to think of like,

what's the title that would best describe here

she's using like as a filler word, because she's thinking, okay,

how can I best express my thoughts and ideas?

She's not confused about the correct grammar for this.

She's not trying to translate the word from her language to English,

you know what I mean? so yeah, for me it's a 9

But if that answer got an 8.5, now you know why!

Remember, IELTS examiners are just humans and sometimes humans can be (eggplant emojis)

Mai Phuong: “You guys should see yourself ever since day one...”

my God.

I can't imagine how nervous you must feel, not just talking in front of

other people, but a whole other language which isn't your own.

this is a good thing to remember.

Your examiner knows that you're nervous.

Everyone's nervous doing an IELTS exam.

If they're not, they're a psychopath.

Your nervousness will not lower your score

I promise.

Having this hair, though, that will lose you points.

That's a zero, sir!

So okay.

Just by the way she's talking - Pronunciation

We can understand everything.

We're looking in the 7, 8, 9 range

more the 8 - 9. She uses a wide range of grammar structures

flexibly like

and

really wide range of vocabulary and using it perfectly.

Brilliant.

the only reason this doesn't get a 9 is because

you can have grammar slips and still get a 9

but they need to be “You know what the mistake was”

And you just slip, everyone slips, I slip, you slip in your language.

So that's not a problem.

And this doesn't stop us understanding what she's saying.

I think on a regular day in conversation,

she probably would have said the correct thing.

Stick with it

and here...

things that KIND OF sadden me.

But because they assess you on this specific exam.

There are too many mistakes here to simply ignore.

And the examiner might, rightly, say,

okay, your grammar isn't quite good enough to be in that band 9

So this makes it not a perfect answer, but I would be very

comfortable giving her a solid 8 maybe even an 8.5, because it's

obvious that nerves really affected the way she gave the answer. So

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Okay. Back to grading.

IU

Okay, if this were a real IELTS

speaking exam, IU gets like an easy 6

That sounds harsh because we both know that she's actually very good at English.

but the IELTS exam doesn't care how good you sound in general.

your IELTS score is only based on the answers you give at that moment

and how well you deliver those answers in that moment.

Okay, Great fluency

and coherence speaking without really any hesitation.

So we're looking around the 7 range

Pronunciation is very important in that

I have to understand what you're saying

and her pronunciation is very, very clear.

So that's very good.

Really helps her score!

okay, so here's the thing.

In real life conversation, this is great.

This is great English.

Nothing wrong with it, but IELTS wants a very structured

and elaborate answer using complex vocabulary and grammatical structures

in order for you to get that tasty band 9 score.

so for IU to get a higher band score here, this would be my advice.

We're going to change this sentence.

to

this version includes more complex grammar structures.

“I'm going to be doing something” We're using more sophisticated vocabulary.

This UPCOMING concert marks a milestone.

a significant occasion.

Significant is a very good word to know.

also here where she says

when we say “I wish to blah blah blah.”

That's for something very formal like a complaint.

Think of Karen Grammar.

I wish to speak to the manager.

IU is not a Karen, so it sounds very unnatural for her to say that here.

Instead just say “I can't wait to meet my fans.”

That sounds more natural. Good grammar. Much better.

Remember in the IELTS speaking exam, They're not trying to make your score low.

No They're on your side and they want you to succeed.

So give the examiners reasons to increase your score.

Use what you know.

Use complex grammar correctly.

Use sophisticated vocabulary! It all helps.

Remember having an emotional connection to what you're saying.

It gives you this natural fluency that really helps your score.

It's hard to sound scripted and robotic if you feel a certain way

about something, right?

So yeah, always good to talk about something you feel passionate about.

those are just some examples of how IU and you could take an answer

that would get a band 6 and turn it into a band 8

Easily she could get an 8

Poopypants

I'm not saying he is a bish in that way.

I mean, he is, Well, this lean is giving “Mean Girls” - “You can't sit with us!”

“We do not wear pink on Mondays!”

So on the surface this on to get something like an 8. Great vocabulary

state of the art.

also is weird that a word which means “new”

is becoming old fashioned.

Weird, right?

nowadays with more naturally say like “cutting edge” or

If it's a complex that you're building, you'd probably just say “ultramodern”

That sounds more common and a bit more natural these days.

massive.

We could change it to expansive.

That just sounds better.

That's just me being nit picky.

the vocabulary was very advanced throughout,

Very few grammatical errors, almost none.

He also forgot a couple of “THE”s

“THE time has come”

Someone is getting thrown out of THE window for that one.

these mistakes don't hurt comprehension.

We understand what he means.

okay, pronunciation.

This is an important point.

Yes, there were a couple of words where I was like, What's he saying?

That took me a couple of tries to know

it's “coveted”, The IELTS does not care about your accent.

If we can understand your pronunciation,

your accent does not change your IELTS score, It is coherent and we can understand

the whole thing, but it's kind of obviously scripted and remember it.

If you rehearse a sentence or a chunk of speech

that you want to use in your speaking, because you saw a video of ten words

that you must use in your exam, no,

The examiners will know that you've rehearsed it.

It won't sound natural, and you won't get those tasty fluency points.

So don't. Don't bother.

but I think most important thing to get from this is maybe don't

invade a neighboring country

just because you think you're going to die soon

and you want to be

remembered for something I think that's the biggest letdown here.

And for that he gets nothing.

The big fat zero for you, Poopypants

This guy. Seriously?

Okay, Here is a perfect example of why

native does not mean fluent.

IELTS asks just one thing from you.

Communicate your answers effectively, clearly and fully.

You don't need to use big fancy words in your answer.

Just stay on topic and you'll be great if you're trying to express a thought,

take it to completion before starting the next thought.

Then you'll be great.

You know, we have a world, right?

So the world is his response here shows signs of repetition,

lack of coherence, completely

the inability to take a single thought to completion

this puts him at a band score of around 5 where there is some fluency

but noticeable issues in maintaining coherence.

It's not a 4 because his speech is not slow.

In fact, the words pour out of him like diarrhea.

so he wants to describe

the impact of windmills but there's no varied or advanced vocabulary

so this places him in a very low band range again around a 5

Like I said, it's not necessary to use fancy long words to give a good answer,

but you do need to show some kind of varied vocabulary

and preferably less common words.

So to improve his band score, this is what we’ll change.

Instead of this, we'll say this.

see just a little change to the vocabulary and grammar structure

already sounds much better, and we'll change this

to

This just gives a more detailed answer

with what he's trying to express and again, shows a wider,

richer vocabulary and gives the IELTS examiners more to work with.

I will also change this

to

There’s that word, again: “significantly”

now, obviously, pronunciation will be the strongest part of his answer.

We understand everything except for this:

No idea what that is.

pronunciation is very, very important However, again,

you need to be intelligible 100% of the time to get that band 9 score.

Overall, his response would fall within the band range of 5 - 6

Why? He's a native speaker, right?

well, remember, his score is based on the answer he gives.

And the answer he gave did not have good fluency.

His vocabulary was not wide, nor rich.

But the important thing that I will always come back to

is he really needs to organise his thoughts more coherently

because at the moment, wow.

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and let me know.

Do you agree with my ratings today?

Who should I grade next?

Let me know in the comments and I'll see you in class! Bye!