How To Do IELTS Listening Sentence Completion Questions?

Sentence completionin the IELTS listening test is often more difficult than it ought to be.  This is how one might appear:

Below is my step by step guide on how to do IELTS sentence completion questions:

1. Read all of the question instructions carefully and check if there is a word limit.

2. Take a moment to understand the meaning of the sentences given.

3. Predict what the answer might be. Is it a phone number a name, a verb and so on.

4. Listen closely to the recording and fill in the gaps.

5. Check quickly for spelling and grammar.

Tips and Tricks

The sentences you are given are not the same as the sentences you will hear in the recording. The sentences are paraphrases of what is said in the recording. Your job is to listen of for words or phrases in the recording that would complete the sentences appropriately.

You can normally guess the word type that is required to fill the gap, this gives you an additional clue of what you should be listening out for.

Complete the sentences using the exact words, phrases or numbers that you hear in the gaps on your question paper, and double check your spelling as you will not gain marks for incorrectly spelt words.

Pay close attention to the words that come immediately before and after the gap as they can give additional clues as to when the correct answer might be mentioned.