PTE Experience - The Victory

I could not believe my eyes after looking at my Scores which were as below:

It was a moment of victory. I checked the document again and again on phone as well as my laptop to be sure. My result speaks the rest...

I am more than happy to assist all those who are striving to crack PTE. Please send your comments and I would guide you with whatever knowledge and experience I have.

PTE Experience - The Aftermath

I felt like a soldier returning from battle when I came out of Test Centre in Dubai Silicon Oasis. Whilst revellers were gathering in prime spots of Dubai to celebrate new year eve, I silently drove to a quiet corner of Sharjah for barbeque with family and friends. Whatsapp was buzzing with messages from PTE Group who was eager to know my experience. I spent hours chatting and fell asleep in the morning. Despite being tired, I was unable to sleep as I was worried about the result. I kept waking up every hour to check result and checked email whenever my phone beeped. Finally, I was woken up by an email from Pearson around noon.

PTE Experience - Listening Test

Once again, I cleared my mind of bad attempt in Reading Section and forced my focus on Listening Test. It is not as easy as it appears. However, my listening scores were perfect in Mocks and I was very confident. There are not many strategies to discuss in this section. However, I plan to create a separate post to create strategies for each question types in all sections.

I thought that Listening Test is only individually timed but was taken back by overall section timer ticking down. I did not realise this until I had spent nearly half of my time in detailed question types like Summarize Spoken Text.

As I moved on, I had very less time for other question types and had to play single read single select method like Reading Test. Not to mention that Scary Overall Listening Section timer keeps ticking even when the speaker is speaking. Felt helpless when I could not fast forward or skip Speaker's lectures. Anyway, I kept going as fast as I could with my blood as cold as ice. The last question type which I attempted is Dictation and believe it or not, I finished the test in last 10 seconds. I was like racing against a countdown timer and I was happy that I made to it somehow.

PTE Experience - Reading Test

I heaved a sigh of relief at the end of Speaking Section. Despite feeling utterly dissatisfied, I let go of it to focus on what was coming next. Reading section is sheer test of your subconscious knowledge of English. You got to know word pairs and grammar like the back of your hand to crack this section because time limit does not allow you to think. If you divide the time, you have just enough to read each text only once and come up with an answer instantly. If you are not able to do so then guess and move on instead of thinking. This would help you attempt all questions and you would get a chance to score in those about which you were sure.

Initially, I went carefully reading and re-reading Multiple Choice Questions and wasted more than half of my time. Then I realised that I had very less time remaining so I followed above mentioned strategy and managed to attempt all the questions before time out.

I would highly recommend you to use 10 minutes optional break at the end of Reading Test to calm your nerves and tune in for Listening Section. I raised my hand and the examiner came to enable 10 minutes break on the computer. I went to washroom and splashed some water on my face again. Stretched a bit and spoke some encouraging words to myself in the mirror.

PTE Experience - Real Test Begins

D Day

30th December, a day before test i came to know that there is a power failure at my site and all servers were down because UPS was also faulty. I woke up at 5:30 am and rushed to site to restore the servers back to operation. After lunch, i left the site and started for PTE test center.
Everyone was preparing for new year eve celebrations whereas i was busy preparing for PTE scheduled for 5:30pm on 31st December 2016 in Dubai silicon oasis.
I reached the venue more than an hour before to ensure that I don't get stuck in traffic. I was a bit tired but couldn't find a place to rest. A cup of tea was all I could get to charge myself. I splashed some water on my face after reaching the center and ensured that my throat is clear.

Test begins:
I spent a lot of time testing microphone and making sure that system is working. I also prepared to speak up my personal introduction.
I changed the position of microphone several times until I was convinced that the best position is just above the nose.
  I realised that many of the candidates had already started the test and the room became noisy. Therefore, I took time to adapt myself to the room noise. I diverted my attention from noise and decided to speak without hesitation and without caring about other candidates. Basically I ensured that my attention was 100% focused. For first timers, believe me, it would be very awkward to speak to a computer. However, my experience in working in a call centre and spending better part of my life with computers helped me to overcome this feeling.

Speaking section :
I had already decided not to mention immigration as my aim for this test while giving my introduction. I stated that I am English language enthusiast and would like to develop English learning solutions with the knowledge of software programming.

Read Out Aloud -
It is a pretty easy task with good weightage. As usual, I read the paragraph aloud and fast before Microphone opened and prepared myself to pronounce the tough words in the given block of text. I stayed confident, didn't hesitate and read fluently with a smile on my face. Smile gives you more confidence and improves fluency.

Repeat Sentences -
This is a slightly tougher task. I had practised scribbling first 2 words as I listen to the sentence and then remembering remaining part of the sentence in my mind. This method helped me and I could tried my best to recollect and repeat the sentence exactly as it was played. This is a nerve-wracking task and requires utmost concentration. There were a couple of sentences in which I missed a word or two but tried to maintain fluency at all times.

Describe Image -
Seemingly the most intimidating task turned out to be a funny one. I calmed my nerves down and convinced myself that I am not going to be overwhelmed by abundance of information given in the images. I confined myself to one or two aspects of the given image and tried to talk about them fluently. Remember that we have just 40 seconds to talk about given image so in my experience, fluency and accuracy in pronunciation and grammar is more important than covering a lot of given data. There were some graphs which I could not understand at all but I made it a point to follow method provided by e2language.com. I am sure I did not speak correct statistics for some images but tried to maintain intonation and flow.
With good introduction and appropriate conclusion, my description was encapsulated properly. There are many more tips to be discussed regarding this section and I will prepare a separate post on this blog.

Short Answer -
Short Answer questions are becoming increasingly complex with introduction of maps and diagrams. Moreover, we have to be extra careful as they immediately start after Describe Image section. I fumbled in first two questions thinking that they were from Describe Image section. However, I did not lose hope and tried to give my best in remaining questions.

Retell Lecture -
It is not one of the cruelest task. e2language.com method is certainly suitable for this question type. I took notes as the lecture was in progress. As soon as audio stops, I stopped writing and organised the scribbled information in my memory. Yet again, I tried to keep away from complex statistics and spoke with fluency and confidence at a normal pace.

Mock Tests

Mock test1:
I was finally able to revert to formal study routine in early October and purchased the pearson official gold kit in mid October. I solved the practice questions and planned a mock test on a weekend. Saturday being half day work, i had heavy lunch and locked my room after office staff left. I told watchman not to disturb me until I come out of the room.
Mock test started off. I must say that mock test is not exactly as the real test. For example, questions might not move to next even after you have used up your time. I felt that the timer wasn't strict but I remained honest and followed exact countdown that was given to me.
I was overwhelmed by speaking tasks and felt awkward speaking to computer because I wasn't getting spoken response. Anyway I tried to calm down but fumbled in many places. When I returned home after the test, i was totally disappointed and had no clue about what to do. The test was so difficult that I thought I'd not get anywhere close to desired score.
For me, toughest sections were describe image, repeat sentence, retell lecture, entire reading section especially mcsa and mcma because they eat up half of your time.
I was a bit relaxed in listening and writing because i found allocated time ample.
Result takes a few minutes to be uploaded. I had a ray of hope looking at my result s-75 r-77 w-90, l-90.

Change of strategy :
Looking at above scores i was confident that little practice was required for listening and writing sections. This reduced my burden and I needed to practise only reading and speaking. I went through webinars again, wrote down strategies and practised question types one by one. I had already read forum posts stating that pearson gold kit mock tests are tougher than actual exam. But I'd say that anxiety of actual exam adds to its difficulty especially for a poor person like me.

Mock test 2 a week later:
I went into it prematurely. Wasn't able to prepare my best in a week after test 1. As a result, I performed as bad as I had done in mock test 1. In general , mock test 2 of gold kit is tougher than mock test 1.
As expected, result was worse than mock test 1 - l90 r75 s73 w85. My wife who is the sole person aware of my migration plan said that there was no hope left. My writing score was lowered because I chose e2 essay structure. So I went back to ieltsadvantage.com essay structure in my actual test and scored 90 in writing. Note than I had used ieltsadvantage.com essay structure in mock test 1 and had scored 90 over there as well.
(to be continued)

PTE Experience - The First Month

Week 1:
I spent more than a week understanding the pattern and collecting material. I printed out reading tests because it is better to do it rather than attempting it using pdf.
I prepared a notebook to write down important points, strategies, methods etc.
E2 language webinars appeared to be most useful.
For writing, I stuck to ieltsadvantage.com because his essay structure was so good.
I decided that there was plenty of free material available online so didn't want to spend anything on buying except pearson official gold kit.
Most importantly, I stayed away from tutorials, tedtalks, podcasts by non native speakers and avoided listening to american accent as well except steven fernandes. This helped me focus on british /Australian pronunciation.

Week 2:
By looking at strategy given by steven fernandes, i decided to practice all sections and then attempt first test in gold kit to evaluate myself. Believe me, although strategy of steven fernandes might appear simple, it is hard to stick to but extremely useful.
I started by solving reading practice test in pearson software CD without timing myself. Then I dId self evaluation using answer key and found that I had made several mistakes even after enjoying luxury of exra time.
I did thorough research of every mistake I made. Tried to learn those words and their forms whenever I made a mistake.

Week 3:
I gave listening test and it was simpler because after practising ielts listening for a long while, anyone would find PTE listening easier. However, PTE aspirants please stay away from ielts listening.
However there are some sections where I found hard to evaluate myself like essay, sst, swt etc. But still I tried to compare my answer with key and tried to figure out how they expect solutions to be.

Week 4
I had already written a lot of essays during ielts preparation but still I wanted to practise typing essays so I solved sample questions in pearson official CD. Most importantly, tried to compare them with answer key.
Hilariously, I spent more time evaluating and researching my mistakes than solving actual questions.
Mistakes are like debt. When they add up, they trap you. So deal with them with a sharp sword of research and excessive practice.
(to be continued)

PTE Experience - The Beginning

After scoring l-8.5 r7.5 w6.5 s7.5 in IELTS, i was devastated. I researched forums and concluded that IELTS is hopeless. I found No other test was more suitable than PTE. This happened around early August 2016. Initially I didn't set a target time frame to finish my PTE and went about it rather casually and randomly.

However, ever since I had applied for ACS, I had started passive learning. Listening to abc Melbourne and watching on drama English movies and shows preferably in British / Australian English.

Wordwebonline.com is my companion since college days. My Google Chrome always had and will continue to have a tab dedicated to wordwebonline.com.

I started thinking in English as much as I could and spoke English to myself and others. I'd suggest that we try to imitate the accent of native speakers because it helps us become fluent and deliver accurate pronunciation. By imitating, i don't mean that we start sounding awkward and fake. It means that we should practice their accent when we are in study room and speak to outsiders only when we have learnt native pronunciation and accent. I'm saying all this because non native accent makes it hard to pronounce correctly and fluently. For example check pronunciation of these words in indian accent vs Australian accent - regularly, organised, Canberra, Melbourne etc.
Go to YouTube and web and check top pronunciation mistakes non natives, indians etc do.
Visit mmmEnglish YouTube channel and you'd find an Australian lady giving useful tutorials.

(to be continued)