Irina Lutsenko

IELTS line graphs are easy to tame - you just go chronologically, so the description doesn't get out of hand. Information in pie charts, however, can be hard to organize because there are different directions you can go in. In this post, I want to share two IELTS pie chart answers I wrote for the same task. The task is from Cambridge IELTS 11 . The introduction and the overview are the same. As you read, pay attention to the organization and try to decide which description works better. ✼✼✼ Introduction  The pie charts compare the percentage of British students of one English university who knew foreign languages in 2000 and 2010. Main Body Version 1 The percentage of students in three groups grew. Speakers of Spanish formed the largest share in both years, rising by 5% from 30% to 35%. The increase was the same in the “Another language” and “Two other languages” groups. In 2010, the former amounted to 20%, while the latter comprised 15%, making up the second and third largest prop...

✼✼✼ “What is your name?” “Irina.” “And what is your address?” Little did I know these questions were about to usher in the happiest moment of my life. After the crash, all went black. In one big blur, I was carried from the car to the ground, to the ambulance, to the hospital. It was beginning to slowly dawn on me what had happened. The word terrifying doesn’t do it justice. But was I breathing? I was. Did I remember my name? I did. Could I recall my address? I could. Were those doctors around me? They were. The feeling of overwhelming, all-consuming happiness was ballooning inside me with each question. I was alive, in my right mind, being taken care of. If you’ve been in a car crash, you’ll know the feeling. Most people haven’t. They think they have all the time in the world, so they delay happiness. Happiness is to be experienced some time in the future. Happiness is to be experienced when they graduate, get married, buy an apartment, reach that goal, fulfil that dream. Not that the...

This is a guest post by Timur Khamzin , a programmer who writes and translates poetry in his free time. In this post, he talks about the whys and hows of his hobby. What Timur does is inspiring and mind-blowing. You can find his bilingual poetry and translations in his community on VK  Переводы стихов | Poetry Translations . Choosing poetic form Don’t be hasty to reel back in horror when I tell you it is writing poetry that I refer to in the headline, not reading it (although that can also be a treat). Some of your apprehensions may turn out to be misconceptions, e.g. “only people with special aptitude can write poetry” or “I lack inspiration that is an indispensable ingredient of writing a good poem”. Writing poetry is a skill to be learnt , like driving a car or doing yoga. What makes it particularly enticing for language learners is that it has the fortunate and lasting side-effects of enriching vocabulary, enhancing precision and sense of style. Now, there is writing poetry and...

This is a guest post by  Anna Pakhomova , my C2 Proficiency student whose skillful use of fancy language will completely blow you away. In this post, she shares her story and her tips.    I realize how disgustingly self-assured this sounds, so I’ll just go ahead and burst my own bubble here. In this guest post, graciously suggested by Irina, I’ll try to show the darker, duller and more mundane part of putting together your own personal toolbox (or, more precisely, a warehouse) of fancy lexis. First off, the way I learned most of my so-called “fancy” vocabulary was by being a decidedly lonely kid at school. I was a full package – I wore thick glasses, had braces permanently in, and was too smart for my own good. At that point, reading virtual tons of books and learning English was my super power, my magical shield against the world I didn’t particularly enjoy. It wasn’t that I was bullied – oh, I was unapproachable in my little ivory tower. It’s just that I, as any self-re...

“Can you write about your language learning routine?” This is a question I got from my student Nina. My answer is, “Sure, but I don't really have a routine. It's more of a way of life.” In this post, I want to share my language learning lifestyle. Input First and foremost, I pretty much live my life in English . 99% of my environment (my devices, software, apps, subscriptions, books, videos et cetera et cetera) is in English. I make sure I expose myself to copious amounts of English. Exposure is king. So is noticing. I am always on the lookout for new vocabulary and familiar vocabulary used in new ways. Most of the time I read or watch something I take vocabulary notes. I have a paper notebook and digital notes for that. If I don’t have them on me when I hear a great expression, I jot it down on an old receipt or whatever I can find. My main criterion for choosing what language to take notes of is a very honest answer to these questions, "Would I ever say it t...

The Fulbright FLTA competition is now open. As the program alumna, I’ve decided to put together some tips that can help you write a great application. I think the tips will work for many other programs and scholarships. Participating in the program was a truly eye-opening and life-changing experience for me, which you can find out more about by reading my other Fulbright posts (see the links at the bottom of this one). Check the requirements on the official website and go for it if you are eligible. My top tips on writing great application essays #1 Don't Google how to write applications and don’t look at other people’s essays. Everything you find online will also be found by other potential participants who google and find the same thing. Just don't. Tap into your own inner resources. Make your application unique and memorable. The decision makers read hundreds of applications. It will play in your favor to stand out. #2 Start brainstorming and writing your fi...

Lyudmila Snezhanova is on the horns of a dilemma which test of English to take  IELTS or C2 Proficiency . Having taken both, I’ve decided to summarize some practical information about the exams, hopefully making her choice easier (and your choice if you are facing the same dilemma). In this post, I will outline the exam structures briefly and comment on what seemed easy or difficult to me personally. I will be talking about IELTS Academic only. I will be using the old abbreviation CPE for C2 Proficiency because it's shorter and more familiar to most people in the EFL world. The post is a long read, but I've organized it into sections so it should be easy to navigate.  First, some words about my exam history. I've taken paper-based IELTS Academic (three times, getting 8.5 in 2011 and 2013, before finally getting 9 in 2016) and paper-based C2 Proficiency (just once, getting an A in 2018). Now off to describing the two exams. 1 Listening IELTS You...

Last year I read a book called " Storytelling with data: a data visualization guide for business professionals ,” which might seem like a bizarre choice for an English teacher. Seduced by the word storytelling , I ended up reading a book for people whose job is to visualize information in the form of line graphs, bar charts, pie charts, and tables, so basically IELTS Writing Task 1 tasks but for real life situations. In IELTS preparation we always describe data. But this book gave me an opportunity to change sides and look at those charts from the perspective of those who create them. In this post, I want to share one important insight I got that can make a huge difference to the way you approach IELTS Academic Writing Task 1. The author of the book emphasizes that to visualize data effectively you need to think about two key questions - who you are describing the data to and what you want them to know or do. Even though these questions are technically not part of the exam, ...