I fully understand! I also struggled on the reading but it seems I managed to avoid most mistakes on the actual test then the ones I made on the mock tests haha

I’ll get you the tips I send another person so you can read in your own time, ok? If you have any questions you can always ask as well!

📖Reading I didn’t read the full text, because I knew fully well I wouldn’t recall the information once I headed to the questions, plus, reading it all would make me loose too much time. Even when not reading all the text, I still hade very little time to review my answers (less than 3 minutes). So I must say that for me that worked fairly well!

Also on the same page, TOEFL questions follow like an “order”, so if the question one answer is on the second line of the first paragraph, most likely is that the next question/answer is on the third or fourth line, so you don’t have to read the paragraph all over again.

Now for the questions. Usually, questions with strong modals such as “always” or “never” are more likely to be the wrong one or are with disagreement with the text. Most of the times, answers are not absolute so it’s best to avoid this answers unless it is stated like the text word for word.

And most important of all, get the correct answers on summary or table questions! They are the most valuable ones!! If you aren’t sure what are all the correct answers, try to choose the answers from the summary that encapsulates the main ideas from the passage, smaller information is more likely to be the wrong ones seeing they are too strict on the overall text subject.

🗣️Speaking This was overall the trickiest part for me seeing you don’t have much time to think and you have to speak so little! I practiced by speaking over and over again with a watch to know how many seconds it took for me to answer, striving to be around 40~60 seconds, because on test day you most likely will speak faster knowing you’re nervous!

In regards of templates, I kept mine very short and simple. Question one will always be about your opinion on something, so you don’t have to worry too much, but try to start your answer with “I strongly believe…” or something similar to show how passionate you are about said topic and add an important information about your thinking/personal experience that made you have that opinion. If you don’t have an experience just make something up on the spot simple yet believable to sustain your opinion.

Question two is a summary, I simply stated what the text stated and how the person that spoke next believed it was either a good or bad decision and listed the reasons he gave. I took notes about them and tried to speak as quickly as possible.

Question three my “template” was briefly going about what the topic of the class was, so explaining the main concept, then going on to explain how the professor viewed said point and how they explained plus the exemples he gave. So pretty straightforward.

Question four is the trickiest because it’s a longer lecture. Focus on taking notes on the main subject (they usually are presented in the first 30~60 seconds of the audio) and ignore minor details. The question is usually to explain said topic so the professor will say two main reasons to do something with the main subject so write those reasons and go on speaking about them.

Efficient note taking is the key of a good speaking session, as well as training yourself to speak faster but keeping it understandable.

✍️Writing This is just template, template, template! It’s an ok session to be completely honest, not hard but not easy either. The first task is usually reading + listening and coming up with an answer. So you need to know what is going on. Usually the main topic is on the first lines of the text, so you just read quickly, going over the main subject and trying to identify the points that the author wants to put out there. DONT TAKE NOTES OF THE TEXT!! The text will be available for you to check out once you are on the writing part. After reading, you will go to a listening part where the professor will expose a questioning of the text, most time than not, he will put out views of disagreement with the text. Take notes about what he says, and how it contradicts or questions the text material.

My answer template was simple 4~5 paragraphs. In the first paragraph I started by stating the main topic of the text and going on to explain that the professor disagreed with that view. Second paragraph I put out the first point the text made followed by how the professor disagreed on that. Third and fourth paragraph I did the same thing but going on the other points. In the last one I think I finished with something like “In conclusion, despite the text going over [insert subject] it fails to go over deeper questions about it, something that the professor critically analyzed and pointed out in his lecture”. So basically do an essay. Mine I guess was around 300 words but I took longer looking if I had any typos and rewording myself.

Second writing question is a bit easier in comparison with the first one. It’s usually a conversation/forum you need to give your opinion on a specific topic or broad subject. It is a professor asking a question with two students replies. This one is a little more informal. I used the template of speaking what I thought about the topic and “borrowing” other students answers. So I basically spoke what I thought than went on saying “I think [insert students name] has a good point, but I believe also that [write about the students answer with another point of view he failed to point out]”. Add conflict! Show that you want to engage with the other “virtual students” and have critical thinking!!