1. PTE is an exam that now I realise is built to give you benefit of doubt.

Which means you can

make mistakes and still get an all 90. Yes, the system is designed for humans!

I know I fumbled in one or two retell lecture in my last two attempts. But that didn't affect
my scores at all.

I know I said the word ‘something’ during repeat sentence and even in answer short
question in my last attempt.

I know the reading section and even listening section answers were very doubtful, but I still
got an all 90. So don’t worry and kill yourself in the exam. In reading and listening tasks
focus on scoring in lesser difficult questions and you will score higheguy

RELAX. The more you relax in the exam, the more you will score. Trust me on this.

2. Go through this link, it is a treasure trove of tips and

resources: http://www.expatforum.com/expats/australia-expat-forum-expats-living-
australia/672738-pte-exam-1635.html#post12015801

3. We have more than enough prep material in our google drive that we maintain. It's a
whatsapp group. You don’t need anything else to prep. More prep material is not equal to
more marks - yes that is true. This is not an exam where you can mug up things. Yes there
are some sections where it helps to know, but really don’t kill yourself over going through a
mountain of material.

4. Redo, redo, redo the official PTE Academic and PTE Plus handbook tests. There are 7 tests
in total - I did all those at least 7 times! And yes also please do the Mc-Millian test atleast
one time - there are 7 of them if I remember it correctly. Again do it as per your schedule
and time. Two tests in a day is enough practice.

5. Book your exam slot for first thing in morning. Have a good breakfast that gives you
complex carbs and sugar and 45 - 30 mins before your exam, eat a protein bar or a sugary
drink. This helps immensely to maintain energy and concentration levels required in
speaking and reading sections.

6. ALWAYS take the break between reading and listening section. I didn’t take it in my
fourth attempt and lost some concentration and lost by 1 point - a mistake that cost me INR
10 K and March 2017 round. Shit happens.

7. Ride to the test center if you can. What this does it activate your brain functions that are
linked to reflexes and coordination. This is hugely tested in PTE, because you have to read
when you listen and understand when you read and so on. It is a multi-disciplinary skill test.
Check screenshot below.
8. I can never stress the importance of this tip - on exam day, before your exam, do alteast
10 repeat sentence and 10 answer short questions from the PTE official material. I cannot
tell you how useful this is. I realised that my memory and brain functions bests in these two
tasks after I had been through 9 questions in each of them. And I realised that early
morning when the brain had a long sleep, it is absolutely important to wake it up!

9. The PTE test is at par with the material provided in the PTE official books (read above on
which ones).

Which means the difficulty level will be more or same. But do kill yourself once in awhile by
doing the Mc-Millian book and the Aussiz online tests (specially speaking and listening). I
would again say - stretch your abilities by doing harder tests but couple of days before
exam switch to official materials.

10. E2 Language material. Absolutely useful stuff - I would say mandatory whatever your
desired score it. Watch all webinars (skip the grammar ones if you want) and make your
notes. Follow the tips without thinking much. Get in touch with me on more details on this.

11. For read aloud - practice. Speak at a moderate pace (not slow and not too fast), pause a
bit on commas and little longer on full stops. This is easiest to crack. Use hand gestures,
open your lower jaw more (but don’t look like a clown), speak with a purpose (you should
know how to say a questions versus and exclamation), use intonations, and yes don't DON’T
SING. Mimic a news reader.

12. For repeat sentence - try and remember as much as you can (read above on some
preceding tips on this section). Use power of visualization. For e.g. if the sentence says
‘Students with exams this semester are requested to come near the library located on the
top floor of this building’ then you are screwed! Why? Because in exam repeat sentence will
test you on slower and faster sentences, longer and shorter ones too. So if you use power of
visualization then you can imagine students for a semester and then a library and then a
floor on top to remember the sequence. This is hard but it happens with practice. And this
has to happen real time, so that’s why I gave tips 7 and 8 above. Also in repeat sentence use
exact same stress and pauses as speaker is using. For e.g. if the speaker says a long
‘Librarrrrrrry’ then you do the same. If the speaker stressed on ‘Top’ then you do the same.
This is how scores from this task are put across for listening section too.

13. Also in repeat sentence I used to repeat softly what the speaker is saying along with
visualization and using hand gestures (like if the word ‘top’ is used, I gestured it as above
my head! Or if word yesterday is used then I used it with a wave of my hand suggesting it
was yesterday). When you repeat the sentence softly, then you will most probably
remember the last part of the sentence (first part is already registered in your brain as soon
as you hear it).

14. For retell lecture and describe image - use E2 language strategy. Use the framework,
and practice it hard. You will need to practice with alteast a 100 of each task types to build
your muscle memory with them. And do it - there is no escape. Speak for as long as you can
in each of them, atleast > 30 secs. I spoke longer sometimes but shorter than 35 secs too,
but never shorter than 30 secs. So train yourself like a Ninja in it.

15. Answer short questions - expect image based question and just plain audio ones in a
mashup! Image based ones have some coloring to highlight where the audio question is
gona be. And never mind if you miss one or two - as I pointed out above I used the
word something and moved on???????????????????????.

16. Hit next in speaking sections as soon as you are done.

17. If you have heard the urban legend of keeping your mic above your nose - then use it. I
cannot ensure its validity but it will work only if you have good speaking skills (as computer
is expecting).

18. In speaking, don’t hesitate, don’t pause longer, don’t use any damm fillers (umm, err
etc.). If you don’t know what to say, speak what comes to your mind. The key is you speak.
You didn’t hear a lecture correctly but have an image for the question - speak about it! You
heard only bits and pieces of the lecture - use the E2 language strategy. Speak normally as
you spoke in read aloud. Don’t ever rush here.

19. In describe image again see point 13 above. It is a must that you conclude. And for
almost all the graphs I concluded as ‘We can clearly conclude that the similar trends would
be seen in the near future!’. It doesn’t matter what you conclude, just damm conclude.

20. In writing - use E2 strategy. In all my 5 attempts I never scored less than 79 because I am
generally good at writing. It’s a skill (I can write an obscene amount of stuff). If you don’t
have it, you can substitute it in the exam with strategy. For essays there are selected topics
(see point 2 above). If you wish memorize them (I never because I will write it differently
each time). Nonetheless practice essays and writing summaries using E2 strategies almost
everyday. Don’t be overconfident here, it happened with me in fourth attempt as I didn’t
practice it and did it directly in exam and got a score of 79. For summarize text, use
conjunctions, who-what-where questions (like in E2 Language strategy). Practice these enuf.

21. Reading - well no tip works here. This is a pure skill. But yes watch and learn from all E2
language webinars to know about general strategies and questions types. Questions like
reorder are weighted heavily and you must target full score for them. MCSA and MCMA you
may or may not get right, so don’t stress (remember Read Aloud from speaking
compensates for some Reading scores). FIB and FIBW will test your knowledge about native
english and collocations. You get it if you get it otherwise just don’t kill yourself in the exam.
Time management is the key. Unlike speaking section, this section flow keeps changing. So
spend like 5-6 seconds before this section starts to know the flow of questions in this
sections. I will tell you from experience that tougher questions are thrown at you first so
that you get stuck and don’t have time to finish easier ones in the last. SO NEVER GET
STUCK. In general read from curiosity (app from iOS), BBC, Mc Millian, PTE official material
and ofcourse our curated drive.

22. Listening - phew. Tough section for me atleast. Go through E2 Language webinars.
Listen to BBC radio or Ted - Education, or podcasts for 30 mins daily, without fail. Go
through Mcmillian, PTE official material and ofcourse our whatsapp curated drive materials
as many times as you can to become familiar with question flow, types and strategies. Some
are easier, some is pure skill and luck. Easier ones are write from dictation (don’t worry if you
miss a word or two - I did and still got a 90), fill in the blanks, find incorrect words,MCSA
and Summarize spoken text. Tougher ones are MCMA, find missing word after beep and
find correct summary. Nail the easier ones and u should be good.

23. SST - use E2 strategy. Infact for all lecture oriented questions like retell lecture,
summarize spoken text, find correct summary - take notes and understand the lecture. You
should be taking faster notes.

24. For easier ones in listening section, try and not get anything wrong. This will maximize
your scores. In Write from dictation I used my computer to type in chat slang as the speaker
spoke and also repeated the sentence in my head. That worked for me rather than notes.
But be very careful of how you write the final sentence. See E2 language webinar for details
on this.

25. I found find summary relatively easy after practice. One or two answer choices will
always be very outrageously wrong. The choice will be between two close choices. But you
have to listen really well to eliminate the outrageously wrong choices and select the finest
one from the conflicting closest two ones! Take notes, create a flow of the ideas
represented. Practice. Critical reasoning is essential. Check E2 webinar on this.

26. In any MCMA or MCSA (reading, listening) see the question prompt very, very carefully.
It will tell you what to read for or what to listen for. If you miss this in listening especially,
then make a random choice and move on. No time wasting in listening especially.

28. FIB in listening - you will be challenged by some fast and some slow sentences. Be aware
and note the words on the notepad. It need some coordinations skills.

29. Listening section in PTE, is all coordination of multiple skills. Practice enough to read as
speaker is saying stuff (esp MCMA, MCSA, select missing word). Never attempt to read the
answer choices in select correct summary or you will miss the audio (just listen well in this
question type). Please look at the E2 language webinars for this section.

Overall, relax in the exam. You will make mistakes, but you have to overlook them and move
on especially in speaking where penalty is high on correcting yourself. Speaking is all about
oral fluency, and content comes next. If you speak about the moon when the lecture is
about geography then you will get a zero.

It’s a pressure exam and more your chill out better you will perform. Reading and listening
takes time to build (atleast couple of months) but speaking and writing have quick fixes.