Sentence completion and word limits

In a sentence completion task you read a set of sentences with a gap in each one, and you complete each gap with words from the recording. It is common in IELTS Part 4 lectures, and it can also appear with talks and discussions in Parts 2 and 3.

Three things make this task harder than it looks:

1. The sentence is a paraphrase. The words around the gap are usually different from the words you hear, so you listen for the meaning of the sentence.
2. The answer must fit the sentence. When you put your word into the gap, the whole sentence must be grammatical. If the speaker says ditches and the sentence needs a plural, ditch is wrong.
3. The word limit is strict. If the instruction says NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS, a three-word answer is wrong, even when the meaning is right.

In an earlier lesson you learned to predict the type of word for each gap. In this lesson you go one step further: you check that what you write fits the gap exactly.

1. Count the words. Articles count: the forests is two words. IELTS says that a hyphenated word such as check-in counts as one word.
2. Read the whole sentence with your answer in it. Does it make sense? Is it grammatical?
3. Check singular and plural. After one, a or each, a countable noun is singular; after two, many or several, it is plural.
4. Don't repeat printed words. If the sentence already says minutes or £ after or before the gap, write only the number.
5. Spell it correctly. A misspelt answer is marked wrong. Writing numbers as digits (45, not forty-five) is quicker and avoids spelling mistakes.

You are going to hear part of a lecture about peat bogs: wet areas of land where dead plants build up very slowly. Complete the sentences. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.

1. Peatlands store more carbon than all the world's ______.
2. Many bogs were drained mainly so that the land could be used as ______.
3. When a bog dries out, the peat begins to release ______.
4. The simplest way to restore a bog is to block the ______.

1. forests. The sentence says store more carbon than; the speaker says hold more carbon than. That paraphrase tells you the answer is coming. The sentence says all the world's ______, so write forests, not the forests.
2. farmland. Fuel is a distractor: peat was burned as fuel, but the land could be used as fuel makes no sense, and the speaker says the main reason… was to turn it into farmland.
3. carbon dioxide (or CO2). This answer needs both words. Carbon alone changes the meaning, because the peat itself is carbon.
4. ditches or drainage ditches. Both fit the limit and the grammar. Old drainage ditches is three words, so it would be marked wrong, even though every word is in the recording.

Notice that the strong listener also checked the form. The speaker said dug ditches, plural, and block the ditches is natural, so the plural is correct.