A 4-minute checklist to check your own IELTS or CELPIP writing

In both IELTS and CELPIP, you lose marks for mistakes that you could have caught yourself if you had left a few minutes to check. The problem is that checking without a plan is just reading your text again and seeing what you expect to see. A short checklist gives your eyes a job. Use the one below at the end of every writing task, in practice and in the real test.

How much time should checking take?

Keep the last three to four minutes of each task for checking. That is a suggestion, not an official rule. If you are still writing in the final minute, you started the checking too late, so practise with a timer and move on sooner.

The checklist

1. The task. Did you cover every point? Is the tone right for the reader? Is the length right (at least 150 words for IELTS General Training Task 1, at least 250 for Task 2)?
2. Verbs. Check each verb: the tense (past events need the past tense), the form after prepositions (look forward to hearing), and agreement (he works, they work).
3. Articles and plurals. Check a, an and the before nouns, and the plural -s (every weekend, many problems).
4. Linking. Is each sentence connected to the one before it? Use simple linking words such as also, however and as a result. Do not join two full sentences with only a comma.
5. Punctuation. Capital letters at the start of sentences and for names, and a full stop at the end of every sentence.
6. Repeated words. If you used very, good or important many times, replace some with a more exact word.
7. Spelling and wrong words. A spell-checker only finds misspelled words. It will not notice a correct word used wrongly, such as their for there. Read slowly for those.

Three ways to make checking work better

• Check one thing at a time. Read the text once only for verbs, then again only for articles. It is slower per pass, but you notice far more.
• Read each sentence quietly out loud, or point at each word. Your eyes skip small mistakes when you read fast.
• Use your own error list. If you always forget the plural -s, make that your first pass. Our article on what good writing feedback looks like shows how to keep an error log.

What not to do

• Do not rewrite whole paragraphs in the last minutes. Fix small errors and keep your structure.
• Do not change something you are not sure about into something you are less sure about. If a sentence is risky, make it simpler.
• Do not skip checking because you ran out of time. A text with fewer mistakes is usually better than a text that is a little longer.

Practise, then get a second pair of eyes

Try the checklist on a task from our timed IELTS or CELPIP practice tests. Then compare what you found with what a teacher finds: our writing feedback service sends written feedback and a voice note, and shows you which mistakes you did not notice yourself. You also get an estimated score as a guide for your practice, not an official result: a band for each IELTS criterion, or an estimated CELPIP level for each dimension and for the skill.