Successful Students

Daniel is a nurse from the Philippines, currently working in Saudi Arabia. He plans to move to the US.

He had a lot of English speaking experience but got very nervous in the exam and his speaking score was stuck at S23. He also had many fossilized errors. We spent several months analyzing and correcting them, and we removed filler template phrases to create more natural sounding responses. Daniel absorbed all my feedback and practiced strategies to boost his confidence. Although he began studying for TOEFL and raised his score to S25, a chance encounter meant that he switched to IELTS. He scored 7.5 and now he can move to the US with his family.

Samah is a pharmacist from Egypt, currently living in the US. She studied for TOEFL for about 2 years.

Her biggest challenge was getting S26, as well as the requirements for the other sections, in one attempt. Samah's speaking was fluent, with wonderful vocabulary, but rushed and without rhythm. So we focused on speaking exercises, and introduced word stress and natural pauses into her responses. She practiced everything diligently. Also, Samah's confidence was a little fragile after many exam attempts, so we worked on lots of strategies to get her exam-ready. Finally, after 9 exam attempts, she achieved her target scores including a wonderful S27. She was thrilled, and full of joy, and can now move on and prepare for her board exam.

Lea is a nurse from the Philippines who now lives in the US. She had been studying TOEFL for over a year and had taken the exam 4 times.

She'd got S24 but she needed S26 for her nursing licence. She'd also had a negative experience of TOEFL lessons that included being in a group speaking class with 20 students! Understandably, she was very frustrated about the whole process. In lessons, we analyzed the different parts of the speaking questions and practiced each one. We focused on grammar and vocabulary and improved Lea's accuracy and range. We also practiced strategies to reduce nerves and anxiety in the exam. When Lea took the exam again, she scored a wonderful S27!

Dalal is a pharmacist from Iraq. She had been living in the US for 5 years and worked in a busy pharmacy.

Her speaking and listening skills were strong because of her work and she'd already achieved S26. She was struggling with TOEFL reading and writing so we focused on building specific reading skills, learning question strategies and practiced many examples. For writing, we concentrated on developing ideas and essay planning to write quickly. We also focused on reviewing grammar structures and developing vocabulary. Dalal's exam was delayed by Covid but she achieved her target scores in her very first attempt when test centres reopened. She raised her reading score from 15 to 22, and her writing score from 19 to 24

Hilda is a teacher from Mexico. She has lived in the US for 21 years and has spoken English for all that time.

She began studying for TOEFL by herself but realized that she needed help with exam strategies, and timing. Although Hilda was comfortable reading English, she wasn't used to reading academic English quickly. So in lessons, we worked through reading passages together and analyzed each question. We focused on time management in the reading and writing sections. Hilda built up her vocabulary and we corrected a few fossilized errors. Her exam attempts were interrupted by Covid but when she was able to do the exam, she exceeded her target scores and she's now working as a bilingual teacher.

His target score was 90 and in just one attempt, he scored a fantastic 94! As he wasn't living in an English speaking country, he didn't have the experience of being immersed in English to help him practice. In lessons, we devised lots of creative exercises so he could build English practice into his everyday life. In total, he took about 3 months to prepare for his TOEFL exam. He studied for around 10 hours each week and fitted TOEFL studying around his university work. His advice for other TOEFL students is never give up and always be positive.

Diego is a chemical engineer from Colombia. He needed TOEFL to apply for a PhD program in biotechnology.

Philipp is a biology student from Germany. He wanted to apply for a Master's program that had a TOEFL requirement of 100+.

He had a very high English proficiency, and could understand everything, but he was a little out of practice in using English. In lessons, we devised strategies for the reading and listening sections, and practiced past questions. For speaking and writing, we practiced skills for each task. We made sure that Philipp provided all the relevant information and that he finished his responses on time. He achieved an outstanding 116 in his first attempt at the exam and he's now studying Biological Oceanography.

Quirenia is a pharmacist from Cuba. When she first started studying for TOEFL, she had very little English.

But she had an incredibly organized and methodical approach to studying and spent a couple of years building up her English language proficiency. In lessons, we focused on speaking and writing. Quirenia had a lot of pronunciation and grammatical errors to correct so we devised practice exercises to help with these. She carefully completed all her homework exercises and even gave herself feedback! In total, she spent 3 years studying for TOEFL and on only her 2nd exam attempt, she achieved scores in excess of her target scores, including S27.

Hasnaa is a pharmacist from Iraq. She had been studying TOEFL for a while and was missing her target scores by 1 or 2 points.

Understandably, she was very frustrated. In lessons, we started with writing and divided the essay writing process into a series of steps. She learnt strategies to write quickly and efficiently. In speaking, we broke the questions down into their individual parts and practiced each part separately. We focused on accuracy, timing and removing template phrases. We did lots of skills-building exercises together so Hasnaa felt confident speaking spontaneously. On her 9th TOEFL attempt she got her target scores and now she can apply for her pharmacy licence.

Meriet is a pharmacist and had successfully achieved S26/S27 in previous exam attempts but she was stuck on W22-23.

She confessed that she hated writing! In lessons, we analyzed her concerns and discovered that she was spending a lot of time thinking about how to write perfect sentences, especially in the introduction, rather than quickly explaining her ideas. So we did lots of exercises concentrating on building arguments and supporting examples for the body paragraphs. Meriet practiced writing out of order which is an excellent technique for writing quickly under time pressure. And she wrote lots of essays for me to review. Finally, after 9 attempts, Meriet conquered TOEFL and achieved her target scores.

Liyi is a computer science student from Illinois. He needed S24 to keep his funding for his PhD program.

He scored S17 in his 1st attempt at the exam and then hired many tutors to help him improve. After 15 attempts at the exam, he scored S23 but his score remained at S23 for his next batch of exam attempts. In lessons, we worked at undoing his bad habits. He had a lot of fossilized errors so we worked on automaticity to correct those. We broke each speaking question into different parts and practiced strategies for each part. Finally, after a very long TOEFL journey, he got S24 and could continue in his PhD program.