Shadowing Practice: ChatGPT vs. IELTS Examiner: Writing - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Over the past few months I've been testing Chagipity and other language models to see if they can act like IELTS examiners.
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For this video I took 30 real essays and compared AI band scores to real examiner scores.
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So let's look at what happened and what it means for your preparation.
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It all started when I received this message from Maria.
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I've been preparing for my IELTS for five months.
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But I think I'm gonna fail my exam anyway.
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I get bent eight or nine in listening and reading.
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But writing almost never reaches span seven.
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I must score a seven everywhere to start my master's in September.
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What can I do?
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Well, Marie had been using chat APT to check how good her essays were
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and i decided to do the same i took one of her essays
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and gave this prompt to chat gpt
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you are an experienced ielts examiner who assesses ielts writing task
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2 essays using the ielts band descriptors give me the band scores for the four assessment criteria
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and the overall task 2 band score.
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I posted the essay and the result stunned me.
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Task response or how well you respond to the task band 6.
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Coherence and cohesion or the flow and structure of your essay band 6.
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Lexical resource or vocabulary band 6.
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Grammar and overall band 6.
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Are you sure this score is so low?
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I asked.
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And ChattyPT gave me a full explanation of why it couldn't possibly be any higher.
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So I sent the same essay using the same prompt to several other language models.
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Claude gave a band 7 for task response and coherence and cohesion but only band 6 for vocabulary and grammar,
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which resulted in an overall 6 .5.
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DeepSeek was more generous, giving a band 7.
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Gemini also landed at a band 6.
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And since I have a paid subscription for Chagipity, I could test its latest 4 .5 model with more advanced reasoning,
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or at least definitely the slowest model.
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And that one gave a band 7.
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To be honest, none of that looked right to me.
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So we decided to conduct a more thorough experiment and see if AI can actually give accurate scores,
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which models perform better, and if the scores are wrong, are they usually too high or too low.
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A St. Marie's essay to a former IELTS examiner on our team and while I was waiting.
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I found 27 essays from Cambridge practice tests so books like that
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and all the essays are graded by official IELTS examiners as you can see each essay comes with a score
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and examiner's notes so I uploaded these essays into chat apt one by one
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and what I found could save you weeks of or wasted preparation.
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So let's take the first essay and upload it with the same prompt as before.
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So chattypt thinks it's a band 6 but I see two problems.
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So first the grammar score is listed as 5 .5
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but in IELTS you can only get a band 5 or band 6 for each criterion not 5 .5.
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So this would be a band 5.
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And the overall score wouldn't be a 6 either.
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To get a band 6 overall you need at least a 6 in each criterion.
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But in any case the examiner's score for this essay is a band 7, not a 6.
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Next essay, band 5 .5 according to HRGPT, but again the examiner gave it a 7.
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And that's a huge difference.
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Essay 3.
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So Chair GPT says band 5.
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Yet once again this is a band 7.
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Now look at this one.
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Chair GPT calls it a 5 .5 but the examiner's score is a band 8.
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That's a two and a half band difference
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and I'm going to show you the essay on the screen it's really good how could it possibly be 5 .5
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At this point I started wondering whether it even made sense to continue.
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Every essay I'd sent so far had been undervalued by at least one full band
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and in some cases by two and a half bands.
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But then I realized something.
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Maybe the scores dropped after I told chat GPT not to use half bands when marking individual criteria.
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So I started a brand new chat with just the initial prompt and things began to improve.
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Suddenly there was a correct score band 6
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when it was really a band 6
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and overall these scores were now mostly just half a band lower than they should be which
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Which honestly isn't bad for a language model compared to a trained human examiner.
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But here's the thing.
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Not a single essay got a score higher than it deserved.
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The result was either accurate or too low.
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That said, this wasn't a perfect experiment.
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Most of the essays were between bands 5 and 7.
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Only one was a band 8 and none were a band 9.
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but we really want to know if you write a brilliant essay band 8
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or 9 will chat gpt recognize it or any other language model
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so i took my own essay and another written by one of our examiners
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and tested them exactly the same way i tested maria's essay first
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i sent both to a different former examiner for scoring not the author to avoid any conflict of interest
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and let's start with my essay then kevin's
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and finally see how the other examiner scored all three of us including maria
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so let me send my essay to chdpt okay a band 8 for task response band 8 for coherence
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Basically a band 8 for the whole essay.
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Well that's more inspiring.
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What if we try the smartest model 4 .5?
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Is it gonna be any different?
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Actually no it's still a band 8 but with a band 9 for grammar so thank you very much.
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And now Claude.
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I know a lot of people love it so I thought we should definitely check it.
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Okay, so it gave me event 7 for vocabulary and grammar and 7 .5 overall.
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Not exactly the kind of examiner I'd want in my test.
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I got an 8 .5 in the real exam and this essay better.
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What about Deep Seek?
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To be honest it's my first time using it.
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A vent 8. And Gemini?
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Oh really?
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A vent 7?
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Oh wait look!
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It gave a vent 7 in every criterion but the overall score is 7 .5.
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Gemini why how does it even work well it gave a long reply
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and to be honest it's total rubbish
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it's not even worth reading to you it seems i'm feeling a bit protective of my essay
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so let's take Kevin's essay and see how well our examiner did it should be fun so chatty bitty band eight
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And this smarter model.. hmm, that's also a band 8.
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It's quite strange actually.
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I did them all and Kevin's essay got exactly the same scores as mine.
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How is it possible when two different people wrote them?
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I'm not sure.
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But the key question is what did our other examiner award us?
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So my essay scored between 8 .5 and 9 and Kevin's got 8 .5.
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I didn't tell the other examiner whose essays they were,
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I just sent them as 1 -2 -3 and Kevin if you're watching this 8 .5 is a fantastic score.
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So it seems that for essays with really high scores language models do give relatively high scores.
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But there is one more score left and the one that matters most.
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Maria's essay.
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The whole reason why we started this experiment.
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And Maria's essay got an 8.
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Imagine you are writing band 8 essays but every time you check with Chagipity it tells you you're band 6.
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What would bad due to your motivation and Maria isn't the only one either here is another message I received
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This candidate also got 6 .5 to 7 by CHAT -EPT, but an 8 in a real exam.
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So, what can we take away from this?
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First of all, AI tends to underrate essays rather than overrate them.
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This means if you are relying on AI feedback, you might think you are doing worse than you really are.
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2. The gap is the biggest for mid -band essays.
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So band 5 and 6 essays were sometimes pretty close, maybe half a band off.
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But 7 and 8 essays were often underrated by one or even two full bands.
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3. AI can recognize quality, it knows when an essay is good.
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But it really struggles to award those top -level scores.
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And AI doesn't follow IELTS scoring rules correctly, like using half -bands when they don't even exist.
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And finally, the results vary a lot between models.
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So use AI to check your vocabulary and grammar, or get help with ideas and flow.
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But don't rely on it for scoring.
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Instead, learn the requirements examiners use for yourself
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and I go through every single one of them while writing a full answer in this video here.
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And thank you so much for watching me today.
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Good luck with your preparation and your exam.
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Bye!
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “ChatGPT vs. IELTS Examiner: Writing”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: band, essay, score, examiner, model. This video has 136 sentences and 1452 words to shadow. The speech runs for 11:39. The speaker talks at a steady 125 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 78% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| bind verb | /ˈbaɪ̯nd/ | To tie; to confine by any ligature. |
| essay noun | /ˈɛs.eɪ/ | A written composition of moderate length, exploring a particular issue or subject. |
| examiner noun | /əɡˈzæmɪnɚ/ | A person who investigates someone or something. |
| grammar noun | /ˈɡɹæm.ə(ɹ)/ | A system of rules and principles for the structure of a language, or of languages in general. |
| examination noun | /ɪɡˌzæm.ɪˈneɪ.ʃən/ | The act of examining. |
| prompt verb | /pɹɑmpt/ | To lead (someone) toward what they should say or do. |
| vocabulary noun | /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/ | A usually alphabetized and explained collection of words e.g. of a particular field, or prepared for a specific purpose, often for learning. |
| experiment noun | /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/ | A test under controlled conditions made to either demonstrate a known truth, examine the validity of a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of… |
| preparation noun | /ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/ | The act of preparing or getting ready. |
| ventilation noun | /ˌvɛntɪˈleɪʃ(ə)n/ | The replacement of stale or noxious air with fresh. |
| compare verb | /kəmˈpɛɚ/ | To assess the similarities and differences between two or more things [“to compare X with Y”]. Having made the comparison of X with Y, one might have found it… |
| rely verb | /ɹɪˈlaɪ/ | To trust; to have confidence in; to depend. |
| upload verb | /ˈʌpˌloʊd/ | To transfer data to a computer on a network, especially to a server on the Internet. |
| assessment noun | /əˈsɛsmənt/ | The act of assessing or an amount (of tax, levy or duty etc) assessed. |
| explanation noun | /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/ | The act or process of explaining. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| go through verb | To travel from one end of something to the other. |
| take away from verb | To subtract a quality from; make something seem not so good or interesting. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- What can I do?
- Are you sure this score is so low?
- To be honest it's my first time using it.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | I've been testing · I've been preparing |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | are graded · is listed · had been undervalued |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 21 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, don't, gonna. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: examination /ɪɡˌzæm.ɪˈneɪ.ʃən/, preparation /ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/, ventilation /ˌvɛntɪˈleɪʃ(ə)n/, explanation /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/, motivation /ˈmoʊ.tə.veɪ.ʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: examiner /əɡˈzæmɪnɚ/, examination /ɪɡˌzæm.ɪˈneɪ.ʃən/, vocabulary /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, preparation /ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like bind, essay, examiner.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.