[Zishen TOEFL] High-Score Experience

School and major: graduated from National Chung Hsing University, Department of History

Scores: first attempt R 4.0, L 4.0, W 5.5, S 5.0, total 4.5

Test date: first attempt 2026/09/26

[Prep Experience & Methods by Section]

[Reading]

-I started with Teacher Kang's Wordgod 20,000 vocabulary book. I mainly used it as a reference, looking things up only when I hit a word I didn't know, and studied the vocabulary by topic; that stage was for building a foundation. Once I started preparing for the TOEFL in earnest, I used Teacher Kang's TOEFL reading handouts, which are good for drilling lots of questions right before the test; intensive drilling builds up your familiarity with the question types and features of the test. My regular practice was mostly the reading fill-in-the-blank and academic reading tasks. Day to day, you can learn vocabulary by reading academic articles, then practice reading around the core topic and use that reading to clear up words you don't know.

[Listening]

-I prepared for listening in three parts. The first was Samantha in the Listening & Speaking Excellence course, who was key to my finally studying, in a systematic way, the pronunciation, accents and variations of different countries; it made me quicker at switching between and understanding how people from different countries and with different accents express themselves, and how they link sounds when they speak. The second was Bruce in the Applied Speaking and Speaking Excellence courses. Although those are speaking courses, by speaking up in different ways and listening to classmates' conversations, I also learned to take in English from different people at different pitches, which brought my listening closer to real situations. The last part was coach Chloe's TOEFL listening and speaking course. Besides finally getting me into the rhythm of the TOEFL listening section, it taught me to understand in modules: systematically breaking long sentences and topic content down into chunks I can understand. That's how I handle listening without taking notes, keeping it in my head instead.

[Speaking]

-Early on, I built my foundation mainly with Bruce. In the Applied Speaking and Speaking Excellence courses, the teacher taught relevant collocations and concise answers, but because I like to explore and try saying things in my own words, my speaking combined that free-expression style with a mind-map framework, which let me improvise while still working, as far as possible, within the topic framework I had designed. Later, for the test itself, I mainly took coach Chloe's course. After learning the coach's shadowing method and pattern drills, I gradually managed to keep up with the pace of the TOEFL speaking repeat task, and I also shifted from memorizing sentences and repeating them to understanding them first and then repeating. My speaking also drew on modular thinking, saying things as they come to mind, and mind maps. Through topic-based review and forcing myself to practice unfamiliar expressions, I got to the point of saying what I think with as few pauses as possible.

[Writing]

-For writing, early on I mainly used the handouts from Ally's English writing course to learn different writing techniques and understand the different organizational structures, layouts and logical thinking of English. That was the foundation for how I systematically make sense of various writing styles, and it also made me realize that English writing is different from Chinese writing: the overall style, translation and expression all differ, so I paid special attention to this early on. Later, William's TOEFL writing course got me used to the overall rules of email writing and academic writing. I learned by first studying letter phrases, essay structure, grammatical logic, ways of expressing ideas and completeness of content, then practicing each one in turn. You can't get it all at once, so I chose to go from the big picture down to the details. For the sentence-building task, I relied on the grammar sense I built during my time with Li Wei to take sentences apart quickly. If you get stuck on a sentence, it's very likely a grammar point you don't know well, so before doing sentence building, be sure to go back and study the grammar thoroughly. Learning by doing is even more important.

[Study Plan]

My overall prep and study plan took a year: I started around September 2025 and took the TOEFL around September, about a year later. Until May 2025 it was all foundation courses; once I had solid basics in listening, speaking, reading and writing, I moved on to the second stage. The second stage ran from late May to late July: I systematically studied content by topic, reading vocabulary and listening material from different fields as well as whatever newspapers and magazines I could find. This is key to building a feel for the language and sharpness. By reading articles from The Economist, TED, The New York Times and others, I learned from and borrowed the writing of foreign editors and practiced summarizing viewpoints and paraphrasing; that was the second, topic-based stage. The third stage, from August to mid-September, was the final sprint, mainly alternating between speaking topics and writing topics. By building almost instinctive spoken output and writing content, I developed the ability to finish the writing and speaking tasks within the time limits. In the last week before the test, you only need to focus on reading and listening. Since those are passive skills I spent less time on them, but if you can, I'd suggest leaving half a month for reading and listening.

[Test Center Report]

My test center was the Zhongxin (忠欣) center just outside Daan Station. The equipment and the proctors were all great, and it's much more convenient for people who live in or commute to Taipei. The center is a bit like an office and the soundproofing is decent; even with everyone doing the speaking section, the noise wasn't too bad. The hardware was all brand new, and overall it was a very good test experience.

[Words of Encouragement for Other Test Takers]

The TOEFL covers a lot of material. Don't think you can't do it. When you hit a problem, find the root cause and treat that. Don't draw up one big plan all at once; when a problem comes up, stop and solve it. Don't pretend to understand what you don't. Learn what you can't do and ask about what you don't understand, so there's less and less you don't know and more and more confidence for the test. Whatever shape you're in on test day, relax and take the test; after each section, reset and move on to the next.

[Score Report]