Beginning Again

Honey’s challenge was passing the TOEFL with enough time for the pharmacy board to approve her for the FPGEE. She set up her FPGEE for October 7th, and the approval process for the FPGEE takes about a month or more.

So, she quickly turned her focus to the TOEFL and started preparing…

Finding Help

Honey was lucky enough to find NoteFull at the start of her TOEFL journey. She got the recommendation from a few friends and dove right in.

Her first attempt was scheduled for April 10th, so she didn’t feel like she had enough time to go through any of our paid courses. She received a free coupon for our Family First program, so she decided to start there.

However, Honey lives in New York. At that time, New York was one of the main locations of the coronavirus breakout in the US. So, unfortunately her test ended up getting postponed until June. This made her schedule for taking the FPGEE in time much tighter.

By the time June rolled around, they still weren’t able to hold the test because of the virus. Honey was running out of time and options…

Searching for a solution, she found a testing center in New Jersey where she could finally have her first attempt. She scheduled it for June 13th and studied hard using our free resources.

At the time, the NoteFull website wasn’t quite done being updated. The resources for all sections were up to date except the speaking material. So Honey turned to some YouTube videos from a different TOEFL resource to study the speaking templates. 

When she got her results back, she had scored a 28 in every section except one. She was only able to reach a 23 in the speaking. Time was short, but her husband quickly stepped in to motivate her, and encouraged her to sign up for the next available test as soon as possible. So she set up her next attempt a week after she got her first test results.

Luckily, by this time the speaking section of the website was finished. With just a week to study, she focused hard on the speaking section and took 2 practice exams. On her second attempt, she earned: R29, L24, S25, W28. Just one point shy of passing the speaking section!

But Honey was still hopeful. She had seen her speaking score jump up by 2 points after studying with NoteFull for just a week in between tests! Despite having very little time at this point, she knew she could do it on her next try.

She set up her third attempt just like her second: one week after she got her results. She started watching more speaking class videos from our free resources immediately…

“It was very well explained. Everything, like how you have to spend your 15 seconds of preparation time, each second when you give your exam. What you have to do. Everything was explained perfectly.”

Two big things Joseph taught in the videos really stuck with Honey. The first one was connection. She learned the importance of connecting what you say in your answer to the language in the question. Learning to establish a connection when she spoke was a huge help to her. The other key thing was speaking with clarity. She learned to focus on the quality of what she was saying rather than just speaking a lot.

NoteFull’s techniques for each section gave her the guidance she needed to manage her time properly. She also practiced the critical skills that NoteFull recommends for the TOEFL (typing, listening videos, dictation exercises, etc.). However, when she took her third test, things didn’t go as well as she would’ve hoped…

Having to get up at 4am to travel from New York to New Jersey for the test ended up hurting her focus. Her time management suffered as a result. She wasn’t able to finish the last 4 or 5 questions in the reading section because she ran out of time. She left out a required example in the first speaking question, and she wasn’t able to understand the point of the second one. All she could do was do her best to maintain a connection with the question in her answer.

She wasn’t very hopeful for her results. But sometimes things aren’t quite as bad as we think they are…

On Their Way

Honey’s results came back and she earned the 26 she needed in the speaking section with a total score of 103!

The stress of her FPGEE date being so close must have been immense. But she stayed strong and kept working hard. Now, she can proudly call herself a TOEFL graduate!

Honey’s hard work definitely paid off, and now she’s doing her best to prepare for her FPGEE in October. Congratulations, Honey!

Here’s her advice to all future TOEFL graduates:

“…Stick to NoteFull. Whatever strategies and techniques are mentioned there, practice them with patience.  I think that’s enough. That’s enough for succeeding. Also never lose your hope and patience. It may take time but still we have to practice and follow notefull methods, and definitely everybody will succeed.”

Here For You

Whether you’ve never taken the TOEFL before and need it for nursing,

—or have taken it more times than you can count for pharmacy,

—or need help in one section for physical therapy,

—or all sections for dentistry,

—or need to improve a little for teaching,

—or A LOT for graduate school,

—or any combination that’s stressing you out…

Take a deep breath, relax, and click here to read our getting started page with care. By the end of that page, you’ll know your next steps to your TOEFL success with NoteFull.

If you’re a current NoteFull student, take a deep breath, relax, and KNOW you will succeed JUST like Honey. Keep following your courses and keep attending your monthly Gold Course of online TOEFL classes.

We CAN and WILL get you to your dream score!

Share your story

Your success IS coming too!

Review these success stories often to keep you inspired. Study the advice each success story gives for specific guidance. Register for the NoteFull courses you need to get your dream TOEFL score. And, stay in touch with us every step of the way.

We’re here to help and will support you UNTIL you pass. We want to be one of the FIRST to congratulate you when you earn your dream TOEFL score. And, when that happens, we can’t wait to invite you to be our next success story so YOU can inspire 100s of others just like Honey.

To learn how NoteFull can help you: click here for our getting started with NoteFull guide.

To reach out to us for more personal guidance: click here to email us through our contact us page.