Most pilots who struggle with the ICAO ELP are not “bad at English” — they lose points to a handful of small, fixable habits. Here are the most common ones, and how to correct each before your next test.
1. Reaching for phraseology when plain language is required
Standard phraseology is efficient, but the ELP measures your plain language — the words you use when the situation goes off-script. If you fall back on “roger, wilco” instead of explaining a problem, you give the examiner nothing to rate.
Fix: practise describing situations in full sentences. Instead of “unable,” say: “We’re unable to accept that climb because of severe turbulence at our present level.”
2. Katakana or first-language pronunciation
Adding vowels to the ends of words (“flight-o,” “radar-u”) or flattening stress patterns is the single most common reason Japanese-speaking pilots stay at Level 4. Pronunciation is a full ICAO rating category.
Fix: record yourself, compare with a native model, and drill the endings of consonant-final words. Small gains here move the whole score.
3. Going silent instead of clarifying
When you don’t understand, silence reads as a comprehension failure. But asking for repetition correctly is a skill the ELP rewards.
Fix: keep a few clarification lines ready: “Say again the last part, please,” “Confirm you want us to hold at the outer marker?”
4. Memorised answers that don’t fit the question
Rehearsed monologues collapse the moment the examiner changes the angle. Interaction — listening and responding to this question — is scored heavily.
Fix: practise flexible frameworks, not scripts. Learn how to open, add a reason, and close, then fill the middle with whatever the question needs.
5. Under-describing in picture tasks
“There is an airport and some planes” wastes the opportunity. The examiner needs enough language to rate vocabulary and structure.
Fix: describe foreground, background, people, actions, and what might happen next. Our Study Hub picture sets are built to train exactly this.
6. Flat delivery with no fluency markers
Long pauses and no linking words make even correct English sound uncertain.
Fix: use natural connectors — “at that point,” “as a result,” “what I’d do is…” — to keep the flow moving.
Put it into practice
Pick one habit from this list and target it for a week. Then read how other pilots handled these exact situations in our exam reports, and rehearse with the scenarios in the Study Hub. Fixing two or three of these is often the difference between a Level 4 and a Level 5.