Material Collocation for IELTS - Advanced Vocabulary for Band 8+

Kasturika Samanta

6 min read

Updated On Nov 20, 2025

Ready to level up your IELTS vocabulary? Enhance your lexical range and accuracy by diving into Material Collocation for IELTS. Check the different types, exercise, and more to use these advanced vocabulary for achieving a band 8+.

Material Collocation for IELTS - Advanced Vocabulary for Band 8+

What are the Different Types of Material Collocation for IELTS?
Exercise on Material Collocation for IELTS

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As you learn advanced vocabulary such as Material Collocation for IELTS, you will be able to formulate ideas with more precision and higher academic standards. With such word pairings, you can explore topics on building materials, study materials, or raw materials. Such combinations would showcase your good command of vocabulary and depth of knowledge. In order to get a band score of 8+ in the IELTS Exam, you need to first understand how to use these collocations correctly, along with practical examples and tips to sound more natural and fluent.

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What are the Different Types of Material Collocation for IELTS?

Using appropriate collocations related to the environment, architecture, clothing, and manufacturing is a must to enhance your IELTS Vocabulary. This would be helpful to refer to the type of matter used where using another word paired with the term can change the meaning altogether. Mastering such phrases makes you more accurate and raises your lexical resource score. Below are some of the different types of Material Collocation for IELTS.

Collocation	Meaning	Example
Raw material	The primary matter from which products are made	A number of developing nations trade in raw materials.
Durable material	Very strong and long-lasting substance	The furniture was made of durable materials to resist the harsh climate.
Use material	To create something with a certain kind of physical substance	For the new clothing line, the designer used a material that is friendly to the environment.
Handle material	To move or touch material while using it in the process of working	Handling of radioactive material is restricted to trained personnel only.
Lightweight material	Material that has little weight	For producing electric vehicles, manufacturers prefer lightweight materials.
Source material	To find or get a specific type of material	The builder sourced high-quality material from local suppliers.
Eco-friendly material	Material that does not harm the environment and is not polluting	To cut down carbon footprint, architects of modern times use eco-friendly materials.
Transparent material	Material that can be seen through	In order to provide natural lighting, the roof is made of transparent material.
Insulating material	Material that does not allow the transmission of heat or electricity	Insulating materials play a great role in reducing the energy consumption of houses.
Gather material	To collect data or information for the purposes of a project or report	The student gathered research material for her dissertation.
Review material	To look through content again for understanding	You should review all the course material before the exam.
Organize material	To arrange content logically and effectively	The speaker organized her material before giving the talk.
Develop material	To create educational or informative content	The company develops training material for new employees.
Publish material	To make written or visual content available to the public	The journalist published sensitive material about the case.

Check out the video below to learn 9 Vocabulary Tips to IMPROVE Your Score for the IELTS Writing Task 2!

Exercise on Material Collocation for IELTS

Once you have succeeded in mastering the Material Collocation for IELTS, the next thing is regular practice. Targeted exercises will help you in remembering and using these expressions effortlessly. In the long run, you will build the linguistic skills and precision that are required for leveling up your preparation.

EXERCISE 1. Use the correct form of these verbs and follow the collocation ‘Verb + Material’ to fill in the blanks:

contain	modify	treat
made from	recycle	use

1 Not many people realise that the Romans were the first to __________ concrete as a building material.

2 We can assure our customers that all our products are __________ natural materials.

3 I think it would be wrong to allow scientists to __________ human genetic material in order to produce the ‘perfect’ human being.

4 The outer material of the garment has been __________ with wax to make it waterproof.

5 One aim of the Green movement is to encourage people to __________ more of their waste materials.

6 A lot of older buildings __________ harmful materials such as asbestos.

EXERCISE 2. Complete the sentences with these adjectives:

hardest	waste	inflammable	radioactive
raw	synthetic	recyclable	hard-wearing

1 My country has few natural resources and has to import most of its_________ materials.

2 Highly__________ materials like petrol have to be handled with great care.

3 Seat covers on trains and buses take a lot of wear and tear so they need to be made from strong, __________ materials.

4 Our products are environmentally-friendly. We package all of them in __________ materials.

5 Most __________ materials can be put in a washing machine. Unlike many natural fabrics they don’t shrink when washed.

6 Diamonds are one of the__________ materials known to man.

7 The transport of__________ materials is still one of the biggest problems for the power industry.

8 __________ materials should be recycled whenever possible.

EXERCISE 3. Complete the sentences below with these words:

reading	valuable	copyright	publicity
indecent	relevant	fresh	classified

1 All sorts of__________ materials are being used to promote the latest video -TV ads, videos, posters and leaflets.

2 These documents relating to the last war won’t be available to the public for 50 years as they contain __________ material.

3 I’ve listed some useful__________ material at the end of the handout.

4 Employees caught downloading __________ material from the internet will be sacked immediately.

5 I’m afraid this is__________ material. You’re not allowed to copy more than 10% of it and only for private use.

6 The band can’t go on playing the same old songs year after year. It’s time they produced some __________ new material.

7 Professor Smith travelled the world gathering __________ material for his book.

8 When I was researching my family tree, I found a lot of __________ material in the public library.

Notes

1. In 3-4‘obscene’ is also possible.

2. Note the following:

He’s a good soldier but I don’t think he is officer material. (not good enough to be an officer)

3. We talk about building, reading, teaching and writing materials:

There were bricks, cement and other building materials scattered all over the site.
There is always a shortage of teaching materials in this school.
You’ll find some paper and writing materials over there on the desk.

4. Notice this expression using noun + of + material:

Samples of the material were sent for analysis.

5. Remember that ‘material’ can be used as a general term to mean ‘things’. It also has a specific meaning when it means ‘cloth’:

Her coat was made of very expensive material.

Answers for the Exercise on Material Collocation for IELTS

Well done! Did you get the answers? Let’s check the correct answers and pay attention to the way collocations are formed and used in context. This analysis will not only help you in spotting mistakes but also in improving your structure and acquiring better fluency. For deeper learning for getting a higher IELTS Band Score, you can start paraphrasing the sentences. With this, you will learn how placing a collocation in different parts of a sentence transforms the tone and the clarity of your answer.

EXERCISE 1.

1. use	2. made from	3. modify
4. treated	5. recycle	6. contain

EXERCISE 2.

1. raw	2. inflammable	3. hard-wearing	4. recyclable
5. synthetic	6. hardest	7. radioactive	8. Waste

EXERCISE 3.

1. publicity	2. classified	3. reading	4. indecent
5. copyright	6. fresh	7. valuable	8. relevant

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Discover how Material Collocation for IELTS is capable of transforming your simple ideas into fluent and natural answers. With the acquired knowledge, you can start by creating sentences with a minimum of five new collocations as you attempt an IELTS mock test. Focus on the way these word pairings influence your clarity and confidence which will help build the accuracy and fluency necessary for a Band 8+ performance.