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The C1 Advanced has 4 parts : Reading and Use of English, Listening, Speaking and Writing. Let’s take a more detailed look at the Reading and Use of English paper. The focus of this paper is to check your ability to confidently read different texts and answer questions about them, and your ability to use English grammar and vocabulary correctly.

It contains 56 questions over 8 parts and a total allowed time of 1 hour and 30 minutes. The total reading length for all text passage is 3000-3500 words. The texts might come from newspapers and magazines, journals, books (fiction and nonfiction), and promotional/information leaflets.

Let’s take a closer look at what each part of the exam looks like so that you could be ready to get the CAE score you need!

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Part 1

The question type use here is multiple-choice cloze. This is a text with numbered gaps that a missing represent a word of phrase. Each gap has a choice of options A, B, C, or D for you to choose from. This is a practice of your vocabulary, such as idioms, collications, phrasal verbs, etc There are 8 questions in the part and each is worth one point.

Part 2

This is also a text with gaps, with each one being a missing word. You have to find the correct word for the gap in the sentence. There are 8 questions like this. It is a test of your grammar and vocabulary. Each question is worth one mark. The question type here is called open cloze.

Woman thinking about books to train for CAE.

Part 3

This is a text that has 8 gaps in it. Each gap needs to be completed with a word. There is a prompt at the end of the line to help you. This is not the answer! The word should be changed in some way to give the correct one. This is a test of your vocabulary. Each question is worth one mark. The question type is called word formation.

Part 4

Here you are given a sentence followed by a ‘key’ word. Then you have another sentence with a gap in it. You need to use the ‘key’ word to complete the second sentence. This must be done in 3-6 words. The meaning of the two sentences must be the same. There are 6 questions in this part and each is worth up to 2 marks. This is a test of your grammar, vocabulary, and collocations. This question type is called key word transformations.

Part 5

This is a text and you have to answer questions about it. The question type is multiple-choice so you choose from the four option you are given – A, B, C or D. This tests the skills of reading for detail, opinion, tone, purpose, main idea, implication, and attitude. There are 6 questions like this and each is worth 2 marks.

Part 6

This part consists of four short texts with multiple matching questions. This means that you need to read all four texts to match the prompts to the correct one. This is testing your ability to understand and compare opinions etc across texts. There are 4 questions in this part and each is worth 2 marks. The question type is cross-text multiple-matching.

Part 7

This is a page of text with numbered gaps for missing paragraphs. At the end of the text are some missing paragraphs. You have to put them in the correct order. It is about understanding the structure of a text. There are 6 questions each worth 2 marks each. The question type is gapped text.

Part 8

This is a multiple-matching question activity. You have to match the prompts to the correct part of the text. It could be one text or several texts that you are given. It tests reading for specific information, detail, opinion, and attitude. There are 10 questions and each one is worth one point.

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