B2 READING & USE OF ENGLISH

    

What’s in the Reading and Use of English paper?

The Cambridge English: First Reading and Use of English paper is in seven parts and has a mix of text types and questions.

For Parts 1 to 4, you read a range of texts and do grammar and vocabulary tasks.

For Parts 5 to 7, you read a series of texts and answer questions that test your reading ability and show that you can deal with a variety of different types of texts.

Summary

Time allowed:	1 hour 15 minutes
Number of parts:	7
Number of questions:	52
Marks:	40% of total
Length of texts:	About 2,200 words to read in total.
Texts may be from:	Newspapers and magazines, journals, books (fiction and non-fiction), promotional and informational material.

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Part 1 (Multiple-choice cloze)

What's in Part 1?	A text with some multiple-choice questions. Each question has four options (A, B, C or D) – you have to decide which is the correct answer.
What do I have to practise?	Vocabulary – idioms, collocations, shades of meaning, phrasal verbs, fixed phrases etc.
How many questions are there?	8
How many marks are there?	1 mark for each correct answer.

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Part 2 (Open cloze)

What's in Part 2?	A text in which there are some gaps, each of which represents one missing word. You have to think of the correct word for each gap.
What do I have to practise?	Grammar and vocabulary.
How many questions are there?	8
How many marks are there?	1 mark for each correct answer.

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Part 3 (Word formation)

What's in Part 3?	A text containing eight gaps. Each gap represents a word. At the end of the line is a ‘prompt’ word which you have to change in some way to complete the sentence correctly.
What do I have to practise?	Vocabulary.
How many questions are there?	8
How many marks are there?	1 mark for each correct answer.

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Part 4 (Key word transformations)

What's in Part 4?	Each question consists of a sentence followed by a ‘key’ word and a second sentence with a gap in the middle. You have to use this key word to complete the second sentence so that it has a similar meaning to the first sentence.
What do I have to practise?	Grammar and vocabulary.
How many questions are there?	6
How many marks are there?	Up to 2 marks for each correct answer.

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Part 5 (Multiple choice)

What's in Part 5?	A text with some multiple-choice questions. For each question, there are four options and you have to choose A, B, C or D.
What do I have to practise?	Reading for detail, opinion, tone, purpose, main idea, implication, attitude.
How many questions are there?	6
How many marks are there?	2 marks for each correct answer.

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Part 6 (Gapped text)

What's in Part 6?	A single page of text with some numbered gaps which represent missing paragraphs. After the text there are some paragraphs which are not in the right order. You have to read the text and the paragraphs and decide which paragraph best fits each gap.
What do I have to practise?	How to understand the structure and development of a text.
How many questions are there?	6
How many marks are there?	2 marks for each correct answer.

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Part 7 (Multiple matching)

What's in Part 7?	A series of statements followed by a text divided into sections or several short texts. You have to match each statement to the section or text in which you can find the information.
What do I have to practise?	Reading for specific information, detail, opinion and attitude.
How many questions are there?	10
How many marks are there?	1 mark for each correct answer.

EXAM PRACTICE 1    EXAM PRACTICE 2  VOCABULARY BUILDING   

WORD FORMATION + ACTIVITIES     W. FORMATION EXERCISES   W. FORMATION

REPHRASING   REPHRASING 2  REPHRASING 3  REPHRASING 4