CAE Reading tips

Tips for Cambridge Advanced Reading Exam Part

Here are a few general tips to get your reading ability up and going. Our Cambridge courses focus on each of these parts in depth but here are some general recommendations for you all.

PART 5 READING
“Comprehension Text” ADVANCED CAMBRIDGE EXAM

Part 5 is a long text with six comprehension questions. Each correct answer is worth 2 points. It's a test of concentration and understanding. The answers are sequential. The answer to question 2 comes after the answer to question 1 in the text. The only exception might be the 6th question. Sometimes it asks you a general question about the whole text.

PART 6 READING
“Theme questions” ADVANCED CAMBRIDGE EXAM 

In part 6 you read 4 short texts from different writers. You have to answer 4 questions, each worth 2 points. You have to understand each writer's opinion on various topics and compare them with the opinions of the others. You might have to read each text several times, so it could use up a lot of your precious exam minutes. There will be a common theme to the 4 articles. 

PART 7 READING
“Gapped Text” ADVANCED CAMBRIDGE EXAM 

Cambridge calls part 7 a 'gapped text' activity. You get a long text with six paragraphs removed, leaving 6 gaps. You have to put the paragraphs back into the right place. It's quite hard, and Cambridge makes it harder by including an extra paragraph that doesn't fit into any of the spaces. 
The 'key' to this task is to know that each gap in the text can only be filled by one of the paragraphs. 
Read the whole text. Read all the paragraphs. Then pay special attention to the sentences before and after the gap. A lot of the most important information well be there. You don't have to start with the first gap. Always start with the one you think is going to be easiest and leave the hardest ones till later. 
But be careful because sometimes there won't be a clue in the sentence immediately before or after the gap. You really do need to read the whole text to get its meaning - sometimes the 'clue' is the entire paragraph.

PART 8 READING
“Múltiple Matching” ADVANCED CAMBRIDGE EXAM

Part 8 gives you 4-6 short texts and 10 questions. It's called 'Multiple Matching' because you have to match the ten questions with the short texts. Most students find it easier than the other parts of the reading test and can do it quicker. But remember practice makes perfect so that is how we focus our Cambridge courses at English Examination Institute: Practice, Practice, Practice....

BASIC STRUCTURE AND HOW TO FACE THE READINGS

Read everything is essential. It's not enough to read the text carefully, you have to read the questions and answers carefully too.

HOW TO GET BETTER

The best way to improve in this part of the exam is to read a lot in English. Students who read 'for fun' do this part much more quickly, much more accurately than the students who hate reading.

HOW TO FOCUS ON THIS PART

It's better to read the questions first, then look for that information in the text. That's why they put the questions before the texts.

If you can remember the ten questions when reading through the texts, this method is best. But if you read the questions, then the text, and realise you have forgotten the questions, you've just wasted some precious time. That is why we highly recommend you to underline key words and expressions.

COMMON TRAP HOLES

As always, Cambridge give you plenty of opportunity to choose the wrong answer! The most common trap is with exact word matches. If a keyword in the text is the exact same as the word in the question, be careful. It's almost certainly not the answer.

Be careful of partial matches. You must find something that matches all the keywords.

Finally, a huge problem will be not knowing the meaning of one or more keywords. If you don't understand a certain word in the exam. (If you understand every word in the Advanced exam maybe you should be studying our Proficiency course) While preparing for the reading exam, practice the skill of guessing the meanings of unfamiliar words.

FIND THE CLUES

At English Examination Institute we teach you how to look for all the clues given, but let us have a look at some clues That could be in the text:

Names and pronouns (Jack... he... this...)

Chronology (Then... Finally...)

Quotation marks ("I couldn't believe it.")

Contrast words (However, but)

Verb tenses (had gone... will have finished)

Cause and effect (Therefore... as a result...)

Repetition (in other words...)

GENERAL TIPS

- Practice guessing the meanings of words. Predict the meaning, based on the context, before you look them up in the dictionary.

- Take a practice test and photocopy the texts, without looking at the questions. Then take some time to create questions of your own. This will be hard, but when you compare your questions with the ones from Cambridge, you'll learn a lot about how the tests are created. We can teach you how to get an idea of how Cambridge creates the questions and that will really help you answer the questions.

Otras recomendaciones para aprobar tu examen de Advanced de Cambridge

Desde English Examination Institute hemos creado los mejores consejos para ti. Nuestros cursos desarrollan en profundidad todos estos consejos además de incluir recursos y prácticas continuas para que puedas dar lo mejor de ti mismo en la prueba. Los consejos para los exámenes estarán en inglés ya que presuponemos que si usted tiene nivel para acceder a un curso de ADVANCED CAE tiene el nivel suficiente para entender nuestras recomendaciones. Vamos allá!!!

CONSEJOS PARA LA PARTE DE SPEAKING

CONSEJOS PARA LA PARTE DE USE OF ENGLISH

CONSEJOS PARA LA PARTE DE READING

CONSEJOS PARA LA PARTE DE LISTENING

CONSEJOS PARA LA PARTE DE WRITING

ESTRUCTURA DEL EXAMEN DE ADVANCED

INFORMACIÓN ADICIONAL PARA CAE

NUESTROS CURSOS DE PREPARACIÓN DE ADVANCED (CAE)

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