in this video we are going to take a deep dive into B2 first reading and use of English I'm going to show you each individual part and the best way to approach them but we are also going to have a look at some more General strategies and other things to consider for you to save time and score the highest possible marks hi and welcome to teacher Phil where I help people like you pass their Cambridge exams how many parts are there in reading and use of English what do the different parts look like what is the best way to do them how can you do the tasks quickly how much time do you have to complete the test how can you prepare wait come down and take a deep breath all your questions will be answered because in this video I'm going to show you everything you need to know about reading and use of English the B2 first exam consists of four different exam papers reading and use of English writing listening and speaking reading and use of English as the name suggests is actually two exams reading and use of English you need to know that out of the seven Parts in this exam paper Parts 1 5 6 and 7 belong to reading while Parts 2 3 and 4 make up the use of English portion of the exam you get 1 hour and 15 minutes to complete everything which includes transferring your answers onto a separate answer sheet as this typically takes around five minutes you are left with more or less 70 minutes to complete all seven tasks which makes it around 10 minutes for each task last but not least both tests account for 20 of your overall Mark in B2 first which means that reading and use of English combined are 40 percent of your overall Mark in the exam as you can see you have to do a lot in pretty little time but luckily there are different tips and strategies that can help you save time and score high marks so if you want to know more make sure you watch until the end in part one you have to read a short text with eight gaps and for each Gap you have to choose the correct missing word from four possible options A B C or D firstly it is always a good idea to read the text quickly without worrying about the gaps this gives you a general idea of the topic as well as a first Glimpse as the kind of vocabulary that is used in the text next you want to analyze what's around the Gap the language before and after the Gap can help you find signal words which in turn can help you find the correct answer as an example let's have a look at the first two gaps looking at Gap number one the signal word is then it tells us that we need some kind of comparative form in the gap in gap number two the signal word is the preposition in we can now look for a verb that collocates with it which of the options in number one can we use with then only rather and sooner work here because instead and except are not comparative forms the last step is to look at the meanings rather means more whereas sooner talks about time the sentence doesn't talk about time but about different aspects of History so we can choose rather as the correct option Gap number two is even easier as there is only one verb that we use within we can say result in so result must be the correct answer repeat this process for the other gaps and you're done however I always recommend reading the text one last time just to make sure you catch possible mistakes and that's it part one is done but of course we have six more parts to look at so let's keep going in part two you have to fill in eight gaps in a text just like in part one but there are no possible options you decide what the missing word must be part 2 focuses on grammar and some vocabulary like phrasal verbs the strategy here is exactly the same as in part one but because there are no options to choose from you will have to use your brain just a little bit more first you read the text quickly and then you analyze what's around the gaps to find words that might help you choose the correct missing word in the sentence with gap 9 there are two ideas the Lamar race track in France was and I first saw but they aren't logically connected it looks as if the second half describes what happened at the racetrack so we need a word that establishes this connection between a place and the description of that place if we want to describe a place more in English we often use a relative Clause with the word where at the beginning so where makes perfect sense in this example as well after you finish the last Gap again read the text one more time in order to catch possible mistakes see this last step as your safety net and don't skip it because it can really make the difference between pass and fail in use of English in part three you get another text with eight gaps for each Gap you get one word that you have to change so the grammar and meaning fit the sentence part three belongs to use of English and you have to show how well you know word families and how you can change words by using prefixes and suffixes prefixes are the little syllables we put at the beginning of a word to change its meaning for example an in or this to make a word negative suffixes are syllables we put at the end of a word to change its grammar like meant or Ness to turn a word into a noun here is an example of a word family for you from the stem use we can make a noun verb with all the different verb forms an adjective adverb plurals positive negative forms and many more you have to decide which member of the family has to go in each Gap to make the sentence grammatically correct and so the word has the right meaning for any given context before we get into the exact strategy I want to talk about one little detail that many candidates confuse the words on the right are already next to the Gap where they belong you don't have to choose the right gap for each word just put it in the Gap that is on the same line again the strategy is very similar to Parts one and two firstly read the text quickly and then look at each Gap and decide what kind of word is missing for example a noun verb adjective or adverb also think about if you have to use the plural or personal form of a noun or if an adjective has to be negative all of these things are crucial to find the correct member of the word family for each Gap look at this example looking at Gap 17 we can quickly see that we need a noun in the Gap as there is a superlative adjective before the Gap as well as an expression of possession after it both tell us that a noun is needed now that we know that we can go to the next step our keyword in gap 17 is product but we have to change it in order to fit in the Gap even though product is already a noun China is currently the largest product of garlic doesn't make any sense China is the country that makes the largest amount of garlic so product becomes producer because a producer is someone who makes something as with parts one and two you should always read the text again once you finish just to double check your work and to correct mistakes if needed when you're happy with your answers it's time to move to part four part 4 is the only part in reading and use of English where you don't have to work with a text instead you get six sentence pairs the first sentence is always complete while the second sentence has a gap you have to fill in the Gap so the two sentences have the same or at least very similar meaning you have to use between two and five words and there's also a keyword given that you have to include in the Gap without changing its form in reading and use of English part four you have to show that you can paraphrase which means saying something in different words that you can use synonyms and that you can change grammatical forms always remember that the two sentences have to be as similar as possible in meaning that you have to use between two and five words and the keyword must be included this part is special because you can score two marks for correct answer and even if only part of your answer is correct you can still score one Mark so it always makes sense to answer everything even if you have to guess now let's have a look at an example first of all you should read the two sentences carefully and check what pieces of information are already the same then I would simply cross these parts out so you are left with the structure you need to transform and put in the gap in the next step we have to keep two things in mind firstly you have to use between two and five words if you use only one or more than five you will lose marks also contractions like I'm or don't are counted as two words so please be careful Kant is the only exception because it contracts cannot which is just one word secondly you have to use the keyword in the Gap as part of the two to five words without changing it with all that in mind let's have a look at our example from before again here we have two different structures we need to transform was in favor of and visiting in the second sentence we can see part of two structures we have to use for this transformation thought it would be and to remember that we have to use the keyword idea in our answer when you are in favor of something it means that you are happier with one option rather than another one or we could say that we think it's a good idea there we have it our second sentence therefore starts with Jones thought it would be a good idea too after the structure we use an infinitive so I have already added two now we can look at the second structure we need a synonym of visit that we can use with two for me the best option here is go to so our final sentence becomes John thought it would be a good idea to go to the museum it is always a good idea to check your sentences again before you transfer them onto the answer sheet go through the six items again and check if your second sentences have the same meaning as the first ones this last step is going to help you find little mistakes and correct them in our example we used five words we included the key word without changing it and our two sentences are as similar in meaning as possible which means two marks Plus in part five you read a text with around 650 to 700 words and you have to answer six multiple choice questions the focus in this task is on a variety of reading skills like just detail as well as the opinion or attitude of the writer every correct answer in this part is worth two marks as mentioned before there are six questions with four possible answers a to d the first and the last question are often a little bit more General and they might ask about the writer's attitude or opinion while the other questions ask for some more detailed information to find the correct answers to those questions you have to look for very specific things and sometimes the questions like here question 35 even ask you about one specific word in the text and what it refers to together with parts 1 6 and 7 part 5 makes up the reading portion of the exam it is usually a good idea to read the text once very quickly before you jump into the questions just to get a general understanding of course you will have to read quite quickly so as not to lose too much time this way you already know a little bit more about the text without going into too much detail and it can already help you with the first and last question in this task now it is time to look at the questions read them very carefully and underline important words do not look at the answers yet Cambridge always tries to confuse you but we won't let them do that we go step by step like the tortoise in the race against the hair slow and steady wins the race so make sure you know exactly what you have to look for in the text in this example there are two important points to focus on the first paragraph and Caitlyn's main point which tells us where in the text we have to look and what exactly we have to look for Caitlyn's general idea or opinion about the island that's a good start and we can begin to read with confidence again at this point I wouldn't even focus on the possible answers because three of the four are simply there to confuse you so just ignore them and do your work instead we test our comprehension skills without the confusing possible answers look at this paragraph and try to answer the question in your own words feel free to pause the video and give it a minute okay what did you find out to summarize Caitlyn simply describes the island and the connection to the mainland she also says that you sometimes can't get there because the road is covered with water that's pretty much it and easy as well isn't it I know you are already excited about the possible answers so finally let's have a look at them you can now go through them and see if any of the options matches your own answer in the text Caitlyn doesn't talk about any dangerous Crossing as an option A nor the impression you get from the mainland option b nor if it is difficult to live there option D option C however describes quite well what we found out in the previous step so we can choose option C with a lot of certainty so you see By ignoring the possible answers we keep our mind clean of any pollution so when we read the text we can find the answers ourselves then you simply compare what you found with the possible answers and you choose the correct option hopefully you did such a good job in steps one to four that you don't even have to worry about this step anymore however sometimes we are simply not a hundred percent sure which of the possible answers we should choose in this case just go back to the text again read the section one more time and then make your decision in part six you read a text in which six sentences are missing you have to put one sentence in each Gap but there are unfortunately seven sentences to choose from this part tests your ability to find the connection between a sentence and the surrounding text by looking for words that link the different parts you have to be able to understand the text and its different parts as a whole but also look for detailed information part 6 together with parts one five and seven make up the reading portion of the exam and just as in part five you can score two marks for each correct answer it is a common mistake to look right away at the sentences without reading the text first in the exam the text and the possible answers are always designed to confuse you and to drive you into making easy mistakes reading the text once can help you get a general idea of the text as a whole as well as the topics of each individual paragraph I even recommend making a short note next to each paragraph so you know exactly what they are talking about but let's have a look at an example it is really nothing crazy just read a paragraph make a short note and move on to the next one this strategy can help you a lot once you try to put the sentences in the gaps next you want to look at the sentences and find words that might connect them to the text these include things like time periods contrast reason and result examples repetition verb tenses pronouns determiners Etc it can really be a wide variety of signal words or phrases that tell you which sentence to put in which Gap in sentence D we can see a contrast even though the author admits that ballet is Extreme it shouldn't be considered dangerous that's a very good start and we can go back to the text and check where we find information that brings us forward the next step is to find a home for our sentence in one of the gaps to do this we have to check if there is something around one of the gaps to connect the paragraph to our sentence in the first two paragraphs we can read about what people have always thought about ballet before the Gap and what the reality is after it at the end of the first paragraph it says dancers spend every waking hour in pain bodies at Breaking Point their smiles are pretense and after the Gap we read contrary to popular belief there is no need to break bones or tear muscles to achieve ballet positions this is the contrast that we also found in our example sentence so we can be pretty sure that we have a match repeat this process for the other sentences and you will be fine of course you can adjust it to suit your preferences for example you can go get by Gap or sentence by sentence as long as you have a plan in place that you trust there's no stopping you finally make sure you read the text again with the sentences in the Gap just to make sure that everything sounds right please don't skip this step because it might save you a Mark or two that you would otherwise Miss in part 7 the last part of the test you get a text that is broken up in between four to six parts as well as 10 questions to answer your task is to match the questions to the parts of the text where you can find the answers the focus in this part is on reading for detailed information unfortunately I see far too often that candidates just want to jump straight into reading the text and matching the questions to the paragraphs instead the first thing you want to do is look at the questions read them carefully and underline the things that help you see what exactly to look for be aware that you might find similar information in several of the paragraphs in the text so you have to make sure that your match is 100 correct and not just 80 or 90 percent for question 43 the underlining could look just like in my example focus on the most important pieces of information to make it easier for yourself to find the correct answer the biggest waste of time I see when candidates attempt part 7 is that they try to go through the task question by question imagine if you start with question 43 and you read the whole text to find the answer and then you repeat this for questions 44 45 and so on you would have to read the text many times before you find all the answers to the different questions listen to your teacher from Germany we are all about efficiency so please don't make the mistake and don't go through the task question by question what you really want to do is to go paragraph by paragraph that means you read the first part of the text and decide which questions we can answer in this part once you're done you move on to the next part of the text and repeat that process this way you only read each part maybe twice or three times before you have all the answers to the different questions it can save you a lot of time and headaches but let's look at an example in this example you can see how you can analyze a paragraph and find the information which gives you the answer to some of the questions here paragraph a answers number 43 and 48 after you have matched the different questions to the paragraphs you should double check your answers one last time we sometimes get caught up in too much detail and we end up choosing the wrong answer just take a deep breath read the whole part one more time and correct any mistakes so now that we've gone through each individual part and the best way of doing them I also wanted to give you a few General ideas to think about remember that you can decide on the order in which you want to go through the different tasks in reading a news of English you don't have to go from part one to seven but you choose which way is the most efficient and effective for you for example Some people prefer to start with the longer reading tasks part 5 to 7 so they don't get tired so quickly others prefer to start with the tasks where you can score two marks Parts four to six in order to score marks quickly so they can feel a little bit more relaxed when they do the other parts what matters most is your preference choose the order that you like best that saves you time and that you can use to score the highest marks possible secondly you have to be aware of your time management in this part of the exam as we said earlier you only have around 10 minutes for each task some of the parts take a little bit longer some a little bit shorter but you should try to time yourself at least once so you can see which of the parts come easier to you and which ones you need to practice in order to get a little bit faster so that in the end you need around 10 minutes on average for all the different tasks okay that's it now you know everything you need to know to be successful in reading and use of English I hope this video will make you feel more confident and also that my tips and strategies can help you in your practice and in the exam I can also be your teacher I offer writing feedback as well as online classes and you can also check out the articles about all the different parts of reading and use of English on my website all the links are in the description box below and I see you in the next video