Below, you'll find a question relevant to each task on the two papers. Scroll down past the questions and you'll find the suggested answers.
The Questions
Paper 1/1 and 1/2
Not much time left now before the exam, and you need to check any technical terms that you are not certain you understand. Every day, go to the Index page of the ELT Glossary and choose one (or more if you have time) of the pages it links to. Look at the list of terms and click on any that you are not 100% sure of. Make sure you understand the concept and make notes of the basic definition (one or two sentences) and an example, which you should review on the following days. Then choose one you are sure of, and write your own definition and example before clicking to check
Paper 1/1
How would
you have done in past exams? Here are some definitions that have come up in
Paper 1/1 in past years. Could you name each of them? Click on the links
to check your answers.
a) A
verb form which is marked for tense, person and/or number. Eg: He lives in the south;
They left.
b) A type of referencing where an item refers to something that occurs before it in a text. Eg: the utterance I don’t want to go to any noisy parties. I don’t enjoy them, where them refers back to "noisy parties".
c) A
process in discourse in which a noun, phrase or clause is replaced by a word or
words to help with cohesion in a text. Eg : Would you like an ice-cream? / Yes, I’d
love one
d) This
term indicates in a verb phrase how the speaker or writer sees an event
(representing, for example, degree of completeness or duration) regardless of
the time of the event itself.
e) The
repetition of a sentence structure or phrase within a piece of text, which
helps to give cohesion to the text. It may be used for dramatic effect.
Eg He didn’t do it for
love; he didn’t do it for fame; he did it for money.
f) The
state of linguistic competence of a learner at a specific moment in time, which
will show some but not full correspondence to the competence of a native
speaker. Eg : A B1 learner will have
assimilated some of the structures and lexis of the language, but
will still make errors when using other forms, producing a mix of
accurate/inaccurate speech. As s/he progresses in the language the balance will
change.
Paper 1/2
How would you have done in one of the past
exams? Here are some terms that have come up in previous sessions in Paper 1/2.
Could you define and exemplify each of them? Click on the links to check your
answers.
Phrasal verb Communicative competence Polysemy Allophone
Paper 1/3
A group of intermediate (CEFR B1) learners is asked to discuss the following questions in groups of three:
- Describe your family. Do you see all your family regularly, or some of them only occasionally? Why?
- Explain who you feel closest to in your family, and why.
- Were the family relationships that your old group described similar or different? Why?
1. Lexis in the field of family relationships. Example: My sister is married, and she and my brother-in-law live in France.
2. Language for giving reasons and results. Example: Because she lives so far away, she doesn't visit very often.
3. Adverbials of frequency: She comes to see my parents about three times a year.
4. Language of comparison including comparatives, superlatives, as...as etc. Example: Davide's family isn't as big as mine, but Anna's is much larger.
5. Adjectives in the field of personal qualities: Example: Luigi is always happy and positive.
Paper 1/4
Look at the example of a learner's speech which you will find here. Find a key strength or weakness in each of the following categories. Your answer should include at least one strength and at least one weakness.
- range and accuracy of lexis
- grammatical accuracy
- organisation
Paper 1/5
1. Describe the form of the two highlighted words in bold and identify at least 3 problems learners might have with the individual words and/or the phrase : He seems friendly enough
2. Transcribe the following into phonemic script and comment on any features that might occur in connected speech.
a) white boat b) great comfort c) been away d) big garden e) Did you hurt yourself?
Paper 2/1
In the first lesson of a 121 course with the objective of improving the L’s speaking skills, the T administers a direct speaking test which consists of a long turn. While she speaks, he takes notes of her specific strengths and weaknesses under a list of headings such as pronunciation – pronunciation of individual sounds, range and accuracy of grammar, discourse management etc etc. There are ten categories in all.
Using the heading Marking, could you identify two positive points about this test?
Paper 2/2
Look at the materials which you will find here. They are a unit with the overall aim of teaching learners to read and write customer reviews of places tourists are likely to visit - historic sites, museums, restaurants etc.
Identify the purpose related to the overall stated aim of each of the following activities:
- Activity One
- Activity Two (a)
- Activity Three
- Activity Four (b)
- Activity Five (1)
- Activity Six (a)
Paper 2/3
We've seen before that in this task Cambridge often focus on specific teaching techniques - and that several topics have occurred two or three times. Here's a list of some techniques that you should know about which haven't yet been included in this series - the questions usually focus on the advantages and disadvantages of using them, their uses, and the learner types and learning contexts for which they might be suitable or otherwise. The links lead to articles on various topics from An ELT Notebook. Those asterisked are in the type of format that might occur in the exam. The questions are listed in the introduction. Choose one and try and answer it to time (approx 25 mins) before looking at the article and comparing your points with those made there. In addition, make sure you work through all the topics before the exam.
Differentiation* Using songs and music* Storytelling* Using Textbooks - or not?* Roleplay and simulation Personalisation* Feedback and correction* (1) Feedback* (2) Dictation* Extensive reading* Using visual aids at higher levels* Task repetition Using dictionaries*
The Suggested Answers
Paper 1/1
Click on the letters a-f for the answers and further information on each topic - which may be necessary for other tasks in the exam.
Paper 1/2
Click on the links for the answers and further information on each term.
Paper 1/3
All of the points are valid could potentially score full marks (2 for the feature plus 2 for the example). However, in the exam itself points 1 and 2 would not have gained marks as they were the examples that Cambridge included:
- Lexis for family relationships : eg cousin, grandmother
- Language for giving reasons: eg Because she was... due to his kindness...
This wasn't mentioned here, so no problem if you included them. But when you do the exam, look carefully at the Cambridge features, and make sure that those you include don't overlap - if they do, they won't gain marks. In addition, notice there are 5 points - and the task requires three only. Only the first three will be marked and any others will be ignored and cannot gain marks. So here, the fourth and fifth would not be considered for marks even though, in their own right, they are valid features and example. So - in the exam, with the first two given as examples, you'd have scored full marks if you'd used points 3, 4 and 5.
Paper 1/4
1. Weakness - range and accuracy of lexis: Although comprehensible, individual lexical items are often not accurate or not what would be the natural choice to express the concept, indicating a limited range. Example: "copy machine" instead of "photocopier" (l.11).
Paper 1/5
1. Form : friendly = adjective enough = intensifying adverb
NB: If you also described Use or Meaning notice that these were not specified in
the question, and in the exam would just have wasted time without gaining any marks.
Problems for learners
a) Ls might presume that friendly is an adverb because of the –ly ending
and produce erroneous sentences such as:
*He spoke friendly
b) Word order: intensifying adverbs usually come before the adjective
(Eg He seemed quite friendly) and enough used with a noun precedes it (Eg:
I don’t have enough time).
Overgeneralising from knowledge of either of these rules, Ls might therefore
produce: *He seemed enough friendly
c) Spelling: possibility of reversing the i and e in friendly
*freindly
d) Spelling: enough might be
spelt enogh or enugh (Google them if you don’t believe me!)
e) Pronunciation: Japanese learners would have problems producing the
/r/ and /l/ phonemes in /frendli:/ as these are allophones in Japanese.
f) Pronunciation: the written form -ough has several pronunciations in
English. Ls could be confused between whether it was pronounced /ʌf/,
/u:/ as in through, or /ɒf/ as
in cough
2. a) white boat /waɪt bəʊt/ Regressive assimilation of place : unvoiced alveolar /t/ might assimilate to unvoiced bilabial /p/ in front of bilabial /b/ to make the two adjacent consonants easier to pronounce together, resulting in / waɪp bəʊt /
b) great comfort /greɪt kʌmfət/ Regressive assimilation of place : unvoiced alveolar /t/ might assimilate to unvoiced velar /k/ in front of the following /k/ to make the two adjacent consonants easier to pronounce together. The two /k/ phonemes would then geminate leaving one slightly longer than normal /k/ which sounds as if it belongs to both syllables, resulting in /greɪkʌmfət/
c) been away /bi:n əweɪ/ i) possible vowel reduction in unstressed grammatical word “been” from long /i:/ to short /ɪ/; ii) consonant vowel catenation: syllable-final consonant /n/ likely to catenate with syllable initial vowel /ə/ - resulting in /bɪnəweɪ/
d) big garden /bɪg gɑːdən/ i) possible gemination of the two adjacent /g/ consonants, leaving one slightly longer than normal /g/ which sounds as if it belongs to both syllables; ii) possible elision of vowel in final unstressed syllable of “garden” leaving a syllabic /n̩/ - resulting in /bɪgɑːdn̩/
e) Did you hurt
yourself? /dɪd juː hɜːt jɔːself/ i) two likely instances of yod coalescence
: /dɪd juː/ becomes /dɪʤuː/ and / hɜːt jɔːself/ becomes /hɜːʧɔːself/; ii) possible vowel
reduction to schwa of vowels in unstressed syllables of the grammatical words
“you” and “your”- resulting in /dɪʤə hɜːʧəself/
Any terms in the answers that you didn’t understand? Look them up here.
And don't forget that you'll find a lot more practice activities for this task in the exam in the Language Matters section of the site (click on the link in the top menu). All of Cambridge's "favourite" topics are covered. This task carries 50 marks in all - doing badly would be likely to mean failing the exam, so you must be fully prepared.
Paper 2/1
1. As the test involves a long
turn, the T. does not have to participate (which would divide his attention).
He is free to listen and analyse the learner's strengths and weaknesses. Impact
on the L : This will lead to a more reliable result than a test based on short
turns, and will ensure that the course is based on evidence of the L’s most
important weaknesses.
2. There are specific criteria for the test which all reflect elements of
the speaking construct. That means the T. will have to listen specifically for
a range of items/areas and will get a more realistic overall picture of the
learner's competence than if he was eg distracted by grammatical errors and overemphasised
that area in his comments. It will
ensure that he has a balanced picture of both strengths and weaknesses. Impact
on the L : (The effect mentioned above is equally valid here, but remember that you will not gain any marks for repeating an application. So alternatively...) Receiving feedback on strengths is liable to be motivating for the
learner.
Paper 2/2
- Activity One: to start activating schemata on the genre that Ls will later be working on in detail - describing and evaluating experiences as a tourist in customer reviews.
- Activity Two (a): to reactivate and extend learners' knowledge of the first feature of the target genre: adjectives with general evaluative meaning which collocate with a broad range of the places etc that might be the topic of customer reviews.
- Activity Three: to reactivate and extend learners' knowledge of evaluative adjectives with more restricted collocations, which are used when describing specific topics in customer reviews.
- Activity Four (b): To provide the learners with models of customer reviews demonstrating various target features of the genre (evaluative adjectives, paragraphing, ellipsis)
- Activity Five: to ensure learners can recognise elliptical structures - thus introducing and practising another feature of the genre Customer Reviews
- Activity Six (a): To incorporate relevant features of a process approach to writing, in a lesson which is otherwise genre based and focused specifically on individual features of the target genre (customer reviews).
Paper 2/3
Click on the links in the question for the tasks and suggested answers.
Want to review the questions for past six weeks? Click on Doing the Delta in the top menu and scroll down. You'll find links for everything posted so far.
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