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Tips, guides, and insights for English learners.
B2 First Speaking Part 4: Half the Test Is One Topic
Part 3 and Part 4 cover the same subject and run seven minutes between them. That is half a fourteen minute test spent on one topic you did not choose.
B2 First vs B2 First for Schools: What Actually Differs
Cambridge answers this in two sentences: same CEFR level, same format, different topics. Here is what that means for how you prepare and which one to sit.
B2 First vs C1 Advanced Speaking: Every Difference
One minute longer, one extra picture, one extra skill and a different job for your partner. The two Cambridge speaking tests laid side by side from source.
C2 Proficiency Speaking Format: Three Parts, 16 Minutes
The highest Cambridge exam drops a speaking part and gets longer. One part takes ten of the sixteen minutes, which changes where preparation should go.
C2 Proficiency Speaking Part 1: Two Minutes, Split in Turns
The examiner addresses a question to each candidate in turn, so your share of a two minute part arrives in pieces. And speculating enters the interview here.
C2 Proficiency Speaking Part 2: Your Reaction, Not the Picture
At C2 the pictures move into the collaborative task and the question asks for your reaction to them. Describing what you see answers the wrong question.
C2 Proficiency Speaking Part 3: 10 of the 16 Minutes
Part 3 takes almost two thirds of the C2 Speaking test, and the solo turn doubles to two minutes. It is the part that decides how the exam goes.
CAE Speaking Part 1: Your Rehearsed Answer Is Too Long
Part 1 is two minutes shared between two candidates. A memorised self-introduction eats most of your share and answers only half the task.
CAE Speaking Part 2: The Half Nobody Prepares
Everyone rehearses the one minute long turn. Almost nobody rehearses the 30 seconds where you comment on photographs you have never seen.
CAE Speaking Part 3: The Task You Cannot Do Alone
Part 3 is a two minute discussion with another candidate, then one minute to reach a decision. It is scored on how you handle them, not on your vocabulary.