Part 1 Multiple Choice-Tips and Tricks

The B2 First Certificate in English (FCE) has a First for Schools version, which contains more topics familiar to school kids, so is more for the under-18 age group. There is also the C1  Certificate in Advanced English (CAE), and C2 Certificate of Proficiency in English (CPE). The Use of English paper is in all of these exam levels and counts for 20% of the mark of the full exam. 

Use of English Part 1 is a reading comprehension task which focuses on a mix of grammar and vocabulary. You need to consider the following aspects to tackle the exercise successfully. 

1. The Part 1 exercise is quite short, about 150 words, and has eight gaps, distributed throughout the text. 
2. You have four options and they will normally be the same form of word, for example, four verbs with -ing form or four adjectives ending in -ed. 
3. It is relatively easy in comparison to other exercises, such as the Part 4 Key Word Transformation exercise. It is also much shorter than the Reading paper exercises. You may want to leave the Part 1 Use of English to later in the exam so as to focus on the more difficult or longer tasks first. 

The following strategies and reading sub-skills are helpful in tackling the exercise: 

1. Reading the full text quickly; this will familiarise you with the topic and the context. Part 1 has about 150 words, and reading it quickly will help you understand the idea of the text. 
2. Think about vocabulary and what fits the context, but does it fit grammatically? Sometimes in Part 1, more than one word might fit the gap, and these words might not have exactly the same meaning. However, they might fit the context. The problem is that they might not fit the sentence grammatically, so you must read before and after the gaps in the exercises and think about how each option fits grammatically. 
3. Time management is essential; the First Certificate Reading and Use of English Paper is only 75 minutes long and you MUST fill in the official answer sheet in that time. If you consider that each of the three longer reading tasks should get about 15 minutes each, then that leaves half an hour for the four shorter Use of English tasks. Part 1 is short and quick to read, so seven minutes should do this task. As we have said before, you may also want to leave a shorter and easier exercise like this to later on in the exam. 
4. Look over your answers, then fill in the answer sheet. Here at Tailtiu Languages, we recommend filling in the answer sheet just after finishing and reviewing the exercise. This is better than waiting until the end of the exam to fill in everything as it helps with your time management and your focus on the next task. 

These strategies can help you prepare and manage your time more effectively for the exam at all levels. Whenever you are doing practice exams before the actual exam day, use these strategies to prepare yourself, so that you are able to do the exam in the time given and to do the exam, and all of its exercises, with confidence.