A new exam? What’s changed?
Starting in January 2015, there will be a new version of the Cambridge English: Advanced exam (previously known as the CAE). Right now things are a little difficult for students (and teachers) as many people may be preparing for an exam with slightly different materials. This post will summarise the major changes in the new exam.
Big changes to Reading and Use of English papers
First the good news: starting in January the exam will be 45 minutes shorter! There will be 4 papers instead of 5, which means there will be one fewer break as well—saving you even more time.
The new exam combines the Reading and Use of English papers and here is where the time is saved. Previously there were 84 questions in these 2 sections, now there will be 56. Two sections from the old exam have been removed and one new section has been created. The details can be seen in the table below, the colours indicate where the sections of the current exam have moved in the 2015 exam. With the help of this table, you can use materials from the old exams to prepare for the new ones. Click on the image for a larger version.
First of all, you can see that Reading part 1 and Use of English part 4 have been discontinued in 2015. The combined section begins with the Use of English tasks followed by the Reading tasks. Part 6 of the 2015 Reading and Use of English paper is a new task type. In this new part 6, you will have 4 paragraphs on the same topic by different authors and you will have to answer questions which ask you to compare the texts with each other: “Which author shares the opinion of author C?” “Which writer expresses an opinion different from the others?”
Small changes to Writing and Speaking papers
There are minor changes to the Writing paper and I think they are all good. First of all, you are allowed to write more! You may now write between 220 and 260 words for each piece of writing. Part 1 is now always an essay. This will make it easier to prepare as you will know what to expect. In part 2, there is a choice of three tasks, which will be either a review, a letter/email, a report or a proposal. There will not be any more questions about set texts (in the current exam there are questions about Lord of the Flies or The Lighthouse which you may or may not have read).
There are no changes to the Listening paper.
There are some small changes to the timing of the Speaking paper. Part 1 is one minute shorter and part 4 is one minute longer. In part 3, the activity will be the same but the prompts will be in the form of text, as opposed to images.
For more information about the changes, you can watch a webinar by Cambridge English Language Assessment on the topic (probably only interesting for teachers):
Ben’s Cambridge English: Advanced (CAE) tips
Download a practice test
Look at the practice test I have linked and also check my tips for each paper for specific advice about each section.
The 4 parts of the exam
Here is a brief overview of the exam:
Paper 1: Reading and Use of English 1 hour 30 minutes
Paper 2: Writing 1 hour 30 minutes
Paper 3: Listening 40 minutes
Paper 4: Speaking 15 minutes
NB: it is more accurate to say that the reading test is 3 hours and 55 minutes because you are responsible for understanding every word that is written in any part of the test. Following instructions is crucial in the writing paper, and part 3 of the listening paper (in particular) has a lot of text to read in a short period of time.
