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A2 Key reading practice: signs, matching and gap-fill

A2 Key5 topics200 questions

A2 Key reading is short. Almost nothing you read is longer than a few paragraphs, and the hard part is speed and care rather than difficult words. These five pages take the reading tasks one at a time, with the strategy that saves time in each and forty practice questions per task.

What this paper asks of you

  • Getting the main message out of a sign, label or text message in a few seconds.
  • Matching what a person wants to the one text that actually gives it.
  • Finding the detail in a longer text that answers a question, instead of choosing the option that looks familiar.
  • Choosing the right word for a gap when the grammar around it decides the answer.
  • Reading a whole short text before filling any gap, so the story stays consistent.
  • Recognising paraphrase: the correct answer almost never repeats the words of the text.
  • Separating what someone did from what they planned to do or would like to do.
  • Spelling common words correctly when you copy an answer onto the answer sheet.
  • Managing about an hour of reading and writing so that no single question eats the time you need for the rest.

Task types, one page each