C2 Proficiency Reading & Use of English practice
C2 Proficiency Reading and Use of English is the longest paper on the exam and the one that separates a Grade C from a Grade A. It rewards candidates who control idiom, fixed collocation and the small function words that hold a formal text together. The five topics below take one task type at a time and give you forty original items each.
What this paper asks of you
- Fixed collocation and idiom used precisely, not approximately: a near-synonym is a wrong answer here.
- Function words, referencing and discourse markers that signal how a paragraph turns.
- Derivational morphology under pressure: prefixes, suffixes and internal spelling changes from a single root.
- Grammatical range in paraphrase: inversion, nominalisation, passive reporting and cleft structures.
- Text-level cohesion: tracking pronouns, substitution and ellipsis across paragraph boundaries.
- Register control: recognising which of two synonyms belongs in a review, a report or an academic article.
- Connotation: telling approval from disapproval when the denotation of two words is identical.
- Attitude and stance: separating a writer’s own view from a view they report in order to dismiss.
- Reading speed with accuracy, since the paper is long enough that pace alone costs marks.
- Transfer accuracy: spelling, number and word limits, which lose more marks at C2 than comprehension does.
Task types, one page each
- Multiple-choice clozeC2 Proficiency multiple-choice cloze practice: forty original items on idiom, collocation and phrasal verbs, with the near-synonym traps that cost marks.40 questions
- Open clozeC2 Proficiency open cloze practice: forty original gapped items on inversion, fixed phrases, linkers and referencing, with strategy for the grammar-led gaps.40 questions
- Word formationC2 Proficiency word formation practice: forty original items building nouns, adjectives and adverbs from a root, including negative prefixes and confusable pairs.40 questions
- Key word transformationsC2 Proficiency key word transformations practice: forty original items on inversion, nominalisation and fixed phrases, with the word-count rules that lose marks.40 questions
- Gapped text & multiple matchingC2 Proficiency gapped text and cross-text multiple matching practice: forty original items on cohesion, reference, opinion tracking and paraphrase.40 questions
Note
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