TEXTS FOR READING

CAMBRIDGE EXAMINATIONS IN RUSSIA

For students learning English at any level, university, college or school, it has become important to have appropriate certification in the language, which is both respected and recognized for various purposes.
For this end, Cambridge University can provide learners with one exam for each level, and, in addition, with business and young learners’ exams. There are five levels of language proficiency for which there are five exams, united in the main suite. Here is a list of exams with corresponding levels.

Elementary level – Key English Test (KET)
Pre-intermediate/Intermediate – Preliminary English Test (PET)
Upper-Intermediate – First Certificate in English (FCE)
Advanced – Certificate in Advanced English (CAE)
The level nearing a native speaker’s level – Certificate of Proficiency in English (CPE)

So, wherever students are in their language learning, there is an exam to suit. Usually, in Russia, senior form students at specialized schools or gymnasiums and lyceums can pass FCE after a suitable preparation course or taking an FCE-style coursebook during class time. PET can be taken by the same students in the 8th or 9th forms and by school leavers of mass school. CAE and CPE are suitable for university students studying at linguistic departments. Depending what year they are in and how much exposure to the language they have had, they can choose either CAE or CPE.
There are also three levels of the Business English Certificate: Elementary, Pre-Intermediate/Intermediate and Upper-Intermediate levels. It is intended for people working in business or studying business who want to either identify their language level or have their progress in the language measured.
A series of young learners’ exams consists of three exams: Starters, Movers and Flyers starting from a very young age and taking learners to a good elementary level (the Key English Test equivalent) when they are approximately aged 12 . What is actually the point of young children like this taking exams? In fact, tests and exams accompany us all our lives – at school, university, even on the job. So the earlier kids get used to them, the less stress they are likely to be in the future. And for that matter, all Cambridge exams in the interacting parts keep up a friendly, relaxed, but controlled, atmosphere for both young children and adults.
The purposes for which students might take these exams range from using the certificates in a job or when entering a course of study abroad, to receiving clear results demonstrating the achieved level.
In many schools now students are being prepared for Cambridge exams and it has also become part of some universities’ curriculum, as the national standards in English aim to incorporate some of the best features of Cambridge exams. The new format of tests and exams at specialized schools has already switched, or is switching, to the format of the First Certificate in English. And students of these specialized schools must have already taken some tests in the new format. The novelty concerns mostly speaking, writing, grammar and vocabulary.
The appropriacy of Cambridge exams in teaching and learning contexts has to do with the content and format of the exams. They are consistent and offer similar formats of tasks throughout the main suite.
As with all serious exams (and those that cost money!) before entering one’s name in the candidates’ register, we should clearly see what kind of exam is most feasible and “fail-proof”.
To assess tentatively what your language level is there are tests that are specifically written for people who want to prepare either in class with a teacher or individually. They are published by practically every publisher and there is no difference what book of tests you are going to do. But Cambridge University Press has a right to publish past papers, the ones that have been used in a real exam. Here we are offering two tasks taken from a bona fide First Certificate in English exam, courtesy of Cambridge University Press . These tasks are taken from the Use of English paper which tests grammar and vocabulary. They are called “multiple choice” cloze and “open” cloze. We do not have the possibility to offer all five papers of the exam in this article, but we have chosen these two as the most indicative of the level the students have. There is a very strong correlation of the level and the results in these tasks. If students complete more than 60% of the task, it proves that their level is Upper-Intermediate. Of course, it’s very difficult to be absolutely confident about the performance of the students in the real exam, but the margin will not be very large.
The following two tasks are examples from the Use of English paper (which, actually, consists of five tasks). The answers to these tasks will be given in the next article in the series on the subject of exams.

Task 1 Multiple Choice Cloze

For each question 1–15, read the text below and decide which answer, A, B, C or D best fits each space. There is an example at the beginning (0).
Example: 0B

Task 2 Open Cloze

For questions 16–30, read the text below and think of the word which best fits each space. Use only one word in each space. There is an example at the beginning: (0)
Example: 0A