A four-skill test established to consistently assess your English proficiency.
The Tests cover the four language skills – listening, reading, writing and speaking and measure English language proficiency in a practical, everyday context. The tasks and texts reflect both workplace and social situations.
Listening
Candidates listen to recorded texts, monologues and/or conversations by a range of native speakers, and write their answers to a series of questions. These include questions which test the ability to understand main ideas and detailed factual information, ability to understand the opinions and attitudes of speakers, ability to understand the purpose of an utterance and ability to follow the development of ideas. A variety of voices and native-speaker accents is used.
Listening is heard ONCE.
Reading
In the Reading section, candidates answer a wide variety of question types to assess a range of reading skills.
These include reading for gist, reading for main ideas, reading for detail, skimming, understanding logical argument, recognising writers’ opinions, attitudes and purpose. The reading passages are extracted from authentic materials including books, journals, magazines and newspapers.
Writing
Here, candidates are required to write about a familiar topic. Topics are of general interest to them, and are compatible with their levels. The length of the writing text varies from one level to another.
Speaking
This section assesses the candidate’s use of spoken English; it includes short questions, speaking at length about a familiar topic and a structured discussion. The assessment is conducted in a way that does not allow candidates to rehearse set responses beforehand.
Face-to-face speaking assessment
The most effective way to assess speaking skills is through direct interaction with the test taker. It is essential to judge ability to communicate in a real-life situation, not just respond to recorded prompts. That is why trained examiners conduct a face-to-face assessment with each individual Test of English candidate.
All accents are accepted in answering the speaking tasks, including North American, British, Australian and New Zealand English.
