C2 PROFICIENCY - WRITING OVERVIEW // How to pass CPE writing paper. Tips and recommendations.

hello all and thank you for joining me again this is to the point english my name is ben and today we're going to be looking at the writing paper of the c2 proficiency cambridge exam also known as the cpe i'm going to be starting today by looking at the brass tacks so the real practical important information the facts of the exam that you need to know to be able to do this exam as well as possible then we're going to look a bit at the strategy the best strategy to do so the time management for each part of the exam and then i'm going to look at the marking criteria so what the examiners are really looking for and how they grade and mark each part of the exam okay and maybe even amy will give a contribution i'm not so sure about that though okay let's do this [Music] in the writing paper for the c2 proficiency exam you will have an hour and a half to do two writing compositions so there are two parts to this this paper the first part is obligatory it's compulsory it's an essay and you'll have to write between 240 and 280 words in the second part you'll have a choice of compositions between a letter a report a review and an article and also maybe another essay i'll explain a little bit more about that in a moment and in this part you'll have to write between 280 and 320 words so it's a little longer but it's important to remember that each part of the exam is awarded the same number of points so you have the same number of points to to gain that's 20 points in each part although the second part you have is longer you have more words to write so maybe you've done the the c1 advanced or the the b2 first exam before and you think you're prepared for the proficiency writing but you have to be careful it's a little different because you'll have five options in part two parts one two three and four could be um as i said an article a report a review or a letter but in part five this is what we call the set text and then you have two options within that part and the set text it's a book which you can read before the exam and the question will be based on that book so you can find the the name of the book that you need to to read or you have you have two options um you can find that on the the cambridge exams official website now quite interestingly i read the official cambridge assessment english advice about this part of the exam and they suggest that watching the film of the book could be sufficient i would recommend reading the book though because as you know you get a lot more information and more detail in the book okay now let's talk a little bit about time management now the writing part of the exam is the only paper apart from the reading and use of english in which you need to worry about the time because obviously the listening and the speaking you're not in control of the time but with the reading and use of english and the writing you decide how you manage your time now you have two options with the writing the first option is to dedicate more time to part two because you need more words obviously as i said it's 280 to 320 words whereas the first part is 240 to 280. so you think that's logical that you you need a little bit more time for part two the second option however is to dedicate 50 50 50 45 minutes for the part one and 45 minutes for part two and this is what i recommend actually because yes part two is a little longer but it's really only about 40 words more more or less it depends it could be the same amount of words 280 is the minimum and it's the maximum for part one whatever it's not a lot more words and also as i said the points are the same you get awarded the same points or you have the same amount of points to be won so for me i think it's better to dedicate 45 minutes to each part having said that it really depends on the individual on each student you need to practice as much as possible before you take the exam so you find what's best for you i'm a teacher i have my opinion my recommendations based on my experience but everybody is different if you feel more comfortable spending more time on one part than the other that's fine but you also have to think about the time management for each composition too because for me preparation is extremely important when i say preparation i mean planning the writing exercise planning the composition before you even start writing so my recommendation is this 15 20 10. so what what do i mean by that well 15 minutes planning 20 minutes writing and 10 minutes to check and review and correct any mistakes you've made 15 minutes may seem a long time for planning but the more time you spend on the planning the less time you need to spend on the writing again it depends on the individual each person is different but that's my suggestion that you at least 15 minutes on the planning maybe even more but um practice and practice and come up with the best time management for for yourself so now i thought it would be useful for you if we look at the marking criteria that the examiners use first of all it's important to know that the the length the word length is a guidance it's not strictly obligatory to to write within the the word length that they that they give so between 240 280 or 280 320 you if you write a little bit less it's okay if you write a little bit more it's okay too what they do specify is that if you write less it may mean that you're not using a sufficient range of language and then you're not including enough relevant information to express what you want to say so you should try to get him within the word length that they they suggest but i wouldn't waste too much time counting every word maybe count the number of words on one line and then count the number of lines and do the maths um but yeah it's important to know that it's not that strict also they say if you write too many words it could mean that you're including irrelevant information so again it depends on on you but obviously if you write 400 words it's far too many if you write 100 words far too few so get as close as you can to the word length so how do the examiners assess these writing compositions when they look at four particular criteria they look at content communicative achievement organization and language so with the content they're asking has the candidate done what was asked of them and that's really how they answered the question a communicative approach is referring to the style and the register when we say register we're talking about if it's formal or informal in the proficiency exam it's very important to get this style and the register correct spot on really maybe in the first certificate and the advanced you have a bit more flexibility but this is proficiency this is tough with organization they're checking that the composition is logically ordered so it has some kind of flow and structure obviously depending if it's a more formal composition or more informal but it's relevant for both so you need the logic and order and in the language they're looking at the vocabulary and grammar and they're looking to see if you demonstrate a good range of language a good range of vocabulary and grammar and that is accurate again that's very important i spoke about this in another video when i was comparing the cae with the cpe the big difference is that in the in the proficiency exam you need to be accurate you need to use the correct vocabulary depending on the subject you're writing about and the style that you're writing in as i said this register so it's extremely important to be accurate and what's the best way to prepare for this part of the exam you can probably guess what i'm going to say but it's to practice to do as many writing compositions as possible and to really understand what they're asking for in the in the exam the cambridge english website has a fantastic resource called write and improve where you can do a composition you send it and you get immediate feedback i think it must be some artificial intelligence or something but it's a great way if you don't have a private teacher or you're not at school it's a good way of getting feedback another great option you have is to join my telegram group because now we have a lot of members um all studying for the cambridge exams all in a similar situation to you and they're all sharing their experiences their questions their advice their tips so if that sounds interesting to you click on the link that i'm going to put in the description that will send you to my telegram account send me a message and i'll put you in the appropriate groups we have a lot of subgroups where people are talking about different areas of the exam and it's a really positive enthusiastic community in the future i'm going to be making some more specific videos on the different parts of the writing so how to write a report a review an article etc so subscribe if you haven't already because you don't want to miss those videos and i'll see you very soon in the next one okay take care bye

Channel: To The Point English with Ben.

Views: 7,220

Keywords: proficiency writing, cambridge proficiency writing tips, cpe writing tips, cpe essay writing tips, c2 proficiency writing tips, how to do c2 proficiency writing, cambridge english c2 proficiency, how to pass c2 proficiency exam, how to prepare c2 proficiency exam, c2 proficiency writing part 1 essay, cpe writing essay, cpe writing part 2, cpe exam tips, c2 proficiency exam tips, cpe writing explained, cpe writing overview, c2 proficiency writing overview, c2 exam tips

Id: a6jjPftL1sI

Length: 10min 15sec (615 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 04 2021