Cambridge Reading & Use of English

The big picture

• Reading & Use of English
  • Multiple-choice cloze — Choose the word that fits a gap
  • Open cloze — Fill gaps with your own words (grammar)
  • Word formation — Change a root word to fit
  • Key word transformations — Rewrite a sentence using a given word
  • Reading parts — Multiple choice, gapped text, multiple matching

Grammar and vocabulary control

The Use of English parts test your control of grammar and vocabulary through gap-fill tasks. Multiple-choice cloze and open cloze fill gaps in a text; word formation changes a root ('happy' → 'happiness') to fit; key word transformations rewrite a sentence using a given word while keeping the meaning.

Open cloze — think grammar words

In open cloze you supply one word per gap with no options — usually grammar words (articles, prepositions, auxiliaries, pronouns, linkers). Read the whole sentence and ask what structure the gap needs.

Word formation — change the root

Word formation gives a root word in capitals at the end of the line; you change its form (prefix, suffix, noun/adjective/adverb) to fit the sentence. Watch for negatives and plurals — the trap is the right word in the wrong form.

Reading parts — answer from the text

The Reading parts include multiple choice, gapped text (insert missing sentences/paragraphs), and multiple matching (match questions to sections). As always, answers are supported by the text — for gapped text, use referencing and linkers to slot pieces correctly.

Test yourself before you move on

Re-reading a note feels like learning and produces almost none. The retrieval below is what actually builds the memory, so cover the map above and answer these from memory — out loud or written down, not in your head, because "I know this" is the feeling that fails under exam pressure.

1. Without looking: what is Multiple-choice cloze, and how does it connect to Reading & Use of English?
2. Without looking: what is Open cloze, and how does it connect to Reading & Use of English?
3. Without looking: what is Word formation, and how does it connect to Reading & Use of English?
4. Without looking: what is Key word transformations, and how does it connect to Reading & Use of English?
5. Without looking: what is Reading parts, and how does it connect to Reading & Use of English?

Anything you could not produce is the part of this note you have not learned yet — regardless of how familiar it felt while reading. Re-read only that node, then re-test the whole set. Testing the whole set matters: recalling one idea in isolation is easier than recalling it among 5 competing ones, which is the situation the exam actually puts you in.

When to come back to this note

Spacing is not a scheduling detail, it is the mechanism. Meeting this material again just as it starts to fade forces the effortful retrieval that consolidates it, which is why a note reviewed four times across three weeks outlasts the same note read four times in one evening. The built-in scheduler resurfaces these questions at widening intervals for exactly that reason — the prompt arriving when you feel you have half-forgotten is the system working, not failing.

A practical rhythm for Reading & Use of English: today, again tomorrow, then after three days, then after a week. If you fail a review, shorten the next interval rather than re-reading the note end to end — the failure identifies the gap precisely, and re-reading everything wastes the diagnosis.