CAE Speaking Part 1 Questions Practice

The first part of the Cambridge Advanced Speaking exam is one of the easiest parts of the Speaking exam. As a result, this is the part of the speaking exam which is least practised before. However, because students are nervous about doing it (the speaking exam in general, not this particular part), they quite often make mistakes.

Like with everything, the more you both know about something and the more you practise doing it, the easier it will become.

And in this article with a practice test, that is exactly what you'll do. You'll be asked different questions which you will or may be asked in this first part of the exam and you will practise answering them.

But before you do, you'll learn a little about the format of this part of the exam.

The format of Part 1

This part of exam lasts about 2 minutes (3 minutes if there are 3 people doing the speaking exam) and it starts as soon as you sit down in front of the examiner. After being asked what your names are and then giving to the examiner the mark sheets which you will be provided with before you entered the exam room, each candidate will be asked a number of questions to answer individually.

You will each be asked between 2 and 3 questions in this part. Two of the questions which are generally asked in this part of the exam are, "Where are you from?" and "How long have you been studying English". If you are asked either of these questions, don't over explain your answer. For the first simply say the country and the town/city where you are from (e.g. "I am from Santander which is in the North of Spain"). For the second, just say the amount of time (e.g. "I have been learning English for about 10 years").

For the other questions which you are asked, you are expected to speak for more time, around 15 to 20 seconds.

Once the two minutes is over, you will then move on to the second part of the exam where you are asked to speak about two photos.

Now you are ready to practise answering the questions which you will or may be asked in this part of the speaking exam.

Test:

In this test, you will be first asked 6 randomly selected questions which are commonly asked in this part of the Advanced Speaking exam. To hear each question press the play button on the audio player. When you have heard the question, give your answer for it. To hear the next question, press the 'next question' button below the audio player.

When you have heard and answered the first 6 questions, you have the option to hear another 6 questions and so on.