Foreign Language (English, French, German or Russian)
What is tested
The paper checks grammar in context, vocabulary and reading comprehension in your chosen language. Across all four languages the core grammar is tense and aspect, articles and determiners, prepositions, agreement, word order, conditionals, passive voice and reported speech.
Language-specific points examiners like: English - present perfect versus past simple, since versus for, third-person -s, irregular verbs, a/an/the. French - agreement of the past participle, contracted articles (du, au, aux), gender and number of adjectives. German - the four cases, verb-second order in main clauses, separable prefixes, prepositions with the accusative. Russian - the six cases, verb aspect (perfective and imperfective), and prefixes of verbs of motion.
Traps
Word-for-word translation from Armenian produces wrong prepositions and wrong tenses. False friends mislead: English magazine is not French magasin, which means shop, and actual does not mean current. In reading tasks, distractor options repeat words from the text while reversing the meaning, and all-of-the-above options are rarely right.
Rule of thumb and worked example
Match the time marker to the tense before you look at the options. For I ___ here since 2015, since marks a starting point and the action continues, so the present perfect have lived is correct; for five years would also take the present perfect, but in 2015 would take the past simple lived. In reading, look at the questions first, then find the one sentence in the text that proves your answer. If you cannot point to that sentence, the option is a guess.