Password Skills Plus cheat sheet

No negative marking applies: an unanswered item scores the same as a wrong one, so every question must be answered before time expires.

True/False/Not Given decision rule: choose False only when the passage directly contradicts the statement; choose Not Given when the passage is silent on it.

Matching headings rule: a correct heading summarises the whole paragraph, so an option paraphrasing a single detail is a distractor.

Summary and note completion answers must fit the grammar of the gap and stay within the stated word limit; exceeding the limit is marked wrong.

Per-item time budget = total minutes divided by total items (e.g. 60 minutes for 40 items is about 90 seconds each); once exceeded, mark a provisional answer and move on.

Most question sets follow the order of the passage; matching-heading and matching-information sets do not, so locate those items by paragraph, not by sequence.

Question stems rarely reuse passage wording; the answer is identified by locating a synonym set, not an identical phrase.

Verbatim options in multiple-choice items are usually traps: correct options restate the passage meaning in different words.

The recording plays once and does not pause, so each answer must be written while the audio continues.

Pre-question time is used to predict the answer's word class and likely content from the grammar of the surrounding notes.

Self-correction markers such as 'actually', 'sorry' and 'I meant' replace earlier information; the corrected value is the answer.

Contrast markers such as 'however', 'although' and 'on the other hand' signal that the information following them overrides what came before.

In form and note completion, the grammar of the prompt fixes singular or plural and word class, and answers must be spelled exactly as heard.

-teen and -ty numbers are distinguished by stress and vowel length (thirteen has stressed, longer final syllable); stress, not context, decides the figure.

Map and plan labelling is answered by tracking direction phrases such as opposite, adjacent, just past and at the end of, starting from the labelled point.

If an item is missed, abandon it and re-enter at the next question; dwelling on a lost item forfeits the following answers as well.

Two tasks are set: a shorter descriptive or report task and a longer discursive essay; each has a stated minimum word count displayed by the on-screen counter.

Responses below the stated minimum lose marks under task response; responses far above it gain nothing and cost proofreading time.

Four marking criteria apply: task response, coherence and cohesion, lexical resource, and grammatical range and accuracy, each contributing separately.

Paragraph rule: one controlling idea per paragraph, stated in a topic sentence, followed by explanation and a supporting example.

Mechanical connector chains ('Firstly... Secondly... Moreover... In addition') cap the coherence score; fewer, meaning-bearing links score higher.

Essay structure: position stated in the introduction, two body paragraphs each developing one reason with evidence, conclusion restating the position without new arguments.

Report tasks require selection and comparison of key features only; opinions, causal speculation and unsupported conclusions lower task response.

Error-free sentence ratio matters more than sentence complexity: a flawed complex sentence scores below a correctly formed simple one.

Responses are recorded and rated later by examiners on fluency and coherence, lexical resource, grammatical range and accuracy, and pronunciation.

Answer-length rule for short personal questions: two to three sentences including a reason or example; single-word answers give the examiner nothing to credit.

Long-turn preparation uses about one minute of notes limited to four or five keywords, since reading a script aloud damages fluency and intonation.

Expansion pattern 'because - for example - so' adds reasons and examples and demonstrates a wider grammatical and lexical range.

Circumlocution rule: if a word is unavailable, describe it rather than stopping; the paraphrase preserves fluency whereas silence penalises it.

One request for repetition is not penalised; answering a misheard question on the wrong topic is.

Pronunciation is judged on intelligibility, not accent: sentence stress on content words and clear final -s and -ed endings carry meaning.

Hedging and fillers ('sort of', 'you know') used repeatedly reduce fluency scores; content-related pauses do not.