Students studying for the B2 First exam are usually most
nervous about the Use of English parts of the exam,
But actually it's the easiest part... If you know the grammar! My name is Toby,
this is SMASH english and here is everything you need
to know about part two of the Use of English
paper for the B2 First Cambridge exam.
For part two of the Use of English paper of the
B2 First Cambridge exam you are given a text but some of the words in the text
are omitted. Oh no! What must we do!? You must use your big brain to try and
understand what that word is and write it in
the space. This is actually super easy if you think about three things:
the meaning, the function and the form. So what does that mean?
What does the sentence mean? Yes that sounds like a silly question to ask
yourself but often the missing word is part of a
phrasal verb. If you don't know what that phrasal verb
should mean in this context then how do you know
which phrasal verb to use? You don't know! Exactly so the first
thing you do is ask yourself what does this sentence
mean?
This is for grammatical structures often the missing word will be a relative
pronoun, an article, a preposition, an auxiliary verb.
So think about what the writer is trying to do
with the sentence. Are they wishing? Are they giving advice?
Are they talking about a likely future? An impossible past? An impossible present?
Are they talking about a regret? This helps you identify the grammar structure
that you need. And with that information you can move
on to the next step...
Once you know the meaning of the sentence and you know the function of
the sentence you can think about the grammatical form
that you are trying to complete. So let's have a practice!
Here is our passage about the glorious Toby! All right! Shut up! I am glorious
in my own way! Toby is a hero to many all across the world. Many nations look
to him _____ a source of knowledge and inspiration in
times of difficulty. _____ origins of toby's powers remain unknown.
Some say he was born under a full moon. Others say his mother _____ to whisper magical
spells into his ear every night when he was
young. Various traditions exist to honour Toby.
Some perform rituals _____ hanging a picture of him above their beds.
However other more complicated practices exist.
Many _____ off all their lights in their houses
and burn candles whilst singing the words of SMASH
English videos. Animals have also been used to represent Toby. One woman
famously remarked that "if Toby _____ an animal he would be a lion.". This
is because of his great strength and golden hair.
Toby himself is a humble man he usually goes _____
alone and avoids the company of others. Indeed if _____ more people were like Toby
the world would be a better place. Wow! What an exciting read! Let's have a look
at our first sentence! "Toby is a hero to
many all across the world. Many nations look
to him _____ a source of knowledge and inspiration in
times of difficulty". People are looking to me but what
is the function of a source of knowledge and inspiration?
Well we are talking about why they look to me.
What is my function when they look to me. So we need a word that we use to talk
about the form or function of something.
So the function of "a source of knowledge and inspiration"
is to talk about my function... right... confusing. The word we use to talk about
a function of something is...
AS. As. Many students will write LIKE instead but this is wrong.
We do not use LIKE to talk about form or function.
We use LIKE to talk about similarity, so that's wrong here. If you don't know
about all the different ways that we can use AS
for the B2 First Cambridge exam then watch my video
about how to use AS! You have a video about AS?
Yes I do! Watch it! _____ origins of Toby's powers
remain unknown. What type of word is origins? A noun! You are a genius.
And it is a plural noun and it is countable.
That's not very important. Are we talking about
specific origins or are we talking about all origins in general? No we're talking
about origins that are specific to Toby and
Toby's powers. So if we are talking about a
specific noun (we know which one we are talking
about) we must use a definite article.
THE. The origins of Toby's powers. Articles can be tricky. I know!
And that's why I've made a video all about articles!
Yes! Yeah... this will become a pattern throughout the video.
But if there are any answers that you get wrong,
well you can watch a grammar video learn all about it
and say to yourself "I will never make that mistake
again! Thank you, Toby!" No. Thank you for the view on my video... and the like...
and the subscription and maybe the comment... Bye!
Some say he was born under a full moon. Others say his mother _____ to whisper magical
spells into his ear every night when he was young. So we know
Toby's mother did this every night when he was young. So she
does not do this anymore. What is the function of
the sentence then? To talk about a past routine. Something
that was true in the past and happened regularly but
it isn't true now. So can you think of any
grammatical forms that fulfill that function? USED TO
and WOULD. We cannot use both of these. If you look at our sentence we have the
word TO. Because we have TO we cannot say
WOULD TO, so our answer must be USED TO. Yeah... Oh hi!
Do you know the difference between USED TO and WOULD? You don't!?
Wow that's so interesting! Don't worry! Toby has a great video about it on his
SMASH English youtube channel! The best English
teaching channel in the universe! Bye! Various traditions exist to honour
Toby. Some perform simple rituals _____ hanging a
picture of him above their beds. What is the function? Hanging
pictures above their beds is an example. It's an example of
a ritual but we only have one word and we cannot write FOR EXAMPLE because
we only have one word. Students still sometimes write two words
and that's embarrassing.... What one word can we use in english to
introduce an example? LIKE! Like! It's informal but it is used very
commonly and in the part two of the Use of
English paper, the open cloze part, it is very common to get these annoying
AS and LIKE questions, so you must know the differences between them!
I have a video all about LIKE, if you watch it
you will know everything about LIKE! The Cambridge exam
is very expensive! Do you want to waste your money
and fail all because you did not know the meaning
of a word like LIKE? Ridiculous! Educate yourself, please! However other
more complicated practices exist. Many _____ off all their lights in their
houses and burn candles whilst singing the
words of SMASH English videos. Yes, yes, yes!
This is definitely what people all around the world
do! We have our subject which is MANY then we have a space followed by a
preposition followed by an object THE LIGHTS.
Let's think about the meaning. What are these people
doing with their lights? Well they're burning candles
which suggests that it's dark! What do you do with your lights to make
the room dark? And can you think of a phrasal verb
that means to do this? TURN OFF! Here TURN means to stop the flow
of electricity to a device.
Yeah... Do you know all the meanings of turn off?
Do you know all the phrasal verbs with turn!?
Of course you don't! So video... link in the description!
Turn! Great! Animals have also been used to represent
Toby. One woman famously remarked that if Toby _____ an animal he would be a lion
this is because of his great strength and golden hair.
There are two possible answers here. We have two
clauses and in the beginning of the first clause we have
IF. This means this is a conditional structure
but which one? In the second clause the result clause,
the main clause, we have WOULD followed by an infinitive. So which
conditional requires WOULD followed by an infinitive?
Let's think about the function. Are we talking about
something that's imaginary in the future? Something that's likely in the future?
Something that's imaginary in the past? Or maybe an impossible present...
So the function is talking about an impossible present.
The form is with WOULD plus an infinitive so we know
that we must use the
second conditional! Let's think about the form of the second conditional then! We
need IF plus PAST SIMPLE in the first clause.
So "if Toby _____ an animal". We need the verb BE
in the past simple. If TOBY was an animal. For the second conditional we can also
use the subjunctive tense! If Toby WERE an animal. In general
it is better to use WERE than WAS. But for part two of the Use of English,
the open cloze part of the B2 First Cambridge exam
you can use WAS or WERE... doesn't matter... doesn't matter.
Video about the second conditional? You want to watch one?
Link in the description! Toby himself is a humble man,
he usually goes _____ alone and avoids the company of
others. Where does Toby go? Does he go to a specific place?
Or does he go places in general? I cannot see a specific place here, so
I think the meaning of this sentence is more general.
When Toby goes _____
Where? Where is he going? I don't know! Can you think of a phrasal verb with go
that means to just go to places in general?
GO OUT. Yeah, go OUT. Very good. Link... phrasal verbs with GO... Go! That's good
actually! Go! Phrasal verbs with GO, go! Definitely
will use that in this video... yes... Indeed if _____
more people were like Toby the world would be
a better place. Now this one's a little bit more confusing.
It looks like a second conditional right? We're looking at the form
and we can see all of the components of a second conditional.
We have IF plus the past simple. We have WOULD plus an
infinitive but we know it's not the second conditional
because we have a space between IF and MORE. Oh yeah! Good point!
So let's stop looking at the form and let's look at the function. What is
this person doing here? Are they just describing an imaginary
present? Well I don't think they are because they
are saying the world would be a BETTER place!
To me it sounds like they are complaining
about the fact that more people are not like Toby in this world.
So this person is expressing a wish or a desire
about the present. So we know the function
now let's think about forms that can express
this function: expressing wishes and desires about the present.
I WISH more people were like Toby the world would be a better place.
But we cannot use I WISH because we have IF.
So can you think of another expression that has this function
that does not need wish and begins with if?
IF ONLY! If only more people were like Toby the world would be
a better place. And what a fantastic sentence
to finish this video on! But wait, Toby! I don't know how to use I WISH and IF
ONLY! Don't you worry! I have a video on it!
Click the link in the description! So remember for part two of the Use of
English paper of the B2 First Cambridge exam
think about three things every time you read a sentence!
What does it mean? What is the function? And what is the form? If you do this,
if you approach it logically, you will be fine!
But we will make lots more videos about part two of the Use of English exam
because you can never have too much practice and we
both love practice, don't we!? And with that
we are finished! If you liked the video don't forget to SMASH that like button,
subscribe if you haven't already, leave a comment
down below! My name is Toby and this was SMASH English.
you