People often think that part one of the C1 Advanced reading and use of English paper is
the easiest part because it's multiple choice but oh my God they are so so wrong and I am
really sorry to inform you of the terrible news but don't worry because this video is
designed to help you help yourself and SMASH it! My name is Toby, this is SMASH English and here
is everything you need to know about part one of the C1 Advanced reading and use of English paper.
[Music]
In part one of the C1 Advanced reading and use of English paper you will be given a short text with
eight spaces. For each space you will be given a choice of four words. Your job is to decide
which word goes in each space. Easy right? No it's it's not easy. Let me explain. Part one
tests your vocabulary knowledge but it's not a case of simply knowing what each word means.
It's more about knowing the meaning of words but also understanding how they collocate with other
words. A collocation is when two words occur together at a rate greater than that would be
predicted by chance... uh... Basically two words that attract each other. For example in English
we don't say "I did a shower" instead we say "I had a shower". Why? Because collocations. Looking
in a dictionary won't really help you with that because here the definition of "have" and "do"
are the same. Instead it's more about your general awareness of the language. Let's have a look at
an example part one of the C1 Advanced reading use of English paper and hopefully things will
become clear as we go through it together. First though let's see how well you do on your own. I'm
going to display the exercise, I would like you to pause the video and try and do as many of the
answers on your own as you can then after that we will go through the text together and I will
impart all of my knowledge and wisdom to you. Wow. What a privilege. Toby the extraordinary
English teacher with his mesmerizing golden locks possessed a superpower that went far beyond the
realm of Academia. His _____ of language was unparalleled enabling him to effortlessly weave
stories that captured the hearts and minds of his students. Toby's superpower of language led him to
become a beacon of inspiration. His charismatic presence and innate ability to _____ even the
most disinterested minds made him a formidable force in education. With boundless enthusiasm,
Toby's captivating lessons transformed his classroom into an immersive experience. He _____
creative teaching methods that _____ his students imaginations and encouraged active participation.
Beyond the classroom Toby's _____ resonated deeply. He became a mentor,
guiding C1 Advanced students through personal challenges and offering unwavering support.
He created a safe and nurturing environment where his students felt _____ and heard.
Toby the superhero English teacher exemplified the power of Education to _____ lives and ignite
a love for learning. His beautiful golden locks may have _____ the eye but it was
his profound understanding of the human Spirit but truly made him extraordinary.
Wow! What a beautiful text! I wonder who wrote it? Okay let's go through this text together slowly
one by one. Toby the extraordinary English teacher with his mesmerizing golden locks possessed a
superpower that went far beyond the realm of Academia. His _____ of language was unparalleled
enabling him to effortlessly weave stories that captured the hearts and minds of his students.
So his **something** of language. We can eliminate ABILITY because grammatically it doesn't work. You
can have an ability to do something but not an ability of something. We can also talk about the
ability of something to do something but that's not what we have here so let's get rid of ABILITY.
Goodbye, ABILITY... It was nice knowing you. Now we have a bit of a problem because HOLD, GRASP
and POSSESSION as nouns all have a very similar meaning so this means that we need to talk about
collocation. Can we talk about the possession of a language? Well yeah I guess we can. If you have
a language then I guess you possess it but that's not really the meaning here. Instead in this text
the emphasis is on Toby's understanding and His Brilliant use of the language so let's get rid
of POSSESSION. And now we're stuck between GRASP and HOLD. Now, which one of these nouns can mean
understanding? GRASP. If you have a good GRASP of something it means you have a good understanding
of it so of course our answer here is GRASP. See! That's not easy, is it? Well... okay let's go on
and do another one. Toby's superpower of language led him to become a beacon of inspiration. His
charismatic presence and innate ability to _____ even the most disinterested Minds made him a
formidable force in education. So the question is what can you do with a mind? You cannot ATTEND
a mind, that's absurd so let's get rid of that. DEDICATE also does not work. I suppose you could
dedicate your mind TO Something in the same way that you could dedicate your time or your energy
to something. However we normally talk about putting your mind to something so yeah... But also
we're not talking about Toby's mind here. We're talking about what Toby does to other people's
minds and Toby cannot dedicate other people's minds... that's ridiculous. He doesn't have a
superpower! So let's get rid of DEDICATE too. This leaves us with APPLY and ENGAGE. And the answer is
ENGAGE. You can APPLY yourself to something and this is similar to dedicate your time or dedicate
your energy or put your mind to something but again that's not the sense here. Instead you can
ENGAGE people's minds. Something that engages people's minds is also ENGAGING and I'm pretty
sure you've probably heard of that adjective before, and if you hadn't then, well, say "thank
you" because you've learned something new. So the answer is ENGAGE. With boundless enthusiasm Toby's
captivating lessons transformed his classroom into an immersive experience. He _____ creative
teaching methods that his students imaginations and encouraged active participation.
Oh blimey all of our examples are synonyms related to giving people jobs but only one
of them can mean USE and is collocated with the noun METHOD. Which one? EMPLOYED. You can EMPLOY
a method or employ a technique. Okay let's move on. Next one. With boundless enthusiasm, Toby's
captivating lessons transformed his classroom into an immersive experience. He employed
creative teaching methods that _____ his students imaginations and encouraged active participation.
Oh.... the thing is none of these options produce a grammatically incorrect sentence
or even a semantically wrong sentence. If you used any one of these and spoke to someone then
the listener would understand what you wanted to say that's why this part is so
difficult. It's kind of similar to the shower example I gave at the beginning of the video.
If you told someone that you did a shower this morning then they're not going to say "What?!
I don't understand what are you talking about!" They're gonna get it. It's just something will
seem a little bit.... And the same applies to this question. So do you ACTIVATE, STIMULATE,
POWER or INITIATE an imagination? You STIMULATE an imagination. You can INITIATE an order or
violence or legislation but not an imagination. You can ACTIVATE a credit card or an alarm but not
and Imagination. You can POWER a car a stereo or your home but you can't POWER an imagination.
Beyond the classroom Toby's _____ resonated deeply. Well firstly what does the verb
RESONATE mean? If something resonates it shakes or vibrates producing a sound. We can use this
literally for example "his voice resonated throughout the concert hall" but it can also
be metaphorical. If something resonates with you it leaves an emotional impression. Interestingly,
it's very similar to the idiom "to strike a chord". Think about it, if you're playing the
guitar and you strike a chord it will produce a sound and the sound will continue, it will
resonate. So if something strikes a chord with you it resonates, it leaves an emotional impression.
And the metaphor doesn't stop there because another way of expressing this idea is to say
that something CHIMED with us. These are Chimes here. Once they are hit then they make a noise
because they start to resonate. So once again if someone says something or you see something that
leaves an emotional impression on you then you can say "wow that really chimed with me", "that really
struck a chord with me", "that really resonated with me". They all have the same meaning literally
and metaphorically. But yes, enough of that this does have a point... Look at the nouns! Which
of these nouns could resonate? We have RESULT, CONSEQUENCE, AFTERMATH and IMPACT. Which one of
these literally speaking could resonate? Well an IMPACT could, right? Something has an impact and
then the sound of that impact resonates. Something could have a psychological impact and then the
effect of that impact could resonate. So yeah there's our answer: IMPACT. He became a mentor
guiding C1 Advanced students through personal challenges and offering unwavering support.
He created a safe and nurturing environment where his students felt _____ and heard.
These are all kind of similar but remember we're talking about how students feel. If a
student feels EXPENSIVE or COSTLY then they see themselves as something to be bought and oh good
God no no no. Now we have VALUABLE and VALUED. VALUABLE is only related to money and we're not
really talking about money here are we we're talking about importance. How important do the
students feel. Do you know the word invaluable? If something is invaluable it means it's beyond the
value of money. It's so important that you cannot put a monetary value on it. In fact if invaluable
was an option here then that could also be the answer but it's not so yeah and that means that
we have to turn to VALUED. If something is VALUED or something feels VALUED then it feels important,
it feels respected, it doesn't feel taken for granted and of course this is exactly how all
of my students feel as long as I'm being paid for it right... yeah. Toby the superhero English
teacher exemplified the power of Education to _____ lives and ignite a love for learning.
Why oh why is life so terrible because once again all of these verbs mean the same thing! Oh I hate
English! It's disgusting! So we need a verb that collocates with the plural noun LIVES because of
course we do... it's another collocation. What about FORM? Well I guess scientists could FORM
a life in a laboratory. I mean, after all, we talk about life FORMS, right? But that's not
really what we're getting at here so now let's get rid of FORM. You can't CONSTRUCT a life so
let's get rid of CONSTRUCT as well. We do have the expression to BUILD a life for yourself but
this refers to becoming independent, to moving out, to living on your own, to starting a family,
to becoming a normal person in society... something that I've never successfully done. But
that's not quite the meaning here so let's also get rid of BUILD. What does that leave us with?
SHAPE. If you SHAPE someone's life then it means you influence it. This could be positive or it
could be negative. It just means to have a really strong influence. "My granny's life was shaped by
growing up during World War II" for example. That could have been a really negative thing, could
have been a positive thing. I don't know? Don't ask me! I'm just trying to think of an example to
help you all! Right so the answer here is SHAPE. His beautiful golden locks may have _____ the
eye but it was his profound understanding of the human spirit that truly made him extraordinary.
This one is fairly straightforward if you know the idiom. So you can HAVE your eye
on something if you are watching something really carefully but that's not the meaning
here so let's get rid of HAD. You cannot TAKE someone's eye or STEAL it unless you put your
hand in their face and remove their eye and run away but that's disgusting and a terrible thing
to do so please don't do that. The idiom is to CATCH someone's eye. If you CATCH someone's eye
it means you are getting their attention. For example, you're in a restaurant and you want
to pay for your meal that you ate on your own because you've got no friends and you're waving
at the waiter but the waiter's ignoring you. No matter what you do you cannot CATCH their
eye and so you sit there for another hour on your own before paying alone, going home alone,
living alone... yeah the answer was CAUGHT all right? God I'm in a bad mood...
That was so much fun! And with that we are finished! That was how to successfully
complete part one of the C1 Advanced reading and use of English paper. 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...