Hi, I'm Jo from Specialist Language Courses
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means we are experienced and skilled in what we do,
helping people achieve success in the OET exam.
So, in today's video we're going to look at the strategies you can use for
Reading part C. We'll look at some example questions
together and these come from our online course
Reach OET B. For more information check out the links below.
In today's video we will look at an overview of Reading part C,
the strategies you can use for this part of the paper and some study tips to help
you improve.
Here you can see an overview of the OET reading paper.
For this video, we'll focus on part C. So the papers for part B and C will be
given together, and you will have 45 minutes to do both
parts. Part C contains more questions than part
B, so you will need to dedicate more of
your time to part C. So what's the exam format for part C?
There are two texts, each of them about 750 to 850 words long.
There are 16 questions in total, eight for each text.
There will also be two lexical questions for each text
included in that, so a question about vocabulary in context or a feature of
cohesion. And each question is a full option
multiple choice question.
Reading part C will begin with these set of instructions.
So how should you approach Reading part C? Let's take a look at some strategies you
can use. So first, it's a good idea to look over the text or skim read them
quickly. You don't want to spend too long doing this though
but you need to get a general idea of what the texts are about.
Number the paragraphs as most questions will reference a particular paragraph
and you want to be able to find the relevant one quickly.
And approach each question individually, they are not connected.
Read the question carefully to make sure you have understood it properly.
Read the options and notice the difference between them,
then read the paragraph carefully before you choose your answer.
Eliminate any answers you are sure are incorrect
and make sure that the answer you have chosen fully answers the question.
It is important to be careful of distractors, so
distractors are when all the options seem to be mentioned in the text.
If you have difficulty with distractors you might want to think about reading
and understanding the question and then reading the paragraph first
without reading the options, so that you're not distracted by them.
You can then try to summarise what you think is the answer to the question
and only then read through the options and decide.
This works better with questions rather than sentence stems like the one you see
here. So let's take a look at an example
question and have a go at doing it together.
So here we have the first paragraph of the text about breastfeeding
and the question below. For this question, you need to read the options before
reading the paragraph. If we take a closer look at the options,
we can notice the differences between them.
Option A, states that the breastfeeding debate
highlights the benefits of breast milk over formula,
therefore we would need to be looking for a statement of this argument and
some supporting details in the text. Option B, compares the benefits of breast
milk and formula milk. So, there would be information discussing
the advantages of both. Option C, discusses why women choose not
to breastfeed. So for this to be the correct option it
would need reasons and examples to support this.
Option D, a conclusion that breast milk is better for babies.
So for this option to be correct, there would need to be a statement of this
and supporting evidence that suggests that breast
milk is better for babies. Now, read the paragraph and decide which
option you think fits best...
So the correct option is B. Here, we can see at the beginning of the
paragraph it says that the start for life website points to the
protective benefits of breastfeeding, this is followed with evidence to
support this statement. The phrase in contrast is then used to
introduce contrasting information talking about the vitamins and nutrients
contained in the formula which breastfed babies
have to receive from supplements. So, looking at the paragraph overall
we can see that there is a comparison between the benefits of breast milk
and the benefits of formula milk.
Let's look at why the other options are not correct.
Option A is incorrect. We can see that the benefits of breast milk are
highlighted here, however the benefits of formula milk are
also then highlighted and there is no language to suggest
that the writer is comparing or highlighting the benefits of breast milk
over formula milk and saying that it has more benefits.
Option C is also incorrect. This information
is not mentioned in the text.
Option D is incorrect, because even though the benefits of breast milk are
mentioned in the first part of the paragraph, contrasting
information is then introduced about some of the
benefits of formula milk and so there is no conclusion that
breast milk is indeed better for babies.
Now we are going to take a look at some example of a lexical question.
Lexical questions will ask about a specific expression that has been used
in the text or what a specific pronoun refers to in
the text, such as THIS or IT. In this question,
we need to look at what THIS refers to. Notice the difference between the
options first. A, refers to the addition of important
nutrients to soy-based formula.
In option B, this would refer to the position of physicians regarding formula
milk, so their view. C, states that the word
THIS refers to advertising campaigns to
encourage the use of formula milk, and option D, states that THIS refers to
the attitude towards formula after the 1940s.
Now let's read through the paragraph and look for links to the options...
So option D is the correct answer.
We can see where THIS is highlighted and before, it states that by the 1940s
and 50s, physicians and consumers regarded the
use of formula as a popular and safe substitute for
breastmilk. The attitude is stated as formula milk
being regarded as popular and safe to use
and the time reference is 1940s and 50s, clearly stating the time link of after
the 1940s.
Let's look at why the other options are not correct.
So, option A is stated earlier on in the text,
that earlier formulas lacked vital nutrients
and that this was resolved later as nutrients were added,
however there is no link to the word THIS
and that this addition of nutrients was the cause of the aggressive marketing of
formula in developing countries, so option A is not the right answer.
Option B is also incorrect and while it is stated that direct advertising to
physicians began, the following sentence talks about the
attitude of physicians and consumers, not just physicians so
option B cannot be correct. Option C
is incorrect because advertising campaigns to encourage the use of
formula is not mentioned. It is stated that there
was direct advertising to physicians, but not that
this led to aggressive marketing in developing countries.
So how can you improve Reading C? It's really important that you develop
your reading skills for the OET exam by reading widely,
only doing exam practice papers will not sufficiently prepare you for the exam.
You should read extensively on a wide variety of medical topics to help
improve your skills. Here are some websites that you might
find useful. The Conversation, The bmj, The Guardian
Health, The World Health Organization websites
are all useful resources. Let's look at some ideas of things that
you can do with these texts available online.
You need to read extensively on a variety of medical topics,
this will help you when dealing with unfamiliar topics
and unknown vocabulary, as well as building up your stamina for reading
longer texts. You should try and notice language used
in these articles to express attitude and opinion.
Make a note of verbs used frequently such as
suggest, claim, the kind of verbs that suggest
attitude and opinion. You should also take note of evaluative adjectives
such as impossible, common, reliable, or phrases such as he found this
surprising, the worrying thing is.
Another thing you
can do is choose an article and summarise the
main idea of each paragraph in two to three sentences.
This will help you focus on the main idea the writer is trying to express
Top tips for Reading part C. Number the paragraphs in the text, this
will help you find the relevant paragraph when dealing with
the questions. Try a couple of different strategies and
see which one works best for you. Remember that you need to understand
longer chunks of text rather than one isolated sentence.
Practice reading longer text when preparing for the exam
to improve your ability to deal with longer texts.
So thanks for watching if you would like more strategies and tips on how to
prepare, check out our website. You'll also find
handouts which you can download, containing all of the information from
today's video, links below. Please like and share so we
can help more people achieve success in the OET exam.
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