Read Aloud is the first scored section of the PTE test and it contributes to the overall marks for Speaking and Reading. Here we’re going to be looking at the tips and advice for getting a high score in this section.

Task Type Info

There are 6-7 Read Aloud tasks in each test.

Preparation time and reading time are the same (30, 35, or, 40 seconds)

Scoring is for Content, Oral Fluency, and Pronunciation.

Tips & Strategies

Read at SLOW-MEDIUM pace. Reading too quickly or too quietly are the most common mistakes in this section.

Read the paragraph aloud in the preparation time. Think about where the pauses should be and practice repeating any difficult words.

Pause for breath at full stops and leave a short pause at commas.

Read enthusiastically like you’re reading to an audience. You need to vary the intonation between high and low.

Practice 1: (40 seconds)

Practice reading aloud as preparation first, practicing any difficult words a few times as you prepare. Then have a go for real – read slowly, clearly, and loudly, and make sure you pause at the punctuation marks.

A great many of these new picture games were racing games, like Snakes and Ladders, in which two or more players move their pieces around a track according to the number dictated by the dice. Each track has its unique combination of safe squares, penalty squares, hazards, and shortcuts. The objective of all racing games is the same — to arrive at the final square and be the first to remove your piece or pieces from the board.

Word Stress

Stress the words that carry the important information. The smaller ‘grammatical words’ (e.g. in, and, on, will, has, and of) often become ‘weak forms’ which means they are shorter and quieter. Nouns, verbs, negatives and, adjectives are often longer and louder.

Practice 2: (40 seconds)

Underline the stressed words in the following exercise. Practice reading the exercise, making these words slightly longer and louder. Try to emphasize the stressed words and make the other words shorter and quieter.

It was not the thrill of listening to internationally famous performers and speakers that drew audiences to these sessions. Accounts suggest that operators were most successful when they recorded local musicians and speakers in front of an audience and then immediately played back the impressed recordings. It was this, the act of recognizing familiar voices, that ultimately astonished audiences and persuaded them that the machine could reproduce reality.

Phrasing

Try to read in phrases with words grouped into ‘meaningful chunks’. This will give you the natural rhythm and phrasing you hear with newsreaders.

Practice 3: (35 seconds)

Try to draw lines between the different phrases or ‘meaningful chunks’ ask your teacher to help you if you are not sure what this means.

With so many dangerous minds on the job, it is little wonder that work on the cartoons was carried out in the utmost secrecy. The security measures, which divided up production duties among different departments, meant that individual workers were not allowed to see the finished films, making the operation look like a parody of the Manhattan Project.

Further Practice

Practice the following exercises, and don’t forget to follow the guidelines above. Work with a partner if possible and use your phone to record your attempts. Critically listening to yourself can help you perfect your speed, pronunciation, phrasing, and stress.

Task 1: (30 seconds)

Until about the seventeenth century, these games tended to be traditional inventions that could not be traced back to a maker. Their boards were also relatively simple, consisting of squares, triangles, spirals, or holes. With the advent of the Enlightenment and the rise of capitalism, however, the board games of Europe — like so much else on the continent — began to change.

Task 2: (35 seconds)

It was James who first suggested the idea of exhibiting some of Roy’s books. In August 2009 a small gallery had opened, run by two enthusiastic young graduates looking for anything new and unusual with which to fill their calendar. I had mentioned this to James, and he asked me if I thought they might be interested in Roy. They were. We showed fifty books in the gallery that winter, and we also produced a catalogue.

Task 3: (35 seconds)

Despite losing most of his South American and Australian collections in a devastating ship fire while docked in the Java Sea, the newly minted explorer secured a coveted spot as Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles’ hired naturalist in the British colony of Sumatra. Leaving for the large island in 1818, the young man’s task was to collect, dissect, and describe the plants and animals in the fecund rainforests at the far reaches of the empire.

Task 4: (35 seconds)

James and I stayed in touch over the following months. We found that we shared a number of interests, and I would occasionally send him books or prints that I felt he might like. He in turn put me in touch with some useful contacts in the trade, including Bill Littlefield, an American historian, who seemed to know quite a bit about The Falcon and eventually authored a brief article on the subject.

Task 5: (30 seconds)

We began in the spring of 2010, first by marking up the bookshelves with section numbers, then by photographing and systematically numbering the books. We then set about gathering from friends and relatives any associated memories or information that might be interesting, which was tremendous fun. Finally, we entered all these details into a database.

Task 6: (40 seconds)

Surely, there can be no one reading this article who has not already heard of the Titanic, and there can be no one, equally certainly, who does not already know how the story of the Titanic ends. This is, when we think about it, quite remarkable. There is no one alive today who actually remembers the Titanic as all the survivors have passed away. For the rest of us, there is very little possibility that the disaster has directly affected us.

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