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Strategy Guide for the OET Reading Test - Part A
This  method  is  foolproof,  provided  that  you  have  enough  experience  reading  in  English.  

Following  this  guide  effectively  requires  mental  discipline  and  focus.  You  will  need  to  monitor  your  own  
mental  processes  and  make  sure  you  are  performing  these  steps  without  any  other  steps  in  between.  If  
you  are  unsure,  one  of  our  tutors  can  help.    

Get a very quick overview of the 4 texts (max 20 seconds)

 
As  soon  as  you  are  able  to,  spend  a  maximum  of  20  seconds  looking  at  the  4  texts.  That  
means  no  longer  than  5  seconds  on  each  text.  Only  look  at  the  headings,  the  overall  
structure  of  the  paragraphs,  bullet  points  etc,  and  any  charts  or  tables  that  may  be  
included  in  the  text.    
The  purpose  of  this  is  to  categorize  the  texts  according  to  their  type  and  give  yourself  a  
very  rough  idea  of  what  type  of  information  might  be  included  in  each  text.  For  example,  
primary  research  articles  will  give  details  about  methods  and  findings,  articles  directed  at  
the  public  may  contain  advice  about  lifestyle  changes,  and  graphs  will  contain  numbers.    
Most  of  this  does  not  depend  on  your  English  ability,  because  information  is  presented  
similarly  all  over  the  world.    
At  the  end  of  this  time,  you  should  have  each  text  categorized  in  a  way  that  you  can  easily  
remember,  for  example:  “1  is  a  graph  about  prevalence  and  age,  2  is  a  research  article,  3  
is  a  list  of  tips,  and  4  is  a  an  article  about  the  causes.”    
This  should  not  take  longer  than  20  seconds.  With  practice,  it  should  only  take  around  4  
or  5  seconds.  Ideally  you  should  be  able  to  do  it  at  the  same  time  as  turning  the  pages.  
You  don’t  need  to  underline  anything  at  this  point.      
Make guesses about the gap (max 5 seconds)
 
Your  mission  is  simply  to  put  answers  into  the  gaps.  So  find  the  first  gap,  and  then  look  at  
the  words  before  and  after  the  gap  for  only  the  information  you  need  to  answer  the  
question.  This  is  where  your  English  ability  becomes  important.    
 
You  should  begin  to  guess  the  answer  as  you  read  the  words  before  and  after  the  gap.  If  
you  can’t  guess,  or  have  too  many  possible  guesses,  keep  reading  further  on  both  sides  of  
the  gap  until  you  have  some  guesses  that  will  help  you.  It  is  very  important  to  not  turn  to  
the  text  until  you  have  guesses  based  on  the  summary.  Here  is  what  you  should  guess,  
in  order:  
 
A  –  Grammatical  word  type  (Is  it  a  plural  or  singular  noun?  A  verb,  an  adjective,  an  
adverb?)  
B  –  Three  possible  guesses  of  the  actual  answer  
C  –  If  you  can’t  think  of  three  possible  answers,  guess  about  the  general  appearance  of  
the  answer  (is  it  a  number?  Is  it  the  name  of  an  organization,  in  which  case  it  will  be  an  
acronym  like  NIH,  or  have  capitals,  like  National  Institutes  of  Health)  
D  –  Which  text  is  likely  to  include  the  word/phrase  you  need  
  
You  don’t  need  to  read  every  word  in  the  summary,  and  you  definitely  don’t  need  to  read  
the  summary  more  than  once.  Work  slowly  and  make  sure  every  step  is  profitable.  This  
should  take  a  maximum  of  5  seconds  per  question.    
 
Search for your guesses in the texts (max 10 seconds)
  Now  you  have  about  3  possible  guesses  about  the  answer,  and  you  have  a  rough  idea  of  
which  text  contains  the  answer,  based  on  your  quick  overview  from  step  1.    
 
Because  you  have  already  been  through  the  process  of  guessing  an  answer,  you  should  
also  be  able  to  keep  in  mind  the  general  concepts  that  form  the  context  of  the  answer,  
before  and  after  the  gap.  But  you  should  not  actually  search  for  specific  words  before  or  
after  the  gap,  unless  you  are  absolutely  sure  that  these  words  will  only  appear  near  your  
answer.  Many  candidates  find  the  wrong  answers  by  matching  words  in  the  summary  to  
the  wrong  parts  of  the  text.    
 
Turn  to  the  text  that  you  think  contains  the  answer,  and  begin  to  scan  from  the  start  of  
the  text  to  the  finish.  Scanning  is  rapidly  searching  for  particular  word  shapes,  usually  
with  2-­‐4  eye  movements  per  line,  but  scan  at  whatever  speed  is  right  for  you,  so  that  you  
can  be  absolutely  sure  that  you  have  searched  thoroughly  through  the  text.    
 
It  also  helps  to  remember  that  each  paragraph  in  the  summary  usually  relates  to  one  text,  
so  once  you  have  completed  one  answer,  the  next  answer  in  the  same  summary  
paragraph  is  usually  from  the  same  text.      

Confirm your answer by matching the concepts surrounding the gap

  (max 5 seconds)

Now  you  have  found  a  word/phrase  in  the  text  that  either  matches  one  of  your  guesses,  
or  is  the  same  grammatical  word  type  that  you  expected.  Eliminate  the  actual  answer  
word  from  the  sentence  in  the  text.  Then  eliminate  all  of  the  other  concepts  in  the  text  
that  have  equals  in  the  summary  sentence,  to  make  sure  that  both  have  the  same  overall  
meaning.  The  words  will  not  usually  be  identical.  Often  the  sentences  in  the  summary  will  
use  synonyms  of  the  words  in  the  text.  That’s  why  it’s  important  to  not  search  the  text  for  
specific  words  in  the  summary,  unless  you  are  sure  that  they  will  appear  in  the  text,  like  
names  or  numbers.    
 
In  the  actual  exam,  this  “elimination”  of  the  concepts  to  achieve  a  balanced  equasion  
should  be  done  mentally.  But  as  a  practice  exercise,  try  actually  crossing  out  the  words  
that  match  in  meaning.  Try  it  with  this  example  below:  

Summary:
60% of the world’s older people live in low to middle income countries, and this
will increase to (12) … by (13) …. .

Text:
Of the 35 million deaths in 2005 from NCDs, 80% will have been in low and
middle-income countries. This is partly because most of the world's older people
live in these regions - 60% now rising to 80% by 2050.  
   Conclusion

If  you  worked  through  this  process  slowly  and  carefully,  with  no  extra  steps  in  between,  
you  would  be  able  to  complete  a  Part  A  containing  30  questions  in  10  minutes  and  30  
seconds,  leaving  4  minutes  and  60  seconds  of  spare  time,  which  you  could  use  to  check  
your  answers.    
 
Overview  of  the  texts  =  20  seconds  
Answering  each  question  =  20  seconds  x  30  =  600  seconds  
Total  time  taken:  620  seconds  
Time  remaining  to  complete  Part  A:  280  seconds  (4  minutes  and  60  seconds)  
 
You  may  also  be  interested  to  know  that  I  tried  one  of  the  official  OET  Reading  Part  As  
and  completed  it  in  4  minutes.  My  score  was  24  out  of  25.  So  if  there  are  less  than  30  
questions,  and  if  you  are  particularly  experienced  in  English  and  Reading  exams,  you  may  
be  able  to  complete  it  in  less  than  10  minutes.    
 
Anxiety  is  the  biggest  problem  that  causes  candidates  to  forget  the  process  and  repeat  
steps  without  thinking.  If  you  are  anxious,  you  will  want  to  work  faster,  and  this  will  slow  
down  your  results.  Some  signs  of  anxiety  include  rereading  the  same  part  of  the  text  
more  than  once,  or  repeatedly  flipping  from  the  summary  to  the  text  for  one  answer.    
 
You  may  notice,  like  many  candidates  who  have  asked  us  for  help,  that  simply  making  
your  own  guesses  before  searching  in  the  text  is  enough  to  double  your  speed  and  
accuracy.    
 
If  you  find  it  hard  to  understand  or  use  this  process,  just  book  a  Reading  Strategy  Lesson  
with  one  of  our  tutors.  It  would  be  our  pleasure  to  make  this  work  for  you.      
 
John  O’Loughlin  
Principal,  Online  English  Tutors