How PTE Exam is Conducted and Its Question Pattern

The PTE exam, in recent times, has gained much popularity for checking the level of English proficiency for non-native speakers. It is a proficiency test that evaluates your abilities of English on the basis of four criteria: Speaking, Writing, Reading and Listening. The students have to appear for this exam if they are planning for higher studies abroad, or even planning for a Permanent resident in a country like Australia. It is also accepted by many education institutes worldwide and also by the government of New Zealand and Canada too. The PTE is conducted by Pearson officials across many countries.

About PTE Exam

The Pearson Test of English (PTE) is conducted into four modules; which is Speaking, Writing, Reading and Listening. Each of these sections covers a wide range of questions to assess your ability to understand the English language. The exam is fully computerized with no human involvement in checking your result or conducting your exam. The timing of the exam is of 3 hours long with an optional break in between the exam. It is conducted in one sitting, unlike other exams where you need to come on the second day for the Speaking section. The scoring of the exam is done out of 90, which can be converted to the band or CEFR level. The computer algorithm evaluates your PTE exam and provides you the scores within 5 working days.

 The PTE - Question pattern

The exam is 3 hours long having around 71 questions (internal number of questions varies), to test your ability of English skills. The first section which comes in the exam is the Speaking section.

The Speaking section:

This section is consists of 5 different question types, which are PTE Read aloud, Repeat Sentences, Describe Image, Re-tell Lecture and Answer Short Question. All these questions carry different marks. The exam instruction for each question provided on the top of the screen. Additionally, the scores of all the above questions are partially added in the Reading and listening section, except the marks of Describe image. There is no negative marking for any of these question types.

The Writing section:

It assesses your ability to write the English language with proper grammatical and appropriate sentence structures. This task includes two question types; Summarize written Text and Write an essay. The partial scores are added in the Reading section for just the Summarize written text question type. Both the question types do not carry any negative markings. On exam day, you can get 2 Summarise written text and 1 Essay writing or 1 Summarize written text on 2 Essay writing tasks.

The Reading section:

The reading section includes Multiple Choice Choose Single Answer, Multiple Choice Choose Multiple Answer, Re-Order Paragraph, fill in the blanks (Drag and Drop) and Fill in the blanks (Writing). The partial scores are added for the Writing section only. For Multiple choice multiple answers, negative marking is done in the exam. But you will not get less than zero for any incorrect answers.

The Listening section:

It includes a question like: Summarize Spoken Text, Multiple Choice Choose Multiple Answer, Fill in The Blanks, Highlight Correct Summary, Multiple Choice Choose Single Answer, Select Missing Word, Highlight Incorrect Words and Write from Dictation. In Highlight incorrect word you can lose points if you choose any incorrect options. For any wrong options chosen 1 point is deducted. The partial scores are added for the Reading and Writing section only.

Benefits of PTE exam:

The exam has many benefits as compared to other English proficiency exams.

• The exam dates and Test centers are easily available as compared to the IELTS or Tofel exam.
• As the exam is fully computer-driven, there are fewer to no chances of partiality in evaluation or test. 
• The TAT for getting the result is 5 Working days as per the Pearson official timing, but generally, it is available within 48 hours.
• There are no extra charges for sending your scores to the University that you want to apply.
• The scores are accepted by the majority or English-Speaking countries and also by all major Universities.

For achieving the desired scores in the PTE exam, you can avail of the mock test for practice purposes. We at 79score.com provide assistance for the PTE exam related queries. Your doubts are the address and you will be able to access the latest material for the practice purpose. Remember PTE is quite an easy exam to crack if you know the right techniques to tackle it. So, contact 79score for the PTE practice test and PTE practice test materials.