Hello Exam Seekers,

The Cambridge English A2 Key (former KET) Reading and Writing Exam is divided into seven parts.

• Part 1 – Multiple Choice;
• Part 2 – Multiple Matching;
• Part 3 – Multiple Choice;
• Part 4 – Multiple-Choice Cloze;
• Part 5 – Open Cloze;
• Part 6 – Guided Writing;
• Part 7 – Picture Story.

Today, I’m covering Part 5 – Open Cloze.

Before we dig into the Open Cloze sample, let’s review what a Cloze Test means. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a cloze test is

Unlike Part 4 – Multiple-Choice Cloze, where there are spaces that should be filled with one of the three provided words, Part 3 – Open Cloze doesn’t offer words for you to choose from. In this part of the text, you have an email with six gaps, and you should fill these gaps using one word in each. You will get one mark for each correct answer – a quick reminder that spelling should be correct.

This part tests understanding and knowledge of grammatical forms (for example, verb forms, determiners, pronouns) as well as structural relationships at the phrase, clause, sentence, or paragraph level. So candidates need to skim the text to find out the topic and general meaning. For each gap in the text they should think of possible words which may fit and then check each possibility with the meaning and grammar of the sentence and the whole text.

After having filled the gaps, it is advisable that the candidates read the whole text again to make sure it makes sense.

Here is a sample:

As you can see, it’s an email with six (6) gaps as mentioned (25-30). The first one is already done as an example, but it’s important to read to get the gist of the e-mail. Confident candidates tend not to read the whole text to avoid wasting time. But it is relevant to read it and understand what it is all about.

I hope (0) ………… are well. I’m having a great holiday here in Thailand.

This is an email Maria is sending to John, therefore, she would like to know how John is feeling, if he is well. So there is no other word that would fit in this informal email rather than “you“.

Let’s move on to the next paragraph:

Yesterday morning, we went to (25) ………… lovely beach. We had to leave before lunch because it was very hot. We went to a party (26) ………… the evening in the centre (27) ………… the town.

We have two gaps here, one easier than the other.

The first one, there is not much to think.”we went to“, means that the person visited a specific place, in this case, a “lovely beach“. There is no other word than an article that comes before the adjective or the noun, and the correct article in this case is “a” because it comes before a consonant sound.

The second gap might be a little more challenging: “We went to a party ………… the evening“. The word that you will write here to complete the gap is a preposition to indicate the period of time during which this part happened. So we have:

in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening and at night.

So the word that will complete the gap perfectly is “in“.

Well, this is how I would fill in these gaps. Now it’s your turn to try. try to think of the word, but if the word is difficult for you to guess, try to think about the grammar: “is this gap filled by a preposition, and article, an adverb…?” Usually, they are the ones that fill these gaps; you won’t find adjectives or nouns filling these blanks. I hope that by showing you how I do it, it helps you to try and do it by yourself.

If you are still having problems with this test, or if you found it easy, comment in the comment section below so that I can help. You can always buy the A2 Key books with practice tests to help you. The links are here:

If you are buying from Brazil, the link to the A2 Key Book is here, but if you are buying from other countries, link above.

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Have a great week,
Patricia Moura