Method: TCF Canada Reading Comprehension

The Reading Comprehension test (compréhension écrite) measures your ability to read and understand a wide range of texts in French, from a public notice to an opinion piece. You write nothing: everything depends on reading, time management and precision.

The format

• 39 multiple-choice questions, each with 4 options and only one correct answer.
• 60 minutes for the whole test, with no break.
• A score out of 699, converted into a CEFR level (A1 to C2) and an NCLC for Immigration Canada.
• Documents go from the simplest to the most demanding: ads, messages and posters at the start, articles and argumentative texts at the end.

A wrong or missing answer is worth 0 points: there are no negative points. So answer every question, even as a last-resort guess.

The scoring scale: where the points are

Questions 20 to 39 alone are worth almost 70% of the total. A C2 question is worth eleven times an A1 question. In other words: don't waste time at the start, and save your energy for the end.

Time strategy

With 60 minutes for 39 questions, you have a little over a minute and a half per question on average. But they don't all take the same effort:

1. Questions 1 to 10 (A1-A2): about 30 seconds each. Read the question first, then look for the information in the document.
2. Questions 11 to 29 (B1-B2): about 1 minute 30. The document is longer: identify what it is (email, ad, article) and its purpose before looking for the detail.
3. Questions 30 to 39 (C1-C2): up to 3 minutes. These argumentative texts require you to understand an opinion, a nuance or an implication.

Keep 5 minutes at the end to go back to the questions you skipped. If a question blocks you for more than two minutes: pick a provisional answer, note its number and move on.

Reading techniques

• Read the question before the document. That way you know what you are looking for: a date, an intention, an opinion.
• Identify the type of document. A classified ad, a set of rules or an editorial are not read the same way.
• Look for the paraphrase, not the identical word. The correct option rarely repeats the words of the text: it gives their meaning. Conversely, an option that copies a word from the text is often a trap.
• Eliminate. Mentally cross out the options the text contradicts, then those that say more than the text (« toujours », « jamais », « tous »: always, never, all).
• Spot the connectors. « Pourtant », « en revanche », « certes… mais » (yet, on the other hand, admittedly… but) signal the author's real point of view.

Common mistakes

• Spending too long on the first questions, which are worth little.
• Choosing an option that is true in itself but does not answer the question asked.
• Confusing the author's opinion with that of someone they quote.
• Leaving questions unanswered: that is a sure point lost, whereas a guess has a one-in-four chance.
• Rereading the whole document for each question instead of going straight to the useful passage.

Practising effectively

Take the sets under exam conditions: in one go, with the timer, without a dictionary. Then spend as much time on the review as on the set: for each mistake, find the passage that supports the correct answer and understand why your choice was wrong. That is how you move up from one level to the next.