How long should you spend on each task….?

You have 5 hours for the English exam. The order below is how I might do the exam, getting
Portuguese out of the way first and gradually warming up to the composition. But it is a
good idea to check the topic of the composition right away. You may then decide to plan it
before doing other tasks. I leave TrEng for last as it is so difficult to get more than 4 or 5
marks in it, and so it should maybe take a lower priority. In any case, each person has their
own preferred order for the four tasks, and mine is just a suggestion.
Tr Portuguese – 20 marks – 30 to 40 minutes, of which 10 should be checking. Double check
that you didn’t leave out a phrase or a line!
Summary – 15 marks – 60 to 80 minutes, of which I suggest:
1. Read and underline - 10 minutes
2. Make your plan – aim for 5-6 items – 10 minutes
3. Write your draft summary – 25 minutes
4. Check it, cut it – 10 minutes (though with the current expansive word limit you may
not need to cut)
5. Rewrite and check it – 10-15 minutes (or leave this part out for now, and come back
to it at the end of the exam if you have time).
Composition – 50 marks – 2 hours, of which I suggest:
1. Brainstorm – 10 mins
2. Put your ideas into a plan – 15-20 mins
3. Write your draft composition – 40 mins
4. Check it and ask yourself some questions –15-20 mins
– have I followed my plan? Is there a snappy introduction? Does the conclusion link
back to the introduction?
Is this phrase doing any work?- Is this elegant? Is it boring? Verb agreement?
Articles? Spelling?
5. Write the clean version and check –20-30 minutes
TrEnglish – 15 marks – 40 minutes
1. Read through and gauge the style – 5 minutes
2. Underline tough bits – think of idioms, nice vocab – 5 mins
3. Do the translation – 30 minutes
4. Check it – 10 mins

Ideal scenario - Keep about 20 minutes to read through everything one more time if you
possibly can!