Reading Fill in the Blanks: the method

What this guide covers

There are two blank tasks in Part 2. Reading: Fill in the Blanks gives you a box of words to drag into a passage, with more words than blanks. Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks gives each blank its own drop-down list, and counts toward Writing as well as Reading. The task pages cover the format and scoring of each. This guide is the method they share: how to decide every blank, how to work each format, which word pairs to learn, and how to pace them inside the Reading clock.

Both use partial credit: one point for each correctly completed blank, with a minimum of zero. A passage with five blanks and four right answers scores four. So the first rule is never leave a blank empty. A wrong answer costs nothing in these tasks, and an educated guess can only help. (The opposite is true for Multiple Choice, Multiple Answers, where each wrong option takes a point away.)

Three checks for every blank

1. Grammar: what kind of word fits? Look at the words either side. After "the", you need a noun or an adjective plus noun. After "to", often a base verb. After "has been", a past participle. After "despite", a noun or an -ing form. This alone usually rules out half the options.
2. Collocation: which word goes with its neighbours? English pairs words by habit: you make a decision but do research, reach an agreement, pose a threat. Several options may be grammatical. Usually only one sounds natural.
3. Meaning: does it fit the argument? Signal words tell you the direction of the sentence: however and despite mean contrast, therefore means result, similarly means the same direction. The word you choose has to point the same way.

Run the three checks in that order. Grammar is fastest and cuts the most. Collocation decides most of what is left. Meaning settles the rest, and is the only check that needs the whole passage.

Three blanks, three deciders

Our own example sentences.

Strategy for drag-and-drop (Reading: Fill in the Blanks)

1. Read the whole passage first, quickly. You cannot judge meaning from one sentence, and the extra words in the box are chosen to fit single sentences.
2. Fill the blanks you are sure of. Every word you place correctly narrows the choice for the rest.
3. Match what is left by part of speech. Sort the remaining words into nouns, verbs and adjectives, and check which blanks need which.
4. Reread the finished passage. The leftover words are distractors. They often fit grammatically but not in meaning. If a sentence reads oddly, swap and read again.

Strategy for drop-down (Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks)

1. Read to the end of the sentence before opening the list. The words after the blank matter as much as the words before it.
2. Predict before you look. Say to yourself what kind of word, and if possible which word, belongs there. Then open the list and look for it. Predicting first stops the distractors from steering you.
3. Apply the three checks to the options that survive. Usually two or three do. Grammar, then collocation, then meaning.
4. Move on and come back. Each blank is independent. A blank that takes more than thirty seconds gets a best guess and a mental flag.

Pace

Neither task has its own timer. They share the Reading part's clock, usually 27 to 37 minutes for the whole part, so budget about two minutes per blank passage. Spending five minutes on one blank is the costliest habit in Part 2: one point is not worth the rest of the section. Guess, move on, and come back if time allows.

Collocations worth knowing

These are common in the kind of general and workplace texts both tasks use. Learn them as pairs, never as single words.

Verb + noun	Adjective / adverb + word	Phrases
play a role in · pose a threat to · draw a conclusion · conduct research · raise awareness of · meet a demand · reach an agreement · take advantage of · have an impact on · place emphasis on	widely accepted · heavily dependent on · closely related to · a significant increase in · a wide range of	take into account · in response to · contribute to · be responsible for · as a result of

The fifteen-minute reading habit

The fastest way to build collocation knowledge is to read, and notice. Spend fifteen minutes a day on a news or science article, and write down any pair of words that seems to belong together: heavily dependent, pose a risk, draw attention. Five pairs a day is plenty. After a few weeks, the right option in a drop-down starts to simply look right, because you have seen it in the wild.

Drills

1. The part-of-speech drill. Take a blank passage and, before looking at the options, write N, V, Adj or Adv above every blank. Then check. This makes the grammar check instant.
2. The prediction drill. On drop-down passages, cover the lists and write your own word for each blank. Then compare. Where your word was wrong but the same part of speech, note the collocation you missed.
3. The distractor drill. On drag-and-drop passages, after finishing, explain why each leftover word is wrong. If you cannot, you were guessing on that blank.
4. The timed set. Five passages in ten minutes. Note which blanks were flagged and whether coming back changed the answer.

Mistakes to drill out

• Choosing by meaning alone. Effect and affect mean related things. Only one is a noun.
• Ignoring word endings. Singular or plural, -ed or -ing: the right word in the wrong form is a wrong answer.
• Opening the list before reading the sentence. The distractors are written to look right out of context.
• Leaving a blank empty. There is no penalty for a wrong answer in either task. Fill every blank.

Sources: Pearson, PTE Core test format (Reading); Pearson, PTE Core Test Taker Score Guide. The example sentences on this page were written for this guide.