Please send this to ONE Canadian immigrant today and ask them to subscribe here.

Every few weeks, a new student tells me the same thing. They’ve used English for years—running meetings, writing reports, even arguing with their landlord. But when their CELPIP results come in, one skill—usually speaking or writing—is a level or two lower than they expected.

Their English hasn’t suddenly gotten worse. The real issue is that CELPIP scores you on timed tasks, and being good at English doesn’t always mean you’re good at the test itself.

CELPIP scores both Speaking and Writing in four areas. Content/Coherence, Vocabulary, and Task Fulfillment are in both. The last one is Listenability for Speaking and Readability for Writing.

Fluent speakers usually have good vocabulary. Most lose marks on Task Fulfillment, which means relevance, completeness, tone, and length (word count for Writing). Simply put: did you answer everything, in the right way, and at the right length? Most surprises come from this area.

Each Speaking task gives you a short time to prepare and a short time to speak. For half of the eight tasks, you get 30 seconds to prepare and 60 seconds to speak. Two tasks give you 90 seconds to speak, and two give you a full minute to prepare. When your prep time ends, the screen moves on, and the recording starts automatically. You can’t ask for extra time.

At work, you talk to someone who nods, interrupts, and asks questions. In CELPIP, it’s just you, a microphone, and a countdown. Many confident speakers freeze in the first few seconds, restart sentences, and then rush to fill the time.

Those restarts matter. CELPIP includes “pauses, interjections, and self-correction” under Listenability. A few are normal, but a string of “um, actually, what I mean is” in the first ten seconds can lower your score.

Two things can help. First, practice with a real timer from the start, and use CELPIP’s study pack advice to slowly shorten your prep time. Second, always have your first sentence ready so you don’t freeze at the beginning.

Here’s another tip from the study pack for the personal experience task: if you can’t think of a real story, just make one up. Many honest people waste time searching their memory while the clock keeps ticking.

For Writing Task 1, you have 27 minutes to write a 150- to 200-word email. The prompt usually asks you to do about three things, like explain a problem, say when it started, and ask for a solution.

Good writers often get stuck here, writing a great email that answers only two of the three things. The grammar and tone are fine, but missing one part means you lose points for completeness.

You can fix this in 30 seconds. Before you start typing, list the things the prompt asks for. Give each one its own short paragraph. Check your email against the list before time runs out.

Both Writing tasks require 150 to 200 words, and there’s a word counter on the screen. CELPIP allows a little flexibility, but your score can drop if you go too far over or under the limit.

Strong writers are more likely to write too much than too little. A 280-word email that rambles isn’t better than a focused 190-word one, and it takes away time you could use to review your work.

You don’t need a course to fix these issues. What you need is practice that feels like the real test.

Each day, record yourself answering one Speaking task using the real preparation and speaking times. Listen back and count how many times you restart a sentence. Also, write one email a day: list the prompt’s parts before you start, and check your word count when you finish. Once a week, do a full Speaking or Writing section under test conditions, without pausing.

That’s exactly the kind of practice CELTESTPIP offers: timed tasks in the real CELPIP format, with feedback on the same four areas the raters use. If you want to try it, the first question of every Speaking task is free after you sign up: CELPIP Speaking practice.