B2 First · Writing
Pick a task type and write a single answer. Felix, our AI examiner, marks it on the four Cambridge scales and shows exactly how to improve.
Two tasks, worth 20 % of your B2 First (FCE) result. Part 1 is always an essay and it is compulsory — a discursive piece answering a question with two given points plus one of your own. Part 2 is a choice: an article, an email or letter, a review, or a report, each with its own conventions and its own reader.
Cambridge marks both against four criteria of equal weight: content (did you answer the question that was asked), communicative achievement (is the register right for this reader), organisation (does it hold together) and language (range and accuracy). The criterion candidates lose most on is content, and almost always for the same reason — a well-written answer to a slightly different question than the one on the paper.
That is what makes unmarked writing practice nearly worthless. You cannot see your own register slip, and you certainly cannot see which of the four criteria pulled your band down. Every task here is marked against those scales with sentence-level comments and an indicative band, so you find out which criterion is the problem before exam day rather than after.
Against four public criteria — content, communicative achievement, organisation and language — each scored 0–5 and each weighted equally. A strong vocabulary cannot rescue an answer that missed a required content point, which is why reading the task carefully is worth more than any phrase list.
Yes, but not as a hard cut-off. Writing well under the range usually means a content point is missing; writing well over it usually means relevance and organisation suffer. Examiners mark what is there against the criteria — the range is guidance for hitting them, not a rule that is scored on its own.
