Paraphrasing is very important in PTE Academics. All the communicative skills except reading have questions that require paraphrasing. In listening the test taker is expected to paraphrase when answering summarize written text while in speaking and writing paraphrasing is required in re-tell the lecture and summarize the written text. This article is meant to help you understand and learn paraphrasing to get a good score in the sections that require summarizing.

All these sections require good grammar, vocabulary, coherence, fluency while re-tell the lecture needs pronunciation as well. Paraphrasing is telling someone’s words whether written or spoken in your own words without losing the meaning of the original content. Below are three subsections of communicative skills that require paraphrasing and the way that they are structured during the PTE Academics.

• Re-tell lecture assesses listening and speaking skill. It can be tested by either listening to the audio or watching a video clip. The task is to retell the content of the lecture in your own words. The length of the audio/video is 90 seconds and you have 10 seconds to prepare and 30 seconds to respond.
• Summarizing written text assesses reading and writing. The task is to summarize 300 words written text displayed on the screen in 10 minutes.
• Summarize spoken text assesses listening and writing. The task is to summarize the content of the audio in 50-70 words. At the end of the audio, the test taker has 60-90 seconds to deliver their response.

Here are a few tips that will help you with paraphrasing in the PTE Academics.

Separate information

Time is of the essence during PTE Academics but during your preparation, you can actually take time to understand this section. In every communication scenario, there is an important message or words that carry more meaning than the rest. This is the information that stands out or gives the story more meaning. In summarizing written text you can actually write the important information in your notebook and also in summarizing the spoken words.

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Keywords and key phrases

In summarizing spoken text, the test taker has 30-40 seconds to listen to the audio once and to provide an answer within the same amount of time. This means if the content of the audio is missed then you might have missed the whole question. Therefore it is important to learn about keywords and key phrase. They may be one word or two to three words phrase that gives meaning to the story. There might be a repetition of these words. Other keywords may be the events that took place in the story, the time, year or place and etc. Having these in mind or your notepad will make it easier to paraphrase.

Improve your vocabulary

The communicative format of the PTE Academics is professional academic communication. Therefore lack of good vocabulary will make it impossible to communicate as required. It is at the learner’s best interest to read as much as possible. Reading improves vocabulary through learning new words, fluent communication by learning sentence structure and proper punctuation. It also improves grammar to help one reduce grammar and spelling mistake. Improving vocabulary has benefits not only applicable to this section but to the other sections as well.

Understand the content to be summarized

The test taker has to take time to understand the written content because one can’t really summarize or even paraphrase something they don’t understand. With summarizing the spoken text, the learner has a few seconds to understand the content of the audio therefore during practice it is imperative to practice grasping concept fast.  In summarizing the written text the test taker may have to read the passage more than once to be able to better note important point and for clear understanding

Use different sentence structure

This is no brainer because if you have to produce content that is less in length (words) as the original text then it won’t be just about replacing words with synonyms. Synonyms still have to be used together with restructuring the sentences. For example when it is written, “Progress has been slower than was anticipated.” The test taker may structure it in this manner “Progress has not been as rapid as expected.”

Do not change the meaning of the original content

The question is to produce the exact meaning of the original text in your own words without adding to it or taking anything away from it that may change the context. The test taker needs to avoid giving their own view on the matter and adding their own suggestions and comments.  Stick to the original meaning of the content and make sure important information and important points are well documented in your summary.

Listen to the audio, podcasts etc.

During preparation and revision, it is important for the test taker to practice summarizing the spoken task by listening to the spoken communication media. These maybe podcasts, video clips, radio and many more. Practicing as much as possible will benefit the test taker to get accustomed to the art of paraphrasing and summarising. In the end, it will increase the test taker’s chance to score high in summarizing the spoken text section. Moreover, listening to various media will improve vocabulary, pronunciation and other sections.

Learn sentence structure

The sentence structure is helpful to reduce the long passage into a single sentence. It is important for the learner to learn and understand different type of sentences and their applicability. The more appropriate to use may be compound and or compound-complex sentence. The learner must be cautious to avoid big words which would require a human being to use a dictionary. PTE Academics scoring may be automated but remember the software was created by human beings. So bear that in mind in case you want to use complex words.

Avoid jargon information.

As we have already said the task is to write someone’s message in your own words so try to avoid unnecessary information. If the passage has three important points don’t explain each point more than it is necessary. Remember there is time and word limits to consider so the shorter the summary the better and the quicker you respond the more time you will have to correct grammatical errors and spelling mistake.

Your mock test

Mock test is your compass to navigate the PTE Academics so don’t take it lightly. The people who compiled the questions know so much about the examination and have dedicated their time and knowledge to bring you all the information you need. Practicing the mock test as much as possible with dedication can really help the test taker to succeed and score high. So practice and don’t give up until the scorecard reflects the score you desire.