Characteristics of the Trinity ISE II English exam, level B2

A B2 level of English is already an intermediate-advanced language level , which allows you to function safely in many situations, both in the spoken and in the written part. It is essential that you have recognition to open doors and take advantage of all the opportunities that may come to you in this regard. Therefore, we are going to help you if you don't know how to do it. Today we are going to give you recommendations on how to prepare for the Tinity ISE II English exam, level B2. We will leave you tips to prepare well, to enroll and, especially, so that you know what these tests consist of and when you can do them.

What is the Trinity ISE exam?

 Trinity's Integrated Skills in English (ISE) is a contemporary qualification of four skills (reading, writing, speaking and listening) recognized by governments and institutions as reliable evidence of English language proficiency. Preparation for the ISE helps develop authentic communicative and transferable skills required for academic study and employability, such as synthesizing information, engaging in interactive discussions and presenting topics of personal interest.

Two exam modules offer flexibility: there are two exam modules: Reading and Writing and Speaking and Listening, which, depending on whether the exam is taken at a Trinity SELT Center in the UK, or at a Trinity Registered Exam Center in anywhere in the world, they can be taken together, or separately when ready.

Structure with respect to the CEFR: ISE proficiency levels are calibrated according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages ​​(CEFR) and are available in five levels :

ISE Foundation (A2), ISE I (B1), ISE II (B2), ISE III (C1), ISE IV (C2) *

* ISE IV has a different format than ISE in CEFR levels A2-C1

Recognized and accepted:

ISE is a UK government approved test for visa application and settlement purposes when taken at a Trinity SELT Center.If you are preparing for the ISE as a Secure English Language Test (SELT) for Visa or other purposes in the UK, visit UK visa tests,

ISE is an exam suitable for students at the end of study abroad courses, such as the Italian program funded by PON.

ISE scores are also used as strong evidence of English language proficiency and are recognized by an increasing number of universities, governments, and institutions around the world.

Characteristics of the official English exam Trinity ISE II, level B2

In this test you will examine the basic skills that you have to control to master a foreign language: comprehension of both reading and conversations, and both oral and written creation. The exam is divided into two parts :

1. Reading and Writing:

This section is about reading comprehension and written expression. This exam lasts exactly two hours, in which you will have to develop 4 fundamental activities:

• Task 1: reading a text of 500 words with 15 comprehension questions.
• Task 2: reading 4 short texts of 500 words in total with 15 comprehension questions.
• Task 3: using the texts from task 2, write a composition of 150-180 words.
• Task 4: write an essay that can be a report, letter, email or review of 150-180 words.

2. Speaking & Listening:

This section is the speaking and listening test. It lasts 20 minutes, in which the following activities are carried out:

• Topic task, 4 minutes long: presentation of a topic to be chosen by the applicant.
• Collaborative Task, for 4 minutes: simple discussion between the examiner and the student.
• Conversation task, 2 minutes long: conversation on a topic proposed by the examiner.
• Independent listening tasks, 7 minutes long: listen to a radio track and answer some questions asked by the examiner.

We leave you the guides that Trinity College makes available to those interested in taking the test: 

How to prepare for the exam on your own

Trinity College makes material directly and free of charge available to candidates, which is essential that you use to study:

• At Trinity College you have more than enough material to prepare you for the Reading and Wrinting tests.
• You have more material, this time to prepare the Listening and Speaking tests :
• And they also make videos available to the candidates , with which you can see what the oral exam is like live.

But, in addition to all this specific material, we want to help you with a series of tips and complementary material that can help you a lot in preparing for the exam. It is specific material for the B2 level of English, and essential to reinforce all parts of this exam, which will be very useful for you to review and study calmly, to deepen and prepare the test:

• To be able to take this exam, you must already have knowledge of English at an intermediate-advanced level, at a B2 level. The interesting thing, therefore, would be that you start with this, with some general English books that helps you control all the contents of B2 and that you always have close by in case you have any questions.
• To prepare a Writing test you have to write, a lot. It is about spending time every day to write and put into practice everything learned at level B2, but it is also advisable to use vocabulary and structures obtained from listening and reading.
• We advise you to maintain contact with natives, in writing, which will allow you to do it in the most real way. Ask them to correct you, so you will move forward safely. Anyway, with this level you should already have well controlled grammar and make few mistakes, take this into account if this is your case before taking the exam.
• The Reading test requires that you dedicate yourself to reading in English as much as you can and as many texts as you can as well. You need to do daily readings, whether it is from newspapers, blogs, social networks, etc. But beyond that, it is essential and highly advisable that you read complete books adapted to your level. For this reason, we leave you this list of graded readings that we propose for the B2 level of English, it can help you a lot to start making contact with literature and other uses of the English language.
• Always work with a dictionary, since it is what can help you solve all your doubts. Look at this list of possible dictionaries, choose the one that best suits your needs.
• To prepare for the Listening test, what you have to do is listen to everything you can in English. Use all the resources you have at your disposal and take advantage of them. You can use this list of songs for your level. This compilation of series and movies can also help you.

Enrollment and results

Before starting to study, you have to control the future dates to take the exam and the registration deadlines for each of them. We always advise that you confirm everything with your exam center, as these data could be affected by circumstances beyond the current forecast.

Check dates, centers and everything you need, you can also enroll from here, comfortably and safely.

The number of places is limited and they will be assigned as payments are made, so be very careful and do not let it pass, as you may run out of place. You will see that in the module that you have to fill in to enroll you have a section called "Observations", in which you must indicate if you only take a specific part of the exam because you have already previously taken the exam. In the latter case you must insert your candidate ID.

Until days before the exam they will not tell you in which of the available exam centers and closest to your home you should take the test. They do so in order to gather all the candidates by location in the fewest possible centers.