OET exam sample: Writing and Speaking practice with a model letter and role play

OET offers free sample tests for all four parts and two graded booklets with real Writing and Speaking responses and assessor comments. OET warns that its at-home version may not be accepted everywhere, so check before you book. This page explains how Writing and Speaking are marked and gives you our own case notes, model letter and role-play card to practise with.

Listening and Reading are the same for every profession. Writing and Speaking are written for yours, and they are marked by assessors, not by an answer key. Our reading: that makes them the two parts where a sample answer helps most, and the two you cannot mark yourself.

The Canadian bodies OET lists scores for do so part by part, so a weak Writing or Speaking result can hold you back even when Listening and Reading are fine. OET's list shows the medical residency matching service asking for the same grade in all four parts. For nurses, OET's August 2024 post says the Canadian Nurse Regulators Collaborative recommended C+ for Reading and Writing and B for Listening and Speaking. That is a recommendation from two years ago, so check each provincial regulator's current score.

Each regulator sets its own score, so check yours. Our OET guide for Canada lists the bodies OET names.

OET tells nurses to watch the regulator's website in the province or territory where they plan to apply, for its accepted cut scores and benchmark levels. This page is practice, not advice on registration. Your regulator's own page decides what you need.

In Writing you read case notes and write a formal letter for a reader, as you would at work. OET describes it at a glance like this.

• The first five minutes are reading time. You then have 40 minutes to write and check, and you may look at the task and notes at any point.
• The word range is 180 to 200. There is no automatic penalty for going over or under, but OET says a much longer letter probably holds irrelevant material and a much shorter one may have missed something.
• Two OET assessors mark it.
• Spelling, punctuation and grammar sit under the Language criterion.

The six criteria

Each criterion is scored, and the scores are combined onto OET's 500 scale. OET names them as purpose, content, conciseness and clarity, genre and style, organisation and layout, and language.

Layout and details

OET says there is no particular format or layout you have to use, as long as the letter is clearly laid out and suits the task. Use the title and address details given in the task instructions. If you prefer writing in capital letters you may, as long as you are consistent.

How you plan depends on how you sit. On paper the last page of the answer booklet is blank for planning, and you cannot ask for more paper. On computer you plan at the top of the text box, type your letter below, and delete the plan before the time ends.

The task below is ours. It is not an OET task, so use OET's own samples to see how real case notes are laid out. The point of ours is to practise one skill: choosing what the reader needs. Try it yourself, with the same time limit as OET's Writing part, before you read our letter. The medical details are made up for practice, and a nurse or doctor should review them before you treat them as clinical advice.

Our case notes

You are a ward nurse at Riverside Hospital. Write a letter to Ms Carla Mendes, Community Diabetes Nurse, Eastside Community Health, 22 Park Road. Ask her to see Mr Harper at home. Write 180 to 200 words. Not all of the notes are needed.

• Patient: Mr Evan Harper, 68, 14 Brook Lane. Retired bus driver. Widower, lives alone.
• Admitted 3 days ago with cellulitis, right lower leg. Discharge planned tomorrow.
• Type 2 diabetes for 12 years. HbA1c on admission 9.1%.
• Blood glucose during stay: 11 to 14 mmol/L.
• Left foot: reduced sensation. No wound on left foot.
• Treatment: intravenous antibiotics for 3 days. Oral antibiotics for 7 days at home.
• Wound dressed daily. District nurse to change dressing every 2nd day after discharge.
• Says tablets and glucose-testing routine are confusing. Sometimes forgets metformin.
• Ward dietitian gave written meal plan.
• Enjoys gardening. Hospital visiting hours 2 pm to 8 pm.
• Prefers morning appointments.

A model letter

The body of this letter is 188 words, inside the 180 to 200 range. We are not saying what grade it would earn.

What the letter does

• It states its purpose in the first sentence: it asks the reader to assess Mr Harper at home, and says why. The reader knows what to do before she reads the detail.
• It chooses. His gardening, his old job and the visiting hours are left out because Ms Mendes does not need them. His foot sensation, his confusion about medication and his preference for mornings are in because she will act on them.
• It groups the facts: diagnosis and admission, then treatment, then home life and the request. It does not copy the notes in the order they were written.
• It turns note form into sentences, with complete grammar, past and future tenses used on purpose, and no abbreviations the reader could not follow.
• It ends with a polite, specific request and a way to reply.

Five common mistakes

1. Copying the notes in order. A letter that follows the note layout line by line does not select anything for the reader.
2. Burying the purpose. If the request arrives in the third paragraph, the reader has to hunt for it.
3. Including everything. Every extra fact takes words from the facts that matter, and OET warns that much longer letters often hold irrelevant material.
4. Leaving a key fact out. If the reader needs something to act, such as a preference, a risk or a deadline, it must be in the letter.
5. Writing in note form or with unexplained abbreviations. A letter is full sentences to a person, not a copy of a chart.

After you write yours, mark it against OET's six criteria in the section above, and compare how you chose your content. If a teacher or a friend with strong English can read it, ask whether the first sentence told them what you wanted.

In Speaking you play your own profession in two role plays, and the interlocutor plays the patient or their carer. OET describes it as approximately 20 minutes, with two profession-specific role plays of 5 mins each.

• You may write on the role-play card, look at it during the role play and hand it back at the end.
• The role plays are recorded and assessed by two OET assessors.
• A role play usually ends naturally at around the five-minute mark.
• There is no penalty for not covering every element on the card, but the more you cover, the more evidence you give.

OET's advice for the preparation time is to think about which parts of the role play may need a longer explanation, or a question to the patient for more clarification.

OET says role plays may include tension, because real work does.

The criteria, in OET's words

Assessors use two sets of criteria. The Linguistic set has four criteria marked out of six. The Clinical Communication set has five categories marked out of three.

This card is ours and not an OET card. Use it with a friend or a colleague who plays the patient. Cut the line that starts "The patient:" off before the nurse reads the card, and give it only to the person playing the patient. The medical details are made up for practice, and a nurse or doctor should review them before you treat them as clinical advice. Give yourself three minutes to read and prepare, then talk for about five minutes. If you can, record it and listen back.

Our role-play card

• Setting: hospital ward.
• You are a ward nurse. Your patient, Ms Lin Zhang, is 58 and goes home tomorrow after treatment for a chest infection. She has been prescribed an inhaler for the first time.
• The patient: you are worried you will not manage the inhaler on your own, and afraid of becoming dependent on it.
• Find out what she already knows about the inhaler and what worries her.
• Explain how and when to use it, once in the morning and once in the evening, and why using it regularly matters.
• Respond to her worry about becoming dependent.
• Check that she has understood, and agree a follow-up with her GP in 2 weeks.

A model opening

What the opening does

• It starts with a greeting, an introduction and permission to use her name. That is the start of relationship building, which OET describes as starting in a friendly and respectful way.
• It asks what she already knows before giving any information. OET lists this under information giving.
• It asks about her worry and names it back to her, which fits OET's category on the patient's thoughts, worries and expectations.
• It tells her the plan in three parts. That is signposting, which OET's providing structure category asks for.
• It uses plain words and short sentences, the opposite of jargon, which is what OET means by appropriate language.

Our reading of the card: the hardest part is the worry about dependence. Do not brush it aside. Ask what she means, explain in plain words, and check what she makes of your answer. That uses information gathering and information giving together.

Three things to avoid

1. Reading the card out loud. Use it as a checklist and talk to the patient.
2. Explaining everything in one block. Pause, and check the patient has followed.
3. Using clinical words the patient would not use. Say 'inhaler' and 'morning and evening', not the drug name or the dose terms, unless she asks.

Try the card three times with a different partner who plays the patient differently: one anxious, one angry, one who does not stop asking questions. OET says its role plays may include tension, and a partner who changes the patient's mood is the nearest you can get at home.

OET's free samples cover all four parts, Writing and Speaking included. They are on its own site, with separate collections for paper and for computer.

There is a free collection for the paper test and another for the computer and at-home test. At-home is not accepted everywhere: OET's Canada list shows CaRMS accepting OET Test on Paper and OET Test on Computer, and OET says OET@Home may not be accepted by all recognising organisations or authorities in every country, so check before you book.

OET also publishes two downloadable booklets of real, graded candidate responses. The Writing booklet has real letters from candidates in 10 of the 12 OET professions, including medicine and nursing. The Speaking booklet has real role plays and word-for-word transcripts. Each booklet has scores and comments from OET assessors.

OET's advice on how often to practise applies to these too. It recommends one practice test every 2-3 weeks, with work on your errors in between. Practise, then fix, then practise again.

Which version to practise for

If you will sit the computer test, practise typing your letter. OET says the computer test is accepted by major regulators including FMRAC in Canada, but OET also tells you to confirm with your own recognising organisation which delivery modes it accepts. OET also says that on the OET Test on Computer the Speaking sub-test is done at home on an online platform, or at a venue in select countries, so check that Speaking mode as well, and whether results must come from one sitting.

For Listening and Reading practice, with a short original set of ours and OET's rules on spelling and exact words, see our first practice page.

Common questions