How to Prepare for the CLEP Spanish Exam

If you’re looking to take CLEP Spanish to earn college credit this year, we have you covered! CLEP Spanish is one of our most popular test prep courses. CLEP exams are a great way to save time and money while earning college credit. 

What’s on the exam

The CLEP Spanish exam consists of three timed sections containing 121 questions. You will have 90 minutes to complete the exam. 

Here is a breakdown of the exam structure:

• Listening Sections: Two listening sections contain audio portions presented once. You will have 30 minutes to complete the two listening sections. The time begins after you’ve finished listening to the audio portion.
• Reading Section: You will have 60 minutes to complete the reading section of the exam.

Knowledge and skills required

CLEP Spanish test takers will want to have one to two years of college-level Spanish course experience and feel fairly comfortable with Spanish grammar and vocabulary. Since speaking and writing in Spanish are not evaluated on this exam, you will want to focus your attention on listening and reading comprehension skills. 

Here is a breakdown of content and the weight of each section of the exam:

• Rejoinders (15%): This section measures your listening skills through short audio portions. You will then have 10 seconds to select the most appropriate response to complete each conversation.
• Dialogues and narratives (25%): This section assesses your listening comprehension with longer spoken dialogues, narratives,and announcements. The audio portions are supplemented with images and questions. There are different format types to the questions being asked. Pay special attention to the directions and what is being asked for each question.You will have 12 minutes to complete this section.
• Discrete sentences (vocabulary and structure – 16%): This section requires you to finish an incomplete statement by selecting the best word option in each scenario.
• Short cloze passages (vocabulary and structure – 20%): In this section, you will read a paragraph and fill in the blanks within the context of a paragraph. 
• Reading passages (reading comprehension – 24%): To complete this section, you will need to answer questions about short texts. 

Sample Questions

Test your readiness for the CLEP Spanish exam by answering the following practice questions. Scroll down to review the answers. 

1. Mi __________________ es muy divertido. Siempre le gusta jugar conmigo.
   
   A. hermano
   B. hermana
   C. primos
   D. abuelos
2. Para el cumpleaños de Berta, ____ regalamos una nueva novela.
   
   A. lo
   B. les
   C. le
   D. nos
3. Jorge y Alicia ____________.
   
   A. es dos personas interesantes
   B. son profesores
   C. son guapas
   D. hay dos

Preparing for the exam

Peterson’s CLEP Spanish test prep helps you prepare for each section on the exam and includes detailed answer explanations to every question. Test your listening and reading skills by taking three CLEP Spanish practice tests. Review our CLEP Spanish study guide to help you prepare for the exam and take it with confidence. 

RELATED: 6 Tips to Help You Ace Your CLEP Exam

Answers to sample questions

1. The correct answer is A. It is the only response that concords correctly with the adjective “divertido” (masculine and singular).
2. The correct answer is C. It is a singular indirect object pronoun.
3. The correct answer is B. It is the only response that does not contain a conflict in concordance with verb, number and gender.