Sample answers · Reading & Writing FIB
PTE Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks · Reading section
PTE R&W Fill in the Blanks sample: Band 79 dropdown picks.
A worked RWFIB item: a 203-word academic passage on Australian desalination with 5 dropdown blanks, all 20 options analysed against the passage for meaning and collocation, the Band 79 filled version, and the partial-credit scoring math. RWFIB has NO negative marking, so the strategy differs sharply from MCMA.
Last verified 17 July 2026 · Written for PTE Academic post-August 2025 format · Verified against Pearson's July 2025 Score Guide.
The passage
203 words · inside Pearson's ≤300 word limit for RWFIB · 5 dropdown blanks, 4 options each. Only one option per blank is correct.
Desalination plants along Australia's coastline now provide a significant1against drought, particularly in cities that depend heavily on rainfall-fed dams. Perth's Kwinana plant, commissioned in 2006, was the first large-scale seawater desalination facility on the continent and remains central to the city's water security portfolio. Additional plants have since been built in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and the Gold Coast. Each is designed to deliver freshwater during years of low rainfall while sitting2when reservoirs are full. The core technology, reverse osmosis, forces seawater through polymer membranes fine enough to3salt ions from water molecules. This process is energy-intensive, and that remains the industry's chief environmental drawback. However, most Australian plants now source at least a portion of their electricity from dedicated renewable generation, which4a substantial share of their operating emissions. Critics point out that discharged brine, twice as saline as the surrounding seawater, can smother the seabed around outfalls and reduce oxygen availability for benthic species. Site selection and diffuser design help, but the impact is not zero. Even so, in a country where average per-capita water use remains among the highest in the developed world, desalination is likely to remain a policy5rather than a stopgap.
On the real exam each blank is a clickable dropdown. Here the numbered pills stand in for the dropdowns; the options for each one are analysed below.
The task instruction
The verbatim Pearson task instruction as shown on the real exam. No question is asked – the task IS the passage.
Per-blank analysis
Every dropdown option evaluated against the passage.
Every wrong option is grammatically valid. What separates the correct pick from the traps is meaning (does the word fit the paragraph's logic?) and collocation (does it form a natural phrase with the surrounding words?).
Blank 1: “buffer”
Sentence context: “...provide a significant [1] against drought...”
buffer
CORRECTWhy: "A buffer against" is a standard collocation meaning a protective margin. Fits both the grammar (noun after 'a significant') and the meaning (protection from lack of water).
reservoir
TRAPWhy: Grammatically valid and thematically about water, but a reservoir IS what runs low in a drought, not what protects against one. Distractor built by pulling any water word without checking the sentence logic.
shortage
OPPOSITEWhy: Would flip the sentence into nonsense. "A shortage against drought" implies desalination causes water scarcity, when the paragraph is describing how it prevents scarcity.
container
WRONG REGISTERWhy: Grammatical but belongs to physical-objects vocabulary. Academic writing on national water security uses conceptual nouns (buffer, hedge, safeguard), not household ones.
Blank 2: “idle”
Sentence context: “...deliver freshwater during years of low rainfall while sitting [2] when reservoirs are full...”
idle
CORRECTWhy: "Sitting idle" is the standard collocation for equipment that is not currently in use. The whole clause hinges on the contrast between running during drought and NOT running when dams are full.
active
OPPOSITEWhy: Reverses the meaning. If plants sat active when reservoirs are full, they would be running when they are least needed. Fast readers who don't hold the contrast in mind get caught here.
ready
SUBTLE INVERSIONWhy: Grammatical, but "sitting ready" means "on standby to run", not "not running". The paragraph's contrast requires the opposite. Reading only the immediate words around the blank misses this.
silent
WRONG COLLOCATIONWhy: You can describe a machine as silent when it is off, but "sitting silent" is not natural English for industrial equipment. The idiomatic phrase for offline plants is "sitting idle".
Blank 3: “separate”
Sentence context: “...polymer membranes fine enough to [3] salt ions from water molecules...”
separate
CORRECTWhy: Reverse osmosis works by pressure-forcing water through a semi-permeable membrane that separates salt ions from water molecules. Standard, precise terminology.
combine
OPPOSITEWhy: Combining salt with water is dissolution, the opposite of what desalination does. Distractor tests whether the reader is skimming the verb or reading the sentence logic.
dissolve
WRONG PROCESSWhy: Salt is already dissolved in seawater. You cannot dissolve dissolved salt. The verb chosen must describe what a MEMBRANE does, not what dissolution does.
trap
WRONG MECHANISMWhy: Reverse osmosis membranes reject salt while letting water pass through. They do not "trap" ions inside the membrane. Grammatically valid, technically incorrect.
Blank 4: “offsets”
Sentence context: “...renewable generation, which [4] a substantial share of their operating emissions...”
offsets
CORRECTWhy: "Offsets emissions" is the standard climate-policy verb for compensating for greenhouse gas output through cleaner sources. Fits the paragraph's environmental framing.
doubles
OPPOSITEWhy: Grammatically fits, meaning inverts. Renewable generation reduces, not doubles, operating emissions. Distractor for readers who skim the verb without checking direction.
generates
OPPOSITEWhy: Renewables offset emissions, they do not generate them. A subtle trap because "generates" is the natural verb for renewable ELECTRICITY, but the object here is emissions.
masks
WRONG MEANINGWhy: "Masks" implies hiding an emission that still exists. The paragraph's logic is that renewables REDUCE the underlying emission, not that they conceal it. Real distinction that trips up rushed readers.
Blank 5: “cornerstone”
Sentence context: “...desalination is likely to remain a policy [5] rather than a stopgap...”
cornerstone
CORRECTWhy: Cornerstone means an essential foundation. Contrasts cleanly with "stopgap" (a temporary fix). The sentence needs a noun meaning "permanent, load-bearing", which cornerstone delivers.
afterthought
OPPOSITEWhy: An afterthought is closer to a stopgap than opposed to it. The passage's contrast ("rather than a stopgap") needs a noun meaning "central to policy", which afterthought does not.
burden
WRONG TONEWhy: Burden is negative. The paragraph is neutral-to-positive on desalination's policy role. A distractor built to punish readers who ignore paragraph tone.
luxury
WRONG MEANINGWhy: A luxury is non-essential, which would make the sentence say desalination is optional. That contradicts the rest of the paragraph. Distractor that tests reading of paragraph-level intent.
Band 79 answer
The 5 picks that earn full marks.
Passage with correct dropdown values inserted
Desalination plants along Australia's coastline now provide a significantbufferagainst drought, particularly in cities that depend heavily on rainfall-fed dams. Perth's Kwinana plant, commissioned in 2006, was the first large-scale seawater desalination facility on the continent and remains central to the city's water security portfolio. Additional plants have since been built in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and the Gold Coast. Each is designed to deliver freshwater during years of low rainfall while sittingidlewhen reservoirs are full. The core technology, reverse osmosis, forces seawater through polymer membranes fine enough toseparatesalt ions from water molecules. This process is energy-intensive, and that remains the industry's chief environmental drawback. However, most Australian plants now source at least a portion of their electricity from dedicated renewable generation, whichoffsetsa substantial share of their operating emissions. Critics point out that discharged brine, twice as saline as the surrounding seawater, can smother the seabed around outfalls and reduce oxygen availability for benthic species. Site selection and diffuser design help, but the impact is not zero. Even so, in a country where average per-capita water use remains among the highest in the developed world, desalination is likely to remain a policycornerstonerather than a stopgap.
5 correct picks, 0 wrong. Raw score: +5. 5/5 – full marks.
Scoring math (why guessing is always net-positive)
RWFIB has NO negative marking. Wrong picks never subtract.
| Strategy | Picks | Raw math | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Band 79 pick (all 5 correct) | 5 correct, 0 wrong | +5 | 5/5 – full marks |
| One trap (chose 'reservoir' for blank 1) | 4 correct, 1 wrong | +4 | 4/5 – no penalty for the wrong one |
| Two traps (blanks 2 and 4 wrong) | 3 correct, 2 wrong | +3 | 3/5 |
| Skipped a blank (left blank 5 empty) | 4 correct, 1 empty | +4 | 4/5 – SAME as guessing wrong. Never leave a dropdown unset. |
| Panic-guess everything (all 5 wrong) | 0 correct, 5 wrong | 0 | 0/5 – no penalty, just zero. Wrong picks never subtract on RWFIB. |
The rule: +1 per correct blank, 0 per wrong or empty blank. Minimum score is 0. Wrong picks never subtract, so guessing every uncertain dropdown is strictly better than leaving one empty.
The Band 79 dropdown strategy
6 steps to hit 5/5 without losing the section clock.
Read the whole passage first, blanks and all
Paragraph-level context is where 3 of 5 blanks get decided. "Cornerstone vs afterthought" is impossible without knowing the paragraph's overall stance. Two full reads at natural pace before touching a dropdown.
For each blank, check meaning AND collocation
Every distractor is grammatically valid. Your real test: does this word mean what the sentence needs, and does it form a natural phrase with the surrounding words ("buffer against", "sitting idle", "offsets emissions")?
Rule out opposites first
The fastest 30 seconds you can save: two of the four options are usually clear opposites of the intended meaning ("active" vs "idle", "generates" vs "offsets"). Kill them immediately, then choose between the two survivors.
Read the whole sentence with each survivor inserted
Semantic clash is easier to hear than to reason about. "...sitting ready when reservoirs are full" sounds subtly wrong; "...sitting idle when reservoirs are full" sounds right. Trust the ear-check when the analysis is close.
Never leave a dropdown at the default. Always pick
RWFIB has no negative marking. A wrong pick scores 0, and an empty dropdown also scores 0. Guessing gives you a 25% chance of +1 with zero downside.
Budget 90 seconds to 2 minutes per RWFIB item
Reading is 22 to 30 minutes for roughly 15 to 20 items across five task types. RWFIB should be fastish because there is no negative-marking risk to think through. Save the deliberation minutes for MCMA.
5 common RWFIB mistakes
The failure modes that drag a Band 79 to a Band 60.
| Mistake | What it costs you |
|---|---|
| Picking based on the sentence with the blank, ignoring the paragraph | Blanks like #5 (cornerstone vs afterthought) require paragraph-level tone. Reading only 5 words either side of the blank turns those items into a coin-flip. |
| Missing the opposite-meaning distractor | Every RWFIB set has at least one option that is a clear opposite (offsets vs generates, idle vs active). Skimmers pick these because they match the topic, not the direction. |
| Choosing a synonym that doesn't collocate | "Sitting silent" is grammatical and means roughly the same as "sitting idle", but it is not the natural English collocation. Dropdown design punishes near-synonyms that don't match the standard phrase. |
| Leaving a dropdown at the default "select an option" | You get a zero for that blank whether you guess wrong or leave it empty. There is no reason not to guess. RWFIB has no negative marking. |
| Spending 4+ minutes on one item | The Reading section is 22 to 30 minutes for 15 to 20 items across five task types. Losing 4 minutes to one RWFIB item forces rushing on Reorder or MCMA, which are more expensive to rush. |
FAQ
Reading & Writing Fill in the Blanks, answered.
How is PTE Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks scored?
Partial credit, no negative marking. Every blank filled with the correct dropdown option scores +1; every wrong or empty blank scores 0. There is no penalty for guessing, so the correct strategy is to fill every dropdown even when uncertain.
Wait, isn't Reading & Writing Fill in the Blanks a Writing task?
Not any more. From 7 August 2025, Pearson removed the Writing skill from R&W FIB. It is now scored under Reading only. This was one of the four cross-skill decouplings in the 2025 format update, alongside Read Aloud (now Speaking only), Answer Short Question (Listening only), and Listening FIB Type-In (Listening only).
How many blanks are in a Reading & Writing FIB question?
Typically 4 to 6 dropdowns in a passage of up to 300 words. Each dropdown offers 4 options and only one is correct. The number of blanks and options is fixed within a single item – you get exactly what the passage shows.
How many RWFIB items are on the PTE Academic test?
5 to 6 items per test per Pearson's July 2025 Score Guide. It sits in Part 2 (Reading) alongside Reorder Paragraphs, Reading Fill in the Blanks (drag-and-drop), Multiple Choice Multiple Answers, and Multiple Choice Single Answer.
What is the difference between R&W Fill in the Blanks and Reading Fill in the Blanks?
Answer format. R&W FIB uses dropdowns – you pick one of four options per blank. Reading FIB uses drag-and-drop – you drag words from a shared word bank into 4 to 5 blanks in a shorter passage (up to 80 words). RWFIB tests collocation and paragraph meaning; Reading FIB tests vocabulary and syntax.
Should I always fill every dropdown in RWFIB?
Yes. There is no negative marking. A wrong pick scores 0, a blank left empty also scores 0, and a correct guess scores +1. Guessing gives you a 25% chance of a mark with zero downside. This is the opposite of Reading MCMA, where you should skip options you cannot evidence.
How long should I spend on one RWFIB item?
About 90 seconds to 2 minutes on a 4-to-6-blank item. The Reading section is 22 to 30 minutes for 15 to 20 items, so per-item budgets matter. RWFIB should be fastish because there is no negative-marking calculation to run – decisive picking beats deliberation.
Keep going with Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks
One pattern, three depths.
You've just read the band 79 worked example. Here's the rest of the loop for this task.
Reusable framework
Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks template
The reusable answer framework — structure, sentence starters, timing marks — that fits any Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks prompt.
Read the template →Interactive drill
Practise Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks
Free interactive drills — do the reps yourself with the model answer revealed after each attempt.
Start the drill →Further reading
Related tools.
- → Reading Fill in the Blanks sample – the sibling drag-and-drop task with a shared word bank.
- → Reading MCMA sample – the negative-marking Reading task where guessing is expensive.
- → Reading section overview – all 5 reading task types.
- → Take a free scored mock – real RWFIB items with AI scoring.