Quick Review: C1 Structures in Action

Before moving forward, let’s make sure your C1 toolkit is solid — you will keep using all of it at C2.

Notice

  • Inversion: “Never had she felt so confident.”
  • Formal subjunctive: “The committee insists that the report be revised.”
  • Nominalisation: “The implementation of the policy led to a reduction in costs.”
  • Modal perfect / speculation: “She must have known; he can’t have left already.”
  • Sentence relative clauses: “He apologised, which surprised everyone.”

Rule

Rule: these structures are not “finished and forgotten” — they are the raw material C2 builds on. C2 lessons will assume you can produce all five automatically, then add nuance on top.

Practice

  1. Rewrite with inversion: “She had rarely seen such dedication.”
    Answer: “Rarely had she seen such dedication.”
  2. Complete with the formal subjunctive: “It is essential that every applicant ___ (submit) the form by Friday.”
    Answer: “…that every applicant submit the form by Friday.”
  3. Turn into a nominalised phrase: “They decided to expand the company, which increased profits.”
    Answer: “The decision to expand the company led to an increase in profits.”
  4. Choose the correct modal perfect: “The lights are off — they ___ (must/can’t) have gone out.”
    Answer: “…they must have gone out.” (deduction from evidence)

Connect

Want a quick refresher across all your C1 grammar? Run a few rounds of the Grammar Quiz before you continue.

Try Grammar Quiz →

CEFR: C2

Azizul Hakim
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