What GESE Grade 7 is
GESE stands for Graded Examinations in Spoken English, Trinity College London's ladder of speaking and listening exams from Grade 1 (pre-A1) to Grade 12 (C2). Grade 7 sits at CEFR B2.1. The Home Office accepts Trinity GESE as a Secure English Language Test (SELT), and Trinity has announced a Grade 7 SELT for late 2026, in time for the B2 settlement rule that starts on 26 March 2027.
It is a conversation, not a paper. One examiner, one candidate, 15 minutes, face to face at a Trinity SELT centre or by video. Nothing is written, nothing is read. The examiner marks you during the conversation; exams are recorded for quality control, not re-marked.
The three phases
| Phase | Time | Who leads | What happens |
|---|---|---|---|
| Topic | up to 5 min | you | You discuss a topic you prepared at home, from a Topic Form you bring with you. The examiner asks questions, interrupts, asks you to explain. You should ask the examiner questions too. |
| Interactive | up to 4 min | you | The examiner reads out a short situation ("My neighbour's dog barks all night and I don't know what to do"). You take over: ask questions, make comments, give advice, invite the examiner's view. If you stop, the examiner stays silent. |
| Conversation | up to 5 min | shared | The examiner picks two of six subject areas and talks with you about each for about two and a half minutes. |
The six Conversation subjects at Grade 7 are fixed: education, national customs, village and city life, national and local produce and products, early memories, and pollution and recycling. You do not know which two until the exam.
What the examiner listens for
Trinity publishes the language of each grade. At Grade 7 you are expected to use, somewhere across the 15 minutes:
- Functions: giving advice and highlighting advantages and disadvantages; making suggestions; describing past habits; expressing possibility and uncertainty; eliciting further information and expansion of ideas and opinions; expressing agreement and disagreement.
- Grammar: second conditional; simple passive; used to; relative clauses; modals for advice and suggestions (should, ought to, could, you'd better); modals for possibility (may, might, I'm not sure); discourse connectors (because of, due to).
- Lexis: vocabulary for your topic and the subject areas; words that show interest (Really? Oh dear! Did you?); fillers to hold the turn (well…, um…).
- Phonology: clear pronunciation of topic vocabulary; rising intonation for interest and surprise; falling intonation to end a turn; connected speech.
The full list with examples is on the language of Grade 7.
How it is marked
Each phase gets one grade for task fulfilment, judged against Trinity's published performance descriptors, which describe communication, grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation together: A is a distinction, B a merit, C a pass, D a fail. Trinity's conversion table then turns the three phase grades into the result: CCC is a Pass, one D with two passing phases still passes (BCD, ACD, CCD), two Ds fail the exam. Communication carries the most weight within each grade: a candidate who keeps the conversation going, understands first time and gives full answers with reasons will pass with a few grammar mistakes; a candidate with perfect grammar who answers in one sentence and waits will not.
Why candidates fail Grade 7
From Trinity's own guidance and the experience of teachers who prepare for it:
- Reciting the topic. A memorised speech is marked down. The topic phase is a discussion; the examiner will interrupt to make sure it is.
- Not leading the Interactive phase. Candidates answer the prompt as if it were a question and then wait. The silence is the fail.
- Short answers in the Conversation. "Yes, I like it." B2 wants a reason, an example, a comparison, and a question back.
- Grade 7 language never appears. You can speak for 15 minutes without a single used to, would or should if nobody has made you practise them. The examiner creates openings for them; if you do not take them, the grammar mark drops.
- Not understanding the question first time and answering something else. Ask for clarification: "Sorry, do you mean…?" is B2 behaviour and is rewarded.
How to prepare
Build the topic first, because it is the part you control: Topic Form examples. Then practise the Interactive phase with set prompts until asking questions is a reflex. Then work through the six conversation subjects, each with its own page and a free four-minute practice with the AI examiner. A full annotated transcript is on the sample exam page.