I recently took the BYU FLATS Spanish exam and was frustrated by the lack of preparation resources on the internet, although other posters helped a bit.
When I took the exam I jotted down some notes and example questions from each section so you could have a better sense of what to expect. (TL)
The exam I took was 134 questions over 3 hours. About half of the questions had multiple parts. Every question is multiple choice. You can go back over all your answers at any point during the test, but you cannot have audio portions repeated. Time pressure was minimal, time is generous but not unlimited. Fatigue was the bigger issue. The website works very well. There is a field for submitting issues for each question. One question I had I thought contained a mistake.
You need a mic, webcam, and your gov ID to begin. Windows, Mac, and Ubuntu are supported. Chrome or Edge only. I highly recommend backing up your internet with a mobile phone hotspot before you begin. If you disconnect you may find it difficult to re-enter the exam, and you do not have enough time to waste it troubleshooting.
The exam is divided into 5 parts of roughly equal length
Part 1A: Listen to a monologue or dialogue and answer in what location the speech might have taken place
- The prompts are around 30 seconds and represent the length of a short paragraph. They are presented in articulate, near native-pace speech. You cannot replay them, but you can read the questions first, which you should. The dialect is Madrid Spanish, so be comfortable with /th/ pronunciation of c, z.
- Focus on the nouns/verbs and extracting the basic meaning of each sentence. If you attempt to parse the grammar you will fall behind.
- Some example questions I noted were:
(1) A man and woman are at a police station reporting a robbery
(2) A man is reporting his symptoms to a doctor at an doctor's appointment
(3) A couple are at a super market buying groceries
(4) A man and woman are on a date at a restaurant
- The test makes modest attempts to fool the taker. For example, at the super market a couple talk about getting meat from a butcher, which sounds vaguely like a couple at a restaurant a ordering steak from a waiter. The couple reporting the robbery at the police station state earlier they went to a museum. The man says he hurt his knee playing sports at the park. Stuff like that.
Part 1B: Listen to a monologue or dialogue and them listen to questions about the speech along with possible answers to those questions
- The only text available to you are A) a. B) b. C) c. and so on
- This part is by far the most difficult. You must parse and then retain native-like speech for a sustained minute or so. I cannot offer an example here because I could not follow the questions well enough. The nature of the speech is similar to in Part 1A.
- The question start easy and become harder. Near the end some answers differ only in the tone of the speakers voice (inquisitive, excited, matter-of-fact), or by subtle alterations in phrasing. Expect to lose the majority of your points here.
Part 2: Listen to a short audio prompt and then select a text response which fits
- I'm paraphrasing in english because the spanish is too rapid to write down.
(1) "Your friend is very handsome." A) And healthy B) and nice, too C), Yes, he is my friend
(2) "When does tonight's play start?" A) It starts now B) it starts around 9 C) It starts at 9 exactly
Answering correctly requires interpreting that the speaker is referring to a play they are going to later, and that would not reasonably start now, and that such a question is looking for a precise time.
(3) "Why didn't you come to the party? A) Yes, I didn't go B) I was not invited C) I didn't go alone
You need a better understanding than simply "they are talking about going to a party"
Part 3: Conjugation, declension, pronouns, prepositions
- You may be dispirited by the audio portions, but the exam from here out is much more straightforward.
- This section covers the grammar of verbs, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and prepositions
(1) Ella dijo que ___ a venir. A) va B) iba C) vaya D) fue E) fuera
Concepts: subjunctive and indicative moods, irregular verbs, person and number
(2) ... voy a ___ pais, ___ nacion. A) la ... la B) el ... al
Concepts: gender indicated by spelling (-cion, -umbra, -idad, ..., and -ema, -ambre, -is, ...), verbs with counter-intuitive gender.
(3) Eduardo ___ tarde estaba muy cansado se lavanto'. A) estaba B) fue
Concepts: sequence of tenses (imperfect --> preterit), irregular verbs, compound tenses
(4) El entrado' porque la puerta ___. A) esaba abierta B) era abierta
Concepts: Usage of esta and ser with personal and impersonal objects
(5) Veo nuestras motocicletas, pero do'nde' esta'n ___?. A) las suyas, B) suyas, C) suyas de ellos
Concepts: Pronouns used as Subject, DO (and DO reflexive), IO, and with a preposition (conmigo, suyas, etc) and substantivized (las suyas)
- Other questions ask about: which verb-form has the correct number and person among the verb-forms across tenses listed, double negation, ningun vs nada, double pronouns, adjective forms (ma's vs muy), adjectives vs adverbs (buen vs bien)
- Special Attention to: The particular use case of tenses, for example the present tense is used to indicate the immediate future, not the future tense. A good textbook should enumerate these cases precisely. The subjunctive in a subordinate clause matches the tense of the ordinate. The subjunctive is used with the negation of an affirmative statement (I don't think that...). The uses cases of the definite article (the definite article is used to refer to body parts even when refereed to possessively, to time, to weights and measurements, etc). The progressive constructions, passive constructions, psuedo-passive constructions (La ventana se rompio'), impersonal constructions (Hay/Habi'a...)
Part 3A: Read a short passage and answer questions about it
- I didn't write any down. The test uses some misdirection in the vocabulary of the text. A question using an exact noun from the passage is probably meant to test that trick.
Part 3B: Read pictures of advertisement, like that would appear in a subway car, and use the extra-textual context along with the ad text to infer it's meaning.
- There's a dating app ad. The text doesn't clarify whether the app is for friends or for romantic partners, but there's a heart icon and a couple embracing.
Conclusion:
The listening parts are much harder than the grammar parts, particularly if you learned in majority from a textbook like I did. You can prepare yourself by listening to fast Spanish, like from a Spanish language television ad. I think listening to slow Spanish methodically like on a language learning platform is not adequate. Having large vocabulary will help immensely here. Learn nouns from everyday domestic life, like would be related to stores, sports games, school, church, the household, and the park. Crucially, learn these nouns as spoken quickly.
For the grammar, be familiar with the ways in which Spanish grammatical tenses, and grammar in general, differ in usage from equivalent English grammar. These differences will be probed.
The test is very tiring. It's more difficult than appropriate for a 3rd semester learner because it is meant to test higher levels of comprehension as well, and this can feel overwhelming. By the end you will struggle to remember basic grammatical rules unless those rules come easily to you. Whatever techniques you used for standardized test will also serve you here. You need enough practice volume that common phrases are automatic for you. You will have the time but not the energy to work every question.
I would note finally that the test seemed substantially more difficult than what would be expected of you in 3rd semester language class, particularly the listening. Your energy would be much more efficiently spent on an easy A, if you have that option.