11.1 People, Home and Daily Routines

Cambridge A2 Key KET

Track your progress as you read

Finished sections get a check mark.

1 Introduction & Exam Overview

1.1 What Is Cambridge A2 Key (KET)? 1.2 Exam Format: Three Papers 1.3 Who Takes A2 Key and How It Is Delivered 1.4 Study Hours and Preparation Path

2 Scoring, Grades & Results

2.1 The Cambridge English Scale 2.2 Grades A, B, C and Certificates 2.3 How Your Overall Score Is Calculated

3 Reading Parts 1–3: Understanding Texts

3.1 Reading Overview (Parts 1–5) 3.2 Reading Part 1: Short Texts and Main Message 3.3 Reading Part 2: Multiple Matching 3.4 Reading Part 3: Longer Text Detail and Gist

4 Reading Parts 4–5: Vocabulary and Grammar Cloze

4.1 Reading Part 4: Multiple-Choice Cloze 4.2 Collocations and Phrasal Verbs for Part 4 4.3 Reading Part 5: Open Cloze 4.4 Grammar Words for Open Cloze

5 Writing Part 6: Guided Message

5.1 Writing Overview (Parts 6–7) 5.2 Part 6 Guided Writing Task 5.3 Model Emails and Content-Point Checklists

6 Writing Part 7 & Assessment Criteria

6.1 Part 7 Picture Story 6.2 Narrative Language and Connectors 6.3 Writing Assessment: Content, Organisation, Language

7 Listening Parts 1–3

7.1 Listening Paper Overview 7.2 Listening Part 1: Short Dialogues and Pictures 7.3 Listening Part 2: Gap Fill Notes 7.4 Listening Part 3: Conversation Multiple Choice

8 Listening Parts 4–5 & Detail Skills

8.1 Listening Part 4: Gist and Main Message 8.2 Listening Part 5: Matching 8.3 Numbers, Times, Prices and Spelling

9 Speaking Test

9.1 Speaking Test Format 9.2 Speaking Part 1: Interview 9.3 Speaking Part 2: Discussion 9.4 Speaking Assessment Criteria

10 A2 Grammar Essentials

10.1 Present and Past Tenses 10.2 Future Forms, Modals and Obligation 10.3 Comparatives, Superlatives, Adverbs and Word Order 10.4 Questions, Negatives and There Is/Are

11 A2 Vocabulary Topics

11.1 People, Home and Daily Routines 11.2 Free Time, Hobbies, Travel and Transport 11.3 Food, Shopping, Money and Health 11.4 Places in Town, Services and Simple Technology

12 Functional Language for Exam Tasks

12.1 Requests, Offers, Invitations and Suggestions 12.2 Opinions, Agreeing, Disagreeing and Preferences 12.3 Describing People, Places and Events; Simple Narration

13 Exam Day and Test Strategy

13.1 Digital vs Paper-Based and the 2026 Change 13.2 What Happens on Exam Day 13.3 Full Practice Tests and Timing Plans

14 Results and Next Steps

14.1 Interpreting Your Statement of Results 14.2 From A2 Key to B1 Preliminary

11.1 People, Home and Daily Routines

Key Takeaways Explain This Topic AI

A2 Key Speaking Part 1 and many Reading/Listening texts recycle family, appearance, personality, home, and daily-routine vocabulary—learn them as chunks, not isolated words.

High-value collocations include get up, have breakfast, go to work/school, do homework, look like, get on with, and share a room.

Describe people with appearance + personality pairs (short dark hair; friendly and hard-working) ready for Speaking answers of 1–3 sentences.

Home vocabulary (rooms, furniture, flat vs house) appears in Listening detail questions and Reading Part 4-style gaps about everyday life.

School and work routine verbs (start, finish, break, shift, commute) help you catch times and habits when you hear them twice in Listening.

Last updated: July 2026

11.1 People, Home and Daily Routines

Quick Answer: At A2 Key you must talk and understand language about family, looks and personality, rooms and furniture, and daily schedules at school or work. Study collocations ( get up at seven , have a shower , get on with my sister ) and practise short spoken answers. The same chunks fill Reading Part 4 gaps, Listening detail items (times, who lives where), and Speaking Part 1 personal questions.

Cambridge A2 Key is a life-English exam. Papers do not ask for rare academic words; they recycle everyday topics . People, home, and routines sit at the centre of that world. If these areas are thin, you lose marks across skills—not only in one “vocabulary test.”

How This Topic Map Connects to the Exam

• Skill / task How people–home–routine language appears
• Speaking Part 1 Where you live, family, free morning routine, school/job
• Speaking Part 2 Choosing a gift, activity, or room improvement with a partner
• Reading Part 3 Personal stories about moving house, siblings, a new job
• Reading Part 4 Cloze gaps on live with , share , tidy , spend time
• Listening Parts 1–3 Who is speaking, where they live, what time they leave
• Writing Part 6 Email about a visit, a new flat, or a school day

Treat this section as a shared lexicon for production and comprehension, not a list to memorise once and forget.

• Family and Relationships
• Core people words

• Word / chunk Note
• parents, mother/mum, father/dad Use mum/dad in informal speech; mother/father is fine too
• brother, sister, sibling Only child = no brothers or sisters
• grandparents, grandmother/grandma, grandfather/grandpa Ages often appear in Listening
• aunt, uncle, cousin Extended family in short texts
• husband, wife, partner Adult paper contexts
• friend, best friend, classmate, neighbour Social circle
• flatmate / roommate Shared home (British flatmate common in materials)
• Relationship collocations

• Chunk Meaning
• live with my parents share a home
• get on (well) with someone have a good relationship
• look after my little brother take care of
• take care of my grandmother similar to look after
• visit my relatives see family
• stay with friends sleep at their home for a short time
• move house / move flat change home
• grow up in (a city) spend childhood there

Speaking-ready mini-answers:

I live with my parents and my younger sister in a small flat.

I get on well with my brother, but we argue about the TV sometimes.

I grew up in a village, but now I live in the city centre.

Part 4-style traps (family)

• Gap idea Natural choice Weak rival
• I _____ on well with my classmates. get make / do
• She _____ after her nephew on Sundays. looks watches / sees
• They _____ house last year. moved changed / went
• Appearance and Personality

Examiners do not need fashion essays. They need clear, simple description .

Appearance building blocks

• Area Useful language
• Height / build tall, short, medium height; slim, thin, quite big
• Hair short/long/curly/straight/dark/blonde/grey hair; bald
• Age (careful, polite) young, middle-aged, in his/her twenties/thirties; elderly
• Face / features (light) blue eyes, glasses, a beard, a moustache
• Clothes (simple) wear jeans, a uniform, glasses, trainers

Chunk pattern: She has long dark hair and brown eyes. She often wears glasses.

Avoid overloading: two appearance points + one personality point is enough for Speaking.

Personality adjectives (A2 high value)

• Positive / neutral Meaning cue
• friendly, kind, helpful good with people
• funny, quiet, shy social style
• hard-working, lazy work/study habits
• clever, smart learning
• polite, rude manners
• tidy, messy home/desk habits
• confident, nervous exam/speaking feelings
• honest, careful behaviour

Collocations:

• Chunk Example
• be good at + -ing / noun She’s good at maths / painting
• be interested in He’s interested in football
• be keen on I’m keen on cooking
• look like (appearance) He looks like his father
• be like (personality) What’s she like? — She’s friendly

Trap: What’s he like? asks about character . What does he look like? asks about appearance . Listening and Speaking both punish mixing these.

Original mini-description (model)

My best friend is called Sara. She’s medium height and has short curly hair. She’s very friendly and hard-working. She’s good at languages and keen on photography. We get on really well.

Use this length in Speaking Part 1 when the interlocutor asks about a friend or family member.

• Home: Rooms, Furniture, Types of Housing
• Places people live

• Word Note
• house usually more than one floor in many contexts
• flat (US: apartment) British materials prefer flat
• floor / storey on the third floor
• city centre / suburb / village / countryside location phrases
• garden, balcony, garage extras in Listening maps or dialogues
• rent, landlord, neighbour adult life texts
• Rooms

• Room Typical activities / objects
• kitchen cook, fridge, cooker, sink
• living room / lounge sofa, TV, coffee table
• bedroom bed, wardrobe, desk
• bathroom shower, bath, mirror, washbasin
• dining room table, chairs (not in every flat)
• hall entrance area
• study desk, computer (if present)
• Furniture and home objects (collocation-friendly)

• Verb + place/object Example
• tidy your room Make it neat
• make the bed Arrange covers after sleeping
• do the washing-up / do the dishes Clean plates
• put things away Return objects to places
• hang up your coat Use a hook or hanger
• sit on the sofa Furniture preposition
• look out of the window View

Reading Part 4 partners often tested: share a room , move into a flat , decorate the walls , keep the kitchen clean .

Prepositions of place (home)

Phrase Example

in the kitchen She’s in the kitchen.

on the table / on the wall The keys are on the table.

under the bed My bag is under the bed.

next to / beside the sofa Put the lamp next to the sofa.

between the fridge and the door The bin is between…

opposite the window The desk is opposite the window.

Listening Part 1 sometimes links a picture of a room to a short dialogue— The remote is under the newspaper on the table , not on the sofa.

Daily Routines: Weekday Collocations

Routines are verb + time + place chains. Cambridge loves them in Listening (what time?) and Speaking ( Tell me about a normal day ).

Morning-to-night high-value chunks

• Chunk Typical time language
• wake up / get up at half past six; early; late
• have a shower / have a bath before breakfast
• get dressed / put on clothes quickly
• have breakfast at home; on the bus (snack)
• leave home at eight
• go to school / go to work by bus; on foot
• start lessons / start work at nine
• have a break / have lunch at midday; for half an hour
• finish school / finish work at five
• do homework / study in the evening
• cook dinner / have dinner with my family
• watch TV / go online for an hour
• go to bed / fall asleep at eleven
• Frequency adverbs (pair with routines)

• Adverb Use
• always, usually, often high frequency
• sometimes, occasionally mid
• hardly ever, never low
• every day / week / weekend full phrases
• once / twice a week counting

Word order reminder: I usually get up at seven. (adverb before main verb; after be : I am always tired on Mondays. )

School routine vocabulary

• Chunk Note
• have lessons / classes timetable
• take an exam / do a test assessment
• do a project longer task
• hand in homework submit
• have a break between lessons free short time
• after-school club extra activity
• term, holiday, half-term calendar (British materials)
• wear a uniform school rule texts
• Work routine vocabulary (adult A2 Key)

• Chunk Note
• full-time / part-time job hours
• work shifts / night shift hospital, shops, factories
• office, factory, shop, café workplaces
• start work early time
• work from home modern texts
• commute / travel to work journey
• colleague / boss / customer people at work
• earn money / get a salary money link (see 11.3)

Original Listening-style line: I leave home at half past seven, catch the bus, and start work at eight thirty. I have lunch at one and finish at five.

Detail questions might ask: What time does she start work? How does she travel?

• Collocation Tables You Should Master (Not Endless Lists)
• Table A — Verb partners for “life at home”

• Verb Natural partners
• make the bed, breakfast (sometimes), a mess, a noise
• do the housework, the shopping, the washing-up, homework
• have a shower, breakfast, a break, a party
• get up, dressed, home, ready
• go to bed, home, to school, shopping
• take a break, the dog for a walk, a shower (also have )
• Table B — Describe + live

• Pattern Example
• I live in a … small flat / big house / village
• My room is … tidy / messy / quite small
• There is/are … a desk next to the window
• I share … with … a room with my brother
• On weekdays I … leave home at seven
• Worked Reading Part 4 Micro-Text (Original)

Maya [1] _____ with her parents in a flat near the station. She [2] _____ on well with her younger brother, but they share a bedroom and sometimes argue. On school days she [3] _____ up at half past six and has a quick shower. After breakfast she [4] _____ the bus to school. In the evening she [5] _____ her homework at the kitchen table, then watches a little TV. At weekends she [6] _____ after her grandmother for a few hours.

Suggested answers: (1) lives (2) gets (3) gets (4) catches / takes (5) does (6) looks

Notice the test is not “hard words”—it is live with , get on with , get up , catch the bus , do homework , look after .

Speaking Part 1 Bank (Memorise and Personalise)

Practise answering in full sentences , then expand with one detail.

• Question type Model stem
• Who do you live with? I live with… / I live alone in…
• What’s your home like? It’s a small flat on the second floor with…
• What do you do in the morning? I usually get up at…, have breakfast, and leave at…
• Do you get on with your family? Yes, I get on well with… because…
• Tell me about your best friend. He’s/She’s… and has… He’s/She’s interested in…
• What do you do after school/work? I usually… then I…

Record yourself. Check you used at least two collocations per answer.

Listening Detail Focus

When the audio is about people and homes, pre-set your ear for:

• Numbers and times — quarter past , half past , at about eight
• Who lives with whom — names + brother/flatmate
• Places in the home — kitchen vs bedroom can change the picture answer
• Routine changes — usually… but today… (Part 1 trap)

You hear every recording twice . First pass: gist (family morning? new flat?). Second pass: exact detail.

Common Learner Errors

Error Better

I am get up at seven. I get up at seven.

She is like her mother (meaning appearance) She looks like her mother.

make homework do homework

I live in a flat with two bedrooms big I live in a flat with two big bedrooms.

He has 20 years He is 20 (years old).

I very like my room I really like my room. / I like my room a lot.

Weekly Practice Plan (People–Home–Routine)

• Day 15–20 minute task
• 1 Write 12 sentences: six family/appearance, six home
• 2 Speak for 90 seconds: “My normal weekday” (record + replay)
• 3 Gap your own 80-word “about my flat” paragraph (six gaps)
• 4 Listen to any slow dialogue about morning routines; note three times

5 Quiz a partner with What’s he like? vs What does he look like?

• Checklist Before You Move On
• I can name family members and use get on with / look after / live with
• I can describe one person (looks + personality) in four sentences
• I know main rooms and 10 furniture/object words with prepositions
• I can tell a weekday routine with at least eight collocations
• I have personalised Speaking answers, not only textbook names

People and routines are the base layer . Next, free time, hobbies, travel, and transport expand the same “talk about your life” skill into leisure and journeys—another huge A2 Key topic cluster.