# PTE Re-order Paragraphs: scoring, examples and practice

PTE Re-order Paragraphs gives you text boxes of up to 150 words to put in order. Partial credit is scored on adjacent pairs, so a single misplaced box does not cost everything.

## The short answer

Re-order Paragraphs shows several text boxes in the wrong order, up to 150 words in total. You drag them into a coherent sequence. There are 2 to 3 in a test. All boxes in the correct order scores the maximum, and one or more out of place still gives partial credit. That is why finding even two correctly ordered neighbors is worth doing.

## Key facts

- **Items per test:** 2-3
- **Prompt length:** Text up to 150 words
- **Skills scored:** Reading
- **Scoring:** Partial credit for correctly ordered pairs

Timings and scoring rules come from Pearson's task pages and the July 2025 Score Guide, checked 28 September 2026.

## How it's scored

Partial credit is the key to how this task behaves. The item is not one right-or-wrong answer. Lock in the pairs you are confident about: they still earn points when the middle of the sequence defeats you.

Three signals usually recover the sequence. The first box introduces the topic with a full noun phrase. Pronouns and determiners have to refer back to something. Connectors such as however, as a result and finally mark the order of what follows.

> Find the opening box first. It is the one that can stand alone: no "this", no "they", no "such changes" pointing at a sentence you have not read yet.

## Re-order Paragraphs examples

Worked examples written for this page. Answer each one before you open the model response: memorizing a response is scored as an irrelevant answer in the real test.

**Example 1 -- the opener names things in full**

Prompt: Put the four boxes in the order they were written.

1. A three-year study compared bee colonies in city parks with colonies on nearby farmland.
2. The city hives produced more honey in every year of the study.
3. These findings surprised the team, which had expected farmland to be the richer habitat.
4. They now suspect that parks and gardens simply flower for longer than a field of a single crop.
The order above is the correct one; in the test the boxes are shuffled.

Model response: The study, the result, the reaction, the explanation. Only the first box introduces its subject with full noun phrases and no backward reference.

Why it scores: "These findings" has to point back at a result, and "They" at the team named before it. Find the box that could open a paragraph on its own and you have fixed one end of the sequence.

**Example 2 -- pronouns chain the middle**

Prompt: Put the four boxes in order.

1. In 2019 the city introduced a deposit on drink containers.
2. It returns 20 cents for every bottle brought back to a machine in a supermarket.
3. The machines proved more popular than the council expected, and queues formed at weekends.
4. Twenty more were installed the following spring.
The order above is the correct one; in the test the boxes are shuffled.

Model response: Each box hands the next one its subject: the deposit, then "It", then "The machines", then "Twenty more".

Why it scores: A pronoun or a determiner has to refer back to something already named. Pronoun chains are the most reliable ordering signal after the full noun phrases that mark an opener.

**Example 3 -- securing partial credit**

Prompt: Put the five boxes in order. Neighbors in the right order score even if the whole sequence is wrong.

1. Antarctic sea ice reached its lowest recorded extent in February 2023.
2. The record stood for barely a year before it was broken again.
3. Scientists disagree about how much of the loss is driven by warmer ocean currents.
4. Others point instead to changes in the winds that circle the continent.
5. Both explanations predict further records within the decade.
The order above is the correct one; in the test the boxes are shuffled.

Model response: Even if the middle defeats you, put the opener before "The record stood" and "Both explanations" last: that is two correctly ordered pairs, and two pairs score.

Why it scores: Credit comes from correctly ordered neighbors, not from the sequence as a whole. Leaving the boxes as they were given earns whatever the shuffle happened to give you, which is usually nothing.

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## Common mistakes

| What costs marks | Do this instead |
| --- | --- |
| Ordering by topic feel rather than by reference. | Follow the pronouns and determiners. They are mechanical evidence; impressions are not. |
| Giving up and submitting the default order. | Partial credit means a part-correct sequence scores. The default almost never does. |
| Reading each box in full, twice. | Read first and last sentences of each box. That is where the links live. |
| Starting with a box that contains a connector. | "However" and "as a result" cannot open a text. The opener is the box that needs no context. |

**Know the score you are aiming at** Put a target into the PTE score calculator to see the visa band it reaches, the points it is worth, and how far off you are. [Open the PTE score calculator](/pte/score-calculator)

## How to practice

1. Cut a news paragraph into sentences, shuffle them, and rebuild it by reference only.
2. Practice spotting the opener in under 20 seconds: it is the box that names things in full.
3. Mark every pronoun in the boxes before you drag anything.
4. Check your rebuilt text reads aloud as one paragraph. If it stutters, a pair is reversed.

## Common questions

### How is PTE Re-order Paragraphs scored?

All boxes in the correct order scores the maximum. Otherwise partial credit applies, based on correctly ordered pairs, so a part-correct sequence still earns points.

### How many Re-order Paragraphs items are there?

2 to 3 in a test, with a total text length of up to 150 words.

### What is the fastest way to find the first paragraph?

Look for the box that makes sense with no prior context: full names instead of pronouns, and no linking word at the start.

**Sources**
- [Pearson: PTE Academic Reading task types (checked 28 September 2026)](https://www.pearsonpte.com/pte-academic/test-format/reading)
- [Pearson: PTE Academic Test Taker Score Guide, July 2025 (PDF)](https://www.pearsonpte.com/ctf-assets/yqwtwibiobs4/WUcBAMkYCC9Dj5vs2HfVA/941d88d07ba7c2a5007f7ce1b18eedbf/Score_Guide__Test_Taker__-_PTE_Academic_-_July_2025__web_.pdf)

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