Paragon publishes free instructions about the test, and those instructions never ask for Canadian spelling, Canadian date formats, or Canadian address layout. What they ask for is readability, which means paragraphs, capital letters and punctuation, so that the writing is easy to read.
Two sections below describe things you should not put in a Task 1 answer at all: the mailing address (section 4) and the professional signature (section 7). Paragon names both as unnecessary, and together they can eat fifty words of a two hundred word limit.
So why is this lesson here? Because these conventions are real and useful. You will need them for job applications, for letters to your landlord or your bank, for work email, and for the Reading section, where Canadian formats appear in the texts you have to understand. Learn them for your life in Canada. Do not spend exam minutes on them.
🎥 Where this warning comes from (5:24)
The video puts the eight items below on screen as the list most test takers believe CELPIP wants, then shows what Paragon actually publishes, and counts the wasted words in a real answer.
Jump to: 0:32 the list of eight · 1:10 what Paragon publishes · 1:55 the answer with 51 wasted words · 3:03 the three things that are marked · 3:24 does CELPIP require Canadian spelling
Three things, and this is the complete list:
- Paragraphs. One idea each, with a blank line between them.
- Capital letters. At the start of sentences and on proper names. Nowhere else.
- Punctuation. Full stops where sentences end, and commas that hold together.
Everything else on this page is knowledge for outside the exam.
On spelling specifically. Nothing in CELPIP's published guidance asks for Canadian forms. A time written as "9 to 11 am" with no periods is not the usual Canadian pattern, but it is perfectly clear, and clarity is what Readability is about. Use Canadian forms if you know them, keep them consistent, and stop worrying about it.
Useful for daily life and work. Not scored on CELPIP, though consistency helps readability.
The patterns
- Keep our: colour, behaviour, neighbour, humour
- Keep re: centre, theatre, metre, litre
- Use ize and ization: organize, recognize, specialize, organization
- Double the l before an ending: travelling, cancelled, modelling, labelled
- Licence is the noun, license is the verb: a driver's licence, to license a business
- Practice is the noun, practise is the verb: a medical practice, to practise law
- Canadian choices: cheque for the bank, tire for the car, aluminum, program
The one rule that does matter in the exam: pick a set and stay with it. Writing "neighbourhood" in one line and "center" in the next is a readability problem, and readability is scored. Which set you pick is not.
Useful everywhere. Not scored.
In letters and emails
- September 2, 2025
- January 15, 2026
Write the month in full and put a comma before the year.
In numbers, when space is tight
- 2025-09-02, in year, month, day order
Avoid 02/09/25 and 09/02/25. Both are read differently in different countries and neither is clear in Canada.
Ranges
Useful everywhere. Not scored.
Twelve hour clock
- 9:00 a.m.
- 4:30 p.m.
- Lower case a.m. and p.m. with periods, and a colon before the minutes.
Twenty four hour clock
Time zones
- With a time: 4:30 p.m. PT, or 7:30 p.m. ET
- Written out when there is no exact time: Pacific Time, Eastern Time
Noon and midnight. Use the words rather than 12:00 a.m. or 12:00 p.m., which people read differently.
⚠️ Do not put an address in a CELPIP Task 1 answer. Paragon's instructions name your complete home address as one of the things you do not need. A full address with postal code can run to more than twenty words, and those words count toward your total while doing nothing for your score.
This section is for real letters, parcels, forms and job applications.
The order
- Name
- Unit number, hyphen, street number, then street name and street type
- Municipality, then province code, then the postal code
- Canada, only on mail coming from outside the country
Details
- Canada Post prefers the street line in capital letters.
- Postal codes look like A1A 1A1, with one space in the middle and no hyphen.
- Put two spaces between the province code and the postal code.
Province and territory codes: BC, AB, SK, MB, ON, QC, NB, NS, PE, NL, NT, NU, YT
Examples
Apartment
Alex Chen
10-1234 MAIN ST
VANCOUVER BC V6Z 2K1
House
Priya Singh
789 OAK AVE
WINNIPEG MB R3C 1A5
PO Box
Jordan Lee
PO BOX 456 STN A
OTTAWA ON K1A 0B1
From outside Canada
Maya López
55 KING ST W
TORONTO ON M5H 2N2
CANADA
Useful for work writing. Not scored, except that stray capitals hurt readability.
Capital letters when the title comes before the name
- Minister Renée Martin
- Dr Omar Khan
- Professor Lily Tang
Small letters when the title comes after the name, or stands alone
- Renée Martin, minister of finance
- Omar Khan, family physician
- The deputy minister will attend.
Formal honorifics
- the Right Honourable [name]
- the Honourable [name]
The exam connection. Capital letters are one of the three format items that are scored, but what is checked is simple: sentence starts and proper names only. Putting capitals on ordinary words in the middle of a line is the error to avoid.
Useful everywhere. Not scored, and not wanted in a Task 1 answer.
Hyphens, and no brackets around the area code.
- 604-555-0134
- 1-800-622-6232
- With an extension: 613-555-0100 ext. 203
⚠️ Do not put a signature block in a CELPIP Task 1 answer. Paragon's instructions say there is no need for a professional signature. Your name alone is enough, and a made up name is completely fine. No job title, no company, no phone number, no address.
A full block can run to fifteen or twenty words, all of them counted and none of them scored.
This section is for real work email.
What a real signature holds
- Name
- Job title, and team or program
- Organisation
- Phone with hyphens, and email
- Street address
- Optional: website, pronouns
Example
Ava Patel
Program Coordinator, Community Services
City of Calgary
403-555-0199
800 MACLEOD TR SE
CALGARY AB T2G 2M3
In the exam, this is all you write:
Kind regards,
Ava
Useful for work writing. Not scored.
Numbers
- Put a zero before a decimal: 0.8 L
- Thousands with a space or a comma, kept the same throughout: 12 500 or 12,500
Abbreviations
- Write words out in sentences: September rather than Sep., approximately rather than approx.
- Short forms are fine in tables and forms.
Headings
- Title Case for centred headings: Canadian Winter Parking Rules
| What people think CELPIP wants | What CELPIP actually scores |
|---|
| Canadian spelling | Paragraphs |
| Dates as September 2, 2025 | Capital letters |
| Times as 9:00 a.m. with periods | Punctuation |
| Mailing address with postal code | |
| Job titles with capital letters | |
| Phone numbers with hyphens | |
| A signature with job title and company | |
| Headings in Title Case | |
The left column is a useful thing to know. The right column is what is marked. Only one of them belongs in your twenty seven minutes.
For real Canadian writing, outside the exam
For a CELPIP Task 1 answer
1. Sort the list (3 min). Cover the table above. Write down which of the eight items you had believed CELPIP required. Most people find they had been studying at least three of them.
2. Strip an answer (5 min). Take any Task 1 answer that has an address or a signature block. Remove them, recount, and see whether you are still above 150.
3. Real Canadian writing (10 min). Write your own address in the Canada Post format, and a work signature for a job you have or want. Keep them somewhere. That is what this lesson is for.
Related: Task 1 Essentials for what does belong in the email · Task 1 Templates for the lines to use · Readability for the three format items that are scored.