How Canadian Are You?

11 (loooong) weeks after we got our AORs for our citizenship applications, Z and I wrote our Citizenship tests alhumdulillah, to prove to the Canadian government and the IRCC that we are all set to be Canadians, eh. 🙂

I can’t really get into it because a) it’s not allowed, and b) it’s different for everyone. But the main thing is to prepare for it well in advance and not wait until the last minute, go through the Discover Canada booklet as thoroughly as possible, make notes as needed, and practice, practice, practice answering questions (there are some very helpful websites with free practice tests that you can go through – just Google^TM it). Basically, treat it like any other exam you may have taken during your school and/or university days.

Personally, I found taking the practice tests over and over, and going through the Discover Canada booklet a couple times helped a lot with the facts sticking in my brain (there’s a LOT of dates and names to remember, tbh! 😥 ).

So, let me give you some information about what the test is, and who has to take it…. 🙂

Any adult between 18 and 54 years of age has to take the citizenship test and go to the citizenship interview. Due to Covid-19 most of the tests and interviews are still being held online. Most of the time, minors will not be asked to take the test or go for an interview. But in some cases, they may be asked to.

The test assesses your knowledge about Canada. There are questions about your rights and responsibilities as a Canadian, as well as Canada’s history, geography, economy, government, laws and symbols. (It really does feel like going back to school haha)

Getting the test invite is usually the next step in the application process after your background verification is complete (which may or may not require you to submit fingerprints). You would get the test invite 1-2 weeks before the actual test, and the window to take the test is normally 3 weeks. If you’re not available on the day of your appointment, send the IRCC a message to explain why and get a new date. If you don’t give an explanation or your explanation isn’t reasonable, the IRCC may stop processing your application and not grant you citizenship, so be very careful about requesting a new date and your reasons why you need one.

You can take the test in English or French. It’s 30 minutes long and consists of 20 multiple choice and true/false questions.

We’re currently waiting for the citizenship test status in our application tracker to change to ‘Complete‘. Once that status is updated, I believe that the next step is the rest of the application to be marked as complete, and for us to receive the invitation to the Oath Ceremony.

In Sha Allah, that too, will come soon. For now, alhumdulillah, we are one more step closer to achieving our Canadian dream.