I hate exams. Both taking and preparing students for them.
I wish there were a better and more accurate way of judging learners. Part of the reason for my being “out of the loop” recently is that I’ve been trying to race against the clock, preparing three groups for the Cambridge PET and FCE. The CAE group simply disintegrated in the end. Each had their own reason for dropping out, and I can only hope that none had done so because of my teaching. You can imagine the thoughts that had gone around my head these past weeks…
Now, why do I hate exams?
For me, they are not really an accurate measure of the level of the candidate. Let’s face it. How many native speakers will pass these exams? So, what does this prove? I’ve even known native EFL teachers to fail local Official School of Languages examinations, which are based on the format of Cambridge’s. Amazing but true.
Ideally, exam questions ought to be like concept questions, right? To check understanding. But, don’t you get the impression that some of the questions are sort of “tricky”? Like they’re meant to “catch you out”?
Some of the listening questions bother on the absurd. Listening, as it is, is a difficult enough skill for the majority of learners; yet, some listening tasks require candidates to not only understand the bulk of what they’re listening to, but also to interpret and analyse it “accurately” enough to answer the question. Not to mention the time factor.
Of course, I don’t let my students know that I feel this way. I keep encouraging them. I try to motivate them. I try to help them improve their skills, but often, I think to myself, how can I help them improve short of just telling them that the only sure way is lots of exposure to the language? Plus lots of practice.
With receptive skills tests, I try to improve their gist-reading skill by, for example, coming up with an alternative title to a text, or summarising a listening extract. I help their guessing-meaning-from-context skill by guided discovery activities. Sometimes, we converse about the topic.
And yet, even after this, they struggle to get their answers to the comprehension questions right.
Take this extract from FCE Practice Tests, Mark Harrison, OUP.
What’s your answer?
C and D are plainly incorrect. But, between A & B? You read the text, you understand it. But, how do you interpret her father’s thought when he said only rich people can afford to be thrifty? What does he really mean by that?
My personal interpretation is that he considers himself not rich enough to buy in bigger quantities. This, as you can see, is not among the choices of answers. In its absence, I’d opt for B as the lesser of two evils.
The book’s answer is A.
Never mind. I plough on. Onward I march. Pushing and motivating my lot. And hope for the best.
The Dogme Diaries 
Dear Chew,
I am part of your team. I hate exams, both taking and preparing them. And this might be the reason why I enjoy teaching adults.
However I also teach young learners, and I love them, I get along well with them,but when we have to study for PET, KET, FCE or CAE, I just feel we could be doing amazing things with their creativity and their need to discover new things, we could be learning about the world, using their restless imagination to connect them with other kids in the world, sharing more stories and I am sure they would be learning so much more; just because I see the power of communities and how much we, educators, are learning together.
This example you show here in the post is similar to most passages, I just feel they are tricky, and maybe because I have this feeling that there’s always a trick I thought choice A was the right answer, I thought like this: the fifty pound bag is cheaper per pound but they can’t afford to spend so much money.
But you say “you read the text and you understand”, I have serious doubts that FCE students would feel confident with the vocabulary in the text.
But I you say I also try to bring the best I can so that we can narrow the huge gap between the exam and real Language learning.
Thanks Chew for this post
Debbie @datenglish
Thanks for reading and thanks for the comment, Debbie!
One does wonder, doesn’t one?
After all, exams are a big business, and, like it or not, business rules in this world. You see it everywhere, each time, in ever more glaring forms.
I did the same text with another FCE group, did a gist reading, did a more detailed reading for a guided discovery on key lexis, and, after all that, even the best student had almost all the answers wrong!
So, where does that leave me?
She’s demotivated, naturally. And me, I have to pick up the pieces, and wonder how I can help my students…
Oh, I hate exams too! And I hate preparing people for them even more, and try not to do it if I have a choice. As very often it is the case that I just don’t see why the answer offered by the book is the right one…
Aye, we don’t live in a perfect world 😉
All we can do is to try our best, can’t we? And to improve our students’ general level of the language rather than just to pass the exams and not know how to use the language in the real world.
Thanks for your comment!
Much appreciated. 🙂
Chiew, sure, I agree we have to help our students improve their language anyway, though in some exam-related cases the responsibility you have to take is too much) but it’s good to know not everyone wants and needs exam preparation, and there are many other, more interesting tasks..
Svetlana
I have an exam class and I love them! They are so motivated – I give them over 8 hours of homework a week and they do it all, plus extra sometimes! I Guess I am lucky!
I do teach A LOT of exam classes though. In theory, exam classes are supposed to be about skills. But in reality, I find that focusing on language is what makes the difference.
For FCE and CAE, I teach much like a general English course, but with a bigger focus on writing skills. Learning about collocation is probably the most important thing for both exams. Doing plenty of learner training and really focusing on collocations in class helps students a lot, as many parts of the tests rely on solid knowledge of collocation and idiomatic language. Make sure they are recording new vocabulary with collocations, with the help of a good dictionary.
I don’t bother with too many practice tests. In a 150 hour course, we are doing 4 full practice tests at regular intervals and 1 extra test per week. For me, it’s all about the language.
I highly recommend that you get students to purchase a copy of Vince’s ‘language practice for FCE’ and do 2-3 units per week for homework. It is extremely helpful as the same structures and vocabulary tend to come up in all papers. The complicated structures we use in writing are often what the students are struggling with – they are often used to the simple constructions and vocab used in spoken English.
Finally, don’t let yourself or your students get frustrated by difficult questions on exams. They only need to score 65% or so to pass. Concentrate on the answerable questions, and tell them to focus on what they can do. Sometimes very difficult questions come up, but they can be ignored.
If they really are struggling, though, make sure their expectations are realistic. Passing the FCE requires strong upper intermediate level English in all four skills. If they aren’t the right level, they will have to improve before taking the exam. Often students coast up the levels because their speaking improves, but their other skills and broader language knowledge remain insufficient for this level.
Thanks for the comment, Johnny.
Yes, you are lucky if they do so much homework!
I do agree with you about focusing on the language. If you’ve read some of my previous posts, this is usually what I concentrate on, regardless of the type of course, and I tend to concentrate more on the communicative aspect more than anything else. I’ve only started doing practice tests because as the exams are approaching, those taking them want to get used to the format.
My gripe with exams is that they aren’t always an accurate measure of a candidate’s ability of using the language. I’m willing to bet: take a random cross-section of native speakers off the streets and a similarly random section of students of a CAE or even FCE class, and I know which group will fare better.
I couldn’t agree more, I think the cambridge exam suite is full of horrendously doctored, badly written texts.
Still, remember that although some of the language you are teaching them might not be useful, if you help them to pass then you are helping them achieve something which will have a significant positive effect on their lives. They will have more employment opportunities, access to higher education and proof of their English level for their own self esteem. This is how I try to see it anyway; you might not be doing the best job possible at helping their English but you are helping in other ways!
Yes, I agree. As most things in life, it’s a question of balance, and I try to balance well enough to help them pass their exams. At least that’s the “short-term” aim! 😉
I agree with you that such exams don’t necessarily measure language proficiency well, and that many native speakers wouldn’t pass. However, the quality of thinking is part of the problem, and most education leaves out student reflection on thinking practice.
Answer “B” is not possible because he DOES see the point in buying bulk. The point is to be thrifty (cheaper per pound). But they are too poor, as you said; they can’t even buy oatmeal. So, at a given point in time, they do not have enough money to buy in bulk, hence the comment, only the rich can afford to be thrifty. In other words, he is unable to save by buying bulk because he never has enough money at one time to afford the bigger bag.
First, learners need to slow down to carefully consider a situation, not missing any details. This practice of going over it slowly can be developed so that one gains proficiency at accurately recreating situations and imagining underlying assumptions and possible implications.
Thanks for the comment, Niki, and for your insight into the answer. I agree with the lack of the teaching of critical thinking although one can argue that the purpose of this exam isn’t to test the ability of students to think of the intricate nuances of the language…certainly not at this level and under exam constraints…
We can sit over a cup of tea and discuss leisurely what we imagine the things going over in her father’s mind… 😉
Hi, Chiew! I hate exams too. I also don’t like teaching exam preparation. I prefer assessing students in more natural ways. I prefer assessing them in more real-life situations like role-play, telephone conversation, dialogue. Exams focus more on accuracy rather than fluency.