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A dead honest language CV... | ||
Tags: Curriculum Vitae (CV) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4830 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 65 of 104 04 November 2013 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I (correctly I think) remember you telling us once that "Cristin" should be "Cristina", but the forum software wouldn't let you have that many characters). But I also thought I remembered (and now I think, incorrectly so) that you'd said Solfrid was your family name (surname), but it was reversed "continental style", surname, firstname. However, Iversen's deliberate :-) mistake caused me to look at your profile, and I see that your family name is something different entirely, and that I have been incorrectly addressing you by only one of your first names. My humble apologies, Solfrid Cristina (but I still think of you has having all the virtues of a Solveig :-) ). 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5336 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 66 of 104 04 November 2013 at 6:28pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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@Iversen: No need for apologies. Like Solveig my capacity for forgiveness is unlimited :-) I am actually quite
used to being called Solveig in Norway, and answer to that and anything else which starts with Sol. The grandmother of a friend of mine routinely called me Solgull, and you cannot get mad at anyone who calls you Sun gold. @montmorency: Thank you, I am most flattered :-) I generally prefer to use Cristina with non-Scandinavians. It is easier, since many think that Solfrid like Siegfried is a man's name. I always use Solfrid with Scandinavians though, since it is an old Norse name meaning " beautiful as the sun", and is also associated with fryd(joy) and fred (peace). I could have done worse as far as names go:-) 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5432 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 67 of 104 04 November 2013 at 8:01pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
With all due respect, I think that this is a misrepresentation of what the CEFR model and testing systems are all about. The model is not predicated on starting with speaking about oneself and progressing to complex scientific materials. The model is based on the idea that at any one of six levels there are certain things one can do with the language. This is the essence of the can-do statements. Let's look at Spoken Interaction at A1. Here are some of the statements: 1.I can introduce somebody and use basic greeting and leave-taking expressions. 2. I can ask and answer simple questions, initiate and respond to simple statements in areas of immediate need or on very familiar topics. 3. I can make myself understood in a simple way but I am dependent on my partner being prepared to repeat more slowly and rephrase what I say and to help me to say what I want. 4. I can make simple purchases where pointing or other gestures can support what I say. 5. I can handle numbers, quantities, cost and time. 6. I can ask people for things and give people things. 7. I can ask people questions about where they live, people they know, things they have, etc. and answer such questions addressed to me provided they are articulated slowly and clearly. 8. I can indicate time by such phrases as “next week”, “last Friday”, “in November”, “three o clock”. There is no reference to babbling about children, the weather, the laundry. These are certainly potential subjects. But those can be subjects at any level. Can you talk about the weather and children at a C2 level? Of course! Let's look at Spoken Interaction at the C2 level: 1. I can take part effortlessly in all conversations and discussions with native speakers. One single statement that says everything : all conversations and all discussions. Do you want to talk about extreme weather swings due to climate change? Or should India implement a single child policy similar to that of China? You certainly can. There is no mention of specific topics. Understandably, @iversen is not interested in talking about certain topics. And in a test situation, the choice of topics is limited. In most C2 tests, you choose a text to read, present in summary form and then debate with the jury. The text may not be your cup of tea but that's part of the perils of test taking. The point is to see how you are able to handle yourself linguistically. It's the same thing with reading. As we go up the CEFR levels, the difficulty and the complexity of the material increases. In all the certification tests you have to pass all the various component tests. The skill level does not have to be identical but you have to pass them all. You can't be C2 in reading and B1 in speaking and then expect to get an average grade B2. You either pass the C2 exam or you don't. Edited by s_allard on 04 November 2013 at 8:03pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| cacue23 Triglot Groupie Canada Joined 4301 days ago 89 posts - 122 votes Speaks: Shanghainese, Mandarin*, English Studies: Cantonese | Message 68 of 104 05 November 2013 at 1:35am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Hey, Solfrid Cristin, I used to think you were a bit serious and knit-picking, since most of your threads were either info threads of challenges or debates on precise definitions of certain terms. It wasn't until I saw this thread did I realize what a humourous person you are, what with the 1/2 a boyfriend and being called Sun gold (which I initially misread as Sun God). I was wondering what would happen if you actually put "1/2 a boyfriend" onto your CV and use it to apply for a job. Gosh, what comical effect. Edited by cacue23 on 05 November 2013 at 1:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| cacue23 Triglot Groupie Canada Joined 4301 days ago 89 posts - 122 votes Speaks: Shanghainese, Mandarin*, English Studies: Cantonese | Message 69 of 104 05 November 2013 at 3:26am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I used to boast my language levels as anyone who is ignorant of formal assessment standards would, and then my attitude underwent a complete change when I learned of the standards and start scrutinizing myself. Nowadays I put my language levels humbly at the lowest level of my skills, but there are things that I feel deserve recognition.
Here goes my dead honest language CV: Mandarin - native, C2 with a slight lack of vocabulary, but that's excluding Classical Chinese in which I have B2-level passive skills and A0 active skills (theoretically there's no line between ancient and modern vocabulary, but some expressions are almost exclusively found in classical texts nowadays), overall C1 Shanghainese - supposedly native, C1 in most cases with a miserable lack of vocabulary specific to the Shanghainese dialect (use it only when talking to my mom), which is why I put it at an overall B2 English - passive skills C1 (again, with a lack of vocabulary - I need to start using Anki), active skills B2 (I'm a shy person around strangers. The only people I actually converse with regularly are my parents, my landlord, and my roommates, who all speak Chinese, so stricly speaking I rarely have the chance to converse in English. My speaking skills are barely above B2, but writing skills are at a solid B2), overall B2 Cantonese - planned to learn it but haven't started, but since my landlord speaks Cantonese natively, I get to practice my listening skills; also with my knowledge of Mandarin I understand almost everything in a Cantonese text (by which I don't just mean texts in traditional Chinese), though with some difficulty. Passive A2, active A0, overall A1 French - reading skills at B1 (can get the gist of things with a lot of English-like words), writing skills at A2 (make plenty of mistakes, and again, lack vocabulary), listening skills at A1, speaking skills at A0, overall A1 Japanese - learned it for half a year during weekend classes in elementary school, can recognize a few alphabets, remember that "ka." signifies a question, know the basic greetings (hello, my name is, sorry, goodbye), can count to ten, overall A0 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4624 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 70 of 104 05 November 2013 at 9:35am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I could converse about the topics you mentioned without any undue hesitation. But it wouldn't all be phrased in a native-like way. It would be stilted in places. I may not know the all the technical words and have to use a layman's alternative instead. So I suppose you can coverse at C2 level topic-wise, but with a C1 delivery. Edited by beano on 05 November 2013 at 9:38am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5336 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 71 of 104 05 November 2013 at 10:06am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I can be serious when I need to be, but most of the time I am the most informal person you can imagine. There are three things I never put on my CV, one is the amount of language learning I have had due to my boyfriends, the second one is my certificate from a 10 hour intensive course in belly dancing and the third one is a certificate which claims that I can steer a small sail boat (which I can't) and know the traffic rules out at sea (which I don't). I'll recomend the "Sun God" to the guys working for me. At the moment they refer to me as "our Great Leader and Sun". I like your version even better :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4830 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 72 of 104 05 November 2013 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I suppose I won't be putting my one-day Abba workshop on a CV any time soon, either... Edited by montmorency on 05 November 2013 at 12:40pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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