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Article: Students fall short on Vocabulary | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 153 of 319 20 April 2014 at 6:31am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Sorry to be slightly out of sync here. It took some time before I was able to track down the website. I know the topic is becoming a tad tiresome but I want to respond to this particular post about what the requirements for the German C2 oral exam. A first comment. Note that the description for the exam does not mention accent or vocabulary at all. I raise the issue of accent because, like vocabulary, the underlying assumption in all of these tests is that the candidate has a good accent and a good vocabulary. This, of course, begs the next question: what is good accent or good vocabulary? Since the exam descriptor does not indicate any specific vocabulary size, we are left to guesstimating the required receptive and productive vocabulary sizes. What we do know is that we likely won't use more than 1500 word-families. I think that the figures we see around here are mere conjecture and based on the belief that it is impossible to communicate effectively with a relatively small vocabulary. Although the exam description does not mention accent or vocabulary, it does refer explicitly to idiomatic expressions. This is interesting because most idiomatic expressions use common words to create a second level of meaning that is not easily derived from the primary meanings of the words. The reference to idioms is included here because use of idioms is an important indicator of ability to use the language in creative ways. This is whether the advanced speaker shines. Does use of idioms require more words? Certainly not. It requires great skill in the use of very common words. When I hear "get the hang of" or "get to the bottom of" I usually know that I'm dealing with a knowledgeable speaker. The exam description also speaks of the ability to "differentiate finer linguistic nuances". Do you need more words to do this? I would say more words probably helps, but that's not the only way to differentiate meaning. I think that verb tenses and derivation through affixes are very effective ways of manifesting shades of meaning. But my point is always the same: It's basically irrelevant to measure vocabulary size for exam purposes. You basically have to know what is necessary to pass the test. Judging from the test description, I personally believe that fluency and grammatical precision combined with adequate vocabulary are what it takes to do well. Edited by s_allard on 20 April 2014 at 7:10am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 154 of 319 20 April 2014 at 6:38am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
From my reading, this use of "shop" is British. I really don't think that most well-read adult North American anglophones use this. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 155 of 319 20 April 2014 at 7:08am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I won't repeat my earlier arguments about vocabulary size but I want to return to this issue of the probability of encountering rare or exotic vocabulary such as slang in the example above. Do you have to understand the slang and the SMS messages mentioned above? Not really. But you must first see the entire picture. If you go to the actual C2 exams, you will see that the subject is the innovative use of language by young people. Everybody can relate to this because the same phenomenon exists in all the modern languages. You really don't have to know what those slang items mean. You are then asked to write a letter in which you take the viewpoint that the French language is not dying because of bad use by young people but, instead, is simply renewing itself with youthful innovations. This sort of exam is typical of the generic material one finds in these tests. Yes, there is a focus on a specific subject, but the actual exam question is framed in general terms. There is no mention of required vocabulary. In fact, you are asked simply to ".. rédigez un texte structuré dans lequel vous réagissez au point de vue adopté et présentez le vôtre, en adoptant un style approprié et un ton engagé." "...write a structured text in which you react to the point of view adopted and present your own, while using the appropriate style and a strong tone." (Sorry for the so-so translation.) How much vocabulary do you need to write this minimum 700-word essay? I won't get into that debate right now, but I would certainly recommend that your spelling and grammar be impeccable rather than trying to impress with rare or exotic words surrounded by dodgy grammar. It should be pointed out that you are allowed to use a monolingual dictionary. Edited by s_allard on 20 April 2014 at 7:13am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 156 of 319 20 April 2014 at 7:40am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I don't understand. You always say that people refer to the CEFR levels without taking into account what they really require. But isn't this also what you are doing? How can you ignore things like "Can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognise implicit meaning" (C1) or especially "Can understand with ease virtually everything heard or read" (C2)? Exams can't test whether you understand things with ease, but this is still the goal of anyone who wants to reach C2. While there are undoubtedly many members who can benefit from your advice about passing exams and impressing teachers, this site is still called how to learn any language, not how-to-pass-any-cefr-exam.com.
That's not something you choose, or at least it shouldn't be. Grammar won't help you work around even pretty basic nuances like arm vs hand, let alone the more advanced things any language is full of. Speaking of that, let me stress that this depends on the language too. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 157 of 319 20 April 2014 at 3:10pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Can you fake or cheat a CFER exam? I don't think so. Especially at the C2 level. Can you cram 10000 Anki cards into
your head in two weeks? Maybe but how will that help you write an essay? Any language examiner will tell you that they can determine the oral proficiency of a candidate within two minutes of the beginning of the test. They can easily see where the candidate is going by the mistakes they make. How can you fake fluency? If you don't hesitate and can easily connect grammatically correct phrases, then you have attained fluency. There is no way to fake this unless you are speaking gibberish. How can you cheat on grammar? If you don't make a mistake for five minutes, you're good. And when the examiner asks you a complex question, you can segue effortlessly into the answer. You can't cheat on this. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 158 of 319 20 April 2014 at 3:58pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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My argument is not only about cheating though. It's mostly about the fact that fitting the exam requirements doesn't equal fitting the more general guidelines. Most people setting their goal as C2, or B1 for that matter, are not interested in passing exams. They want to be at the level as described. They want to do these things without struggling and without having to brush up/revise before actually using the language.
3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 159 of 319 21 April 2014 at 3:54pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I think that most people HTLAL have no interests in language tests. It doesn't make a difference in their lives. They
are language hobbyists and enjoy playing with languages. That's fine, but there is a world out there of people for whom passing a language test is a serious matter. Where I live there are language tests in order to immigrate to Canada, language tests to enter school, language tests to become a member of a professional association, language tests to get a job in government and, finally, language tests to become a Canadian citizen. How to prepare and pass these tests is of vital importance. Knowing how the tests work and what the examiners are looking for are basic starting points of a study strategy. In this regard, I will point out that I've never seen a test that specifies a required vocabulary size. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 160 of 319 21 April 2014 at 5:49pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I'm glad you finally understand this part. What you are missing is that HTLAL'ers are not necessarily "playing" with languages - I'd argue that most of us are more serious than the people who need the language but don't have much interest in it and only learn as little as they need to.
And CEFR is useful even for those who have no interest in actually taking an exam. It has other functions, like self-assessment or choosing learning materials, and most relevantly for HTLAL - giving and getting advice. Someone who's honestly interested in improving won't claim that their level is higher than what it really is. I don't think we have all that many people making incorrect claims about their knowledge. Most of those not understanding CEFR use it for goals, like B2 in a week or C1 in two months. Experienced learners take them back down to earth quickly enough. Also, immigrating to any country or entering a university abroad requires proving your knowledge of either the local language or English. But beyond that, most non-government companies just have their own tests that you need to pass even if you've passed some official exams already. As for vocab size, many formal and informal tests do rely on some specific words. Of course not as the sole or main criterion, but especially for work you do need to show you have the needed vocabulary. Edited by Serpent on 21 April 2014 at 6:01pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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