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Is C2 possible without a tutor ? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| BAnna Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4625 days ago 409 posts - 616 votes  Speaks: English*, German, Spanish Studies: Russian, Turkish | Message 137 of 144 22 December 2014 at 7:15pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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At the risk of adding fuel to the fire, perhaps some additional background on the German C2 test might be useful:
Writing consisted of two parts: a section where you rephrase a sentence in other words using a keyword (worth 20 points-20 minutes) and writing a minimum 350 word letter to the editor type piece discussing a series of articles appearing in the newspaper, where you are instructed to reference and refute or support various points made in the articles (worth 80 points-60 minutes). Listening: This section is about 35 minutes long of recordings and in three parts and contained specialized vocabulary used at native speed. The first part is a series of 5 short radio broadcasts on various topics such as commercial fishing (no kidding!). You only get to listen to each one a single time and then have to answer Yes or No to 3 questions per broadcast. Part two was a discussion between two people and you have to pick whether the opinions expressed are held by the first or second speaker or by both people. Again, you get only one listen. The topic was orchestral music. The last section was an interview with a professor discussing urban planning (2 listens this time) followed by multiple-choice answers to questions. Speaking: Speaking. You have 15 minutes to select 2 separate topics (one is a presentation and the other is a discussion) and prepare an outline. Then you have to speak solo on a topic for a minimum of 5 and maximum of 10 minutes and answer questions on it (topics such as globalization, stereotypes, environmental issues, etc.). Part 2 is interacting with a native speaker (one of the examiners) for 5 minutes in a pro-contra format trying to convince the other of the rightness of your opinion. A little more about these learners' experience: Learner 1 wrote lots of papers and essays at university, but no "letters to the editor" type of thing. A tutor or an exam prep book might have been useful for this, since it is a "teach to the test" kind of skill. Learner 2 had an unfortunate nightmare-like experience of writing a thorough response on the scratch paper and running out of time to transfer it onto the exam paper. Timed practice sessions would have helped with that. Learner 1 said that by the time the listening part came around, he was tired and couldn't concentrate well since this part was given after 3 hours of testing. Both learners decided to take the test 6 weeks prior to test date, so preparation was not optimal (and both were working 50+ hours a week during that time). Tutoring might have helped if a good tutor had been available, but finding a good tutor is difficult especially on short notice. The tutored speaking session was basically useless since almost no useful feedback was provided. If I have a single piece of advice to give to anyone contemplating a C2 exam, it is to take it piecemeal if possible, rather than trying to do the whole thing at once. It is an arduous experience, particularly if it's been a number of years since you've sat long exams. That way you could take the parts you feel more confident about first and spend more time preparing for the sections you are weaker in (with or without tutelage). 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6600 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 138 of 144 22 December 2014 at 7:35pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
That's simply because English/French/Spanish are relatively similar. Even those who fail to learn to speak are likely to improve their understanding, especially in North America with the massive exposure. Also, there are obviously people whose writing is better than their listening, for example. And writing skills can be transferred to speaking without much listening.
Generally it's not about being perfect in one area and horrible in the other. I also think that if you literally can't say anything in the language, your understanding isn't as great as you think. (general you) As for the person in question, chances are they would still pass C1. There's nothing unusual about having C1 listening and C2 speaking. Classes don't distinguish between listening in interactions and listening to tv/films/radio because they generally focus on the former. The latter is generally just a small fraction of class time (if it's used at all) and basically the responsibility of the learner. @BAnna, thanks for the extra info! and wow, can it be possible to take the different parts on different days? Not in Finland for sure... My exam was from 8:30 am to about 2-3 pm, with some breaks obv. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5433 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 139 of 144 23 December 2014 at 3:34pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Thanks and kudos to BAnna for the great contribution to the debate. Far from putting oil on the fire, this goes a long way towards helping explain the results of the exams. This apparent paradox of Learner 1 getting a 100/100 grade on speaking and still failing the listening test while Learner 2 just passes the speaking test but passes the listening test has become something of an earworm for me. Thanks to BAnna's post, I now think I have a better idea of what happened. First of all, I'll say that I was wrong in my initial explanation that Learner 1 failed the listening test because of cockiness and overconfidence. I now see that there was an element of fatigue, but I believe that there was more to this, as I hope to show in a moment. Aside from some tangential comments on how one can understand better than speaking, the only other attempt to explain what happened is from a poster whose only contribution to the debate has been the following post that I quote in all its scatalogical glory:
Once we wade through the offensive and insulting tone, we see that there are two types of listening. "General" listening is not defined, but, whatever it is, it takes 1500-2000 hours (of what?) according to an unknown author of a 76-page book on language learning. Then there is listening for conversing, which is less demanding and requires only 400-800 hours, of what we don't know, but based on no less an authority than a choice part of the author's anatomy. I would normally dismiss this sort of argument as another example of nastiness aimed at me, but I'm going to be magnaminous and say that I do believe that there is something of interest in this contribution. Although I'm quite familiar with the Spanish DELE and the French DALF C2 exams, I did go the Goethe Institut website and looked at an example of a C2 exam. I noticed, as BAnna has pointed out, that the two-part speaking test is actually very short, a total of 15 minutes. The second part, consisting of a pros and cons debate with an examiner, lasts only 5 minutes. In passing, I'll say out that all this in my opinion confirms a point that I've always made here at HTLAL and that is that examiners can determine a candidate's speaking level very quickly. The other point, close to my heart, is that in 15 minutes, one is not going to use thousands of different words. I would say that in the 5-minute debate, it's not fancy vocabulary that counts but more verbal gymnastics. The other point is that the contents of the speaking tests are rather serious topics. This is not two people chatting aimlessly around a beer. I don't see how these topics in the speaking test differ very much from what could be in a listening test. But there is a huge difference between listening in the speaking test and the listening test per se. It's probably banal to say so, but the speaking test is all about speaking. The candidate must of course understand what the examiner is saying but they (the candidate) are not really being tested on that. In fact, I suspect that the examiner does not do much talking, and certainly much less than the candidate. The listening test, on the other hand, is a pure listening test with questions on specific points of a recording heard once. This is very different from the listening in the speaking test. The listening test has its own challenges. It's not a question of understanding better or worse than one speaks; it's a question of performing on a specific test. This is where I think there is a sliver of truth in the observation by our poster above. I don't believe in a distinction between "general" and "conversational" listening but there are certainly differences between, let's say, listening to a 60-minute lecture and chatting with some good friends in the street. In the case of Learner 1, given their experience in a German university environment, there is probably no reason why did they could not have passed that listening test. The fatigue, and, I suggest, lack of concentration is what did them in. I admit that I was mistaken. There is really not much of a paradox after all. Listening for the listening test and listening for the speaking test are two different beasts. Edited by s_allard on 23 December 2014 at 3:45pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5433 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 140 of 144 24 December 2014 at 3:09am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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In my opinion, a lesson to be learned from the tale of these two German C2 candidates is the potential
utility of a good tutor. I'm not saying that a tutor would have guaranteed success but I think it would have made a big difference for a couple of reasons. First of all, when you look at the amount of study and exposure under the belt of these candidates, you wonder how could they fail. Look at Learner 1. Over a year studying in a German university. A 6-month internship in a German company. This and more makes for a huge amount of exposure. And yet that candidate fails two out of four tests. This can be somewhat discouraging for those of us who may be interested in sitting these tests for whatever reason. Second, his also tells us that these tests are very difficult and require preparation. I have written that in my experience people tend overestimate their linguistic skills - at least in French - I mean that these people feel quite confident of their skills but have rarely been put to a real test where mistakes are counted and quality is assessed. It would be a grave mistake to assume that just because you feel that you speak a language fluently that you could pass a C2 test. The interesting thing is that the contents - or rather the format - of the test are well known, and there are lots of past and mock exams freely available. For example, we know exactly what the speaking test is going to be like. You know that you will have to debate a topic for five minutes. Given all this, how can you fail? Well, it's a lot more difficult than it looks. The fundamental reason for working with a good tutor in all this is preparation for the test. The next round of C2 tests will be most likely in May - July of 2015. So we have at least 16 weeks of preparation. We need a game plan. But a major issue that must be dealt with frankly is the big question: Should you even attempt the C2? You have to register by the end of March. With your tutor you can assess your strengths and weaknesses and determine your chances of succeeding. In any case, you lay out a calendar and a plan with the tutor. You've identified your weak points. For example, you will most likely be required to write a professional letter in the target language. How many letter have you written so far? Maybe you should plan to write a letter a week or every two weeks. For general writing, this is an area where maybe you should plan on writing at least two pages a week that you will review with the tutor. And if you start all this early enough by the time March comes around, you will be able to decide serenely if you want to attempt the test or wait for a later date. A tutor is not necessary by any means but it just seems to make things so much easier to deal with. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| catullus_roar Quadrilingual Octoglot Groupie Australia Joined 4571 days ago 89 posts - 184 votes Speaks: Malay, Hokkien*, English*, Mandarin*, Cantonese*, French, German, Spanish Studies: Italian, Latin, Armenian, Afrikaans, Russian | Message 141 of 144 27 December 2014 at 5:28am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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You don't need a tutor (as in someone who sits with you and teaches you), but you do need a language practice partner. Bonus points if this language practice partner is willing to look over your mock papers or your essays and tell you where you went wrong.
The Spanish and French C2s, which I have experience with, appear to be easier than certain other C2s such as the German one. In fact, based on the exams I've taken, the German exams seem to be disproportionately difficult. If you don't have a tutor, you need to be 1) an experienced learner who has taken similar exams before 2) extraordinarily lucky in that you've lived in the country of your target language or have relatives who speak your TL 3) willing to defy human instinct and drill yourself on your own errors, which you can somehow identify without outside help. My simple answer to this question is that C2 is possible without a tutor, but trying to do well in the exam is not going to be an enriching/enjoyable experience if you go solo. Attaining a C2 level, without the exam, is definitely possible without a tutor. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5133 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 142 of 144 27 December 2014 at 7:40am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Just curious how a 16 year old even has a need to take one of these exams, much less three. I'm not criticizing, I'm genuinely curious. R. == Edited by hrhenry on 27 December 2014 at 7:41am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| catullus_roar Quadrilingual Octoglot Groupie Australia Joined 4571 days ago 89 posts - 184 votes Speaks: Malay, Hokkien*, English*, Mandarin*, Cantonese*, French, German, Spanish Studies: Italian, Latin, Armenian, Afrikaans, Russian | Message 143 of 144 27 December 2014 at 8:05am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I began learning French at the age of 4, so it's more of a second language than a foreign language to me. Most test centres actually prohibit those under 18 from taking the C2, and when I took the A2 there were no DELF Prim exams for those under 12, so my teacher had to write to his superior at the Alliance Francaise in both cases. Spanish was done out of interest, and I began it at age 10; I believe that with grounding in previous romance languages and the provision of private tuition, most people with lots of time and interest can attain a C2 in 5 years. I think my post was badly worded, because I have not yet taken the German C2, only the TestDAF which is B2/C1. But based on what I've heard, and in comparing the TestDAF to French and Spanish exams of a similar level, German exams really are harder. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| noriyuki_nomura Bilingual Octoglot Senior Member Switzerland Joined 5343 days ago 304 posts - 465 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin*, Japanese, FrenchC2, GermanC2, ItalianC1, SpanishB2, DutchB1 Studies: TurkishA1, Korean | Message 144 of 144 27 December 2014 at 11:48am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Having taken a few of these language exams myself, I can say that the German Grosses Deutsches
Sprachdiplom is slightly tougher than the Austrian Wirtschaftssprache Deutsch. In terms of writing, you are required to write 1 email (no word limit) and 1 marketing summary (250 words, if I still remember correctly) for the Austrian C2 exam, which is slighly easier than the one from Goethe C2, the examiners of whom really expect you more to use German idiomatic expressions. With regard to listening, the Goethe C2 was tougher in my opinion in terms of understanding the spoken content (radio), while the Austrian C2 seems to test more on your time management skills - filling in the blanks of what you have just heard, erasing the wrong info and replace it with the correct info eg. Meeting will be held in room 512 and not stand A at the exhibition hall. For oral, however, I thought the Austrian one was as tough, if not tougher, than the Goethe one. You have to negotiate with your examiners who play the role of your business counterparty, and you have to negotiate with them from price, delivery date, to quantity, warehouse, invoice, taxes etc. In reading, the Austrian one tougher as you are given a text from the Finanz und Wirtschaft kinda newspapers/magazines, and you have to rearrange them in order. In that respect, the German exams seem more demanding than the Spanish/French ones, though I have to say, it is also not easy to write a research paper of 76 pages (like a mini masters degree) for the DFP Affaires C2, which you have to present to a panel of 3 jury verbally with powerpoint presentation followed by a debate. One surprising thing though is the DELE exam. My spoken Spanish capability is really limited, very limited to be precise but I was still able to get full marks for the oral section of the DELE B2 which I find weird. Another challenging exam is the Italian one I'm afraid...I have been preparing for the Italian C2 exam, but seriously when you look at the questions they ask for PLIDA C2 oral exam, eg discuss the works of Dante, how to pass such exams when I can't even discuss the works of Shakespeare, let alone those of Dante. This is likewise for the Paris-Sorbonne C2 and C3 levels that demand alot of reading and preparation of selected literature and the European institutions. Edited by noriyuki_nomura on 27 December 2014 at 11:51am 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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