kini mini
Active Member
The 2U written exam is three hours long, including 2h 50 mins working and 10 minutes reading. It begins with the listening component, which takes about half an hour. Then you have a reading comprehension section, a reading and responding section, and two compositions to do in whatever order you please.
Aural
The aural exam is in the format I'm sure we're all painfully familiar with. The passage plays once, there is a pause of a few seconds, and it is played again. I strongly advise you to read the question carefully beforehand and take down the content of the passage in the margin provided. A good way to practise listening is to do the exercises on the CSU site, and to listen to French radio programs. There are stations that allow you to download zip archives of 1 hour programs etc that are interesting and therefore easier to listen to. Personally, I'm a little tired of idiots asking for directions, railway announcements etc
Reading Comprehension
There are two passages in this section. Both were trivially easy to read in last year's paper, but interestingly the examiners sought to introduce a new difficulty in highly ambiguous questions. Read the exam for yourself on the BOS site and see. That said, my teacher marked the comp and when I spoke to him the other day he said they were very careful to give people marks if they could detect that the person had indicated even obliquely that they had grasped the point. This suggests to me that the "shotgun" method of answering is advisable, but you should ask your own teachers.
Reading and responding
You can write about 300 words in this one in response to a text of some sort. It might be a letter written in answer to an original which you must write, a series of emails where you have to fill in the blanks....be prepared to write in a variety of styles. There is no time pressure in the exam so stay calm and plan everything. Use the dictionary if you are in doubt, everyone has one and the time to use it. Be careful to respond to all the points in the given text(s), I underlined them and checked them off.
Compositions
There are two 150 word pieces you have to write, for each you have two choices of subject. Be creative! They aren't worth the same amont of marks, I don't know why unless it's to make it add up to 100. This is the easiest bit as you can take the line or two that you are offeref almost anywhere.
OK, that's all I can think of for the moment, if there are more questions about the exam post them here
Aural
The aural exam is in the format I'm sure we're all painfully familiar with. The passage plays once, there is a pause of a few seconds, and it is played again. I strongly advise you to read the question carefully beforehand and take down the content of the passage in the margin provided. A good way to practise listening is to do the exercises on the CSU site, and to listen to French radio programs. There are stations that allow you to download zip archives of 1 hour programs etc that are interesting and therefore easier to listen to. Personally, I'm a little tired of idiots asking for directions, railway announcements etc
Reading Comprehension
There are two passages in this section. Both were trivially easy to read in last year's paper, but interestingly the examiners sought to introduce a new difficulty in highly ambiguous questions. Read the exam for yourself on the BOS site and see. That said, my teacher marked the comp and when I spoke to him the other day he said they were very careful to give people marks if they could detect that the person had indicated even obliquely that they had grasped the point. This suggests to me that the "shotgun" method of answering is advisable, but you should ask your own teachers
.Reading and responding
You can write about 300 words in this one in response to a text of some sort. It might be a letter written in answer to an original which you must write, a series of emails where you have to fill in the blanks....be prepared to write in a variety of styles. There is no time pressure in the exam so stay calm and plan everything. Use the dictionary if you are in doubt, everyone has one and the time to use it. Be careful to respond to all the points in the given text(s), I underlined them and checked them off
.Compositions
There are two 150 word pieces you have to write, for each you have two choices of subject. Be creative! They aren't worth the same amont of marks, I don't know why unless it's to make it add up to 100. This is the easiest bit as you can take the line or two that you are offeref almost anywhere.
OK, that's all I can think of for the moment, if there are more questions about the exam post them here
