Thai Language Level Test - 29 November 2008

[withnail]

The passport check didn't surprise me. Thai people have ID cards and foreigners have passports, that's the same for everything in Thailand. The bit that makes me laugh is the registration. It assumes you are a foreigner so therefore you must have an address in another country and then asks for your mother and father's name in Thai. This was the same the year before as well. What could possibly be the need for that?

[kriswillems]

Of course, a passport is a prove of identity. But the teachers also checked you visas stamp and if you were staying legally in the country. With their limited knowledge about visas and all kinds of stamps that took a while. Further on there were some people that changed passport number (because their old passport got stolen or expired), so the passport number didn't match with the number on the application form, which caused a lot of problems. The fact that the names matched was not sufficient. The whole check caused the exam to start half hour late. But alright, they apologized for the fact that they started late and for the fact they "had to" check if we were legally staying in the country.

The passport check looked useless to me, because after the check you still had the possibility to let someone do the test in your place (there was no check at the entrance of the exam room). They could just have compared your face with your passport picture during the speaking test, that would be sufficient, would prevent fraud and would have saved a lot of time. I doubt if they did that.

Whatever you do in Thailand, you need to have papers and official looking stamps, and there will always be people that need to manually check (without computer) these papers by comparing them with again other papers It never stops amazing me and it's quite funny.

[withnail]

You're right, I'd forgotten that they were actually checking stamps. Madness.

[withnail]

Got my results today:

Listening : 4

Reading : 4

Writing : 3

Speaking : 4

Although not as good as Kris' score, I am more than happy with this. If anything I feel that they have been slightly generous, but, actually, they are kind of in line with my 76% grade on the P6 last year so I don't think they are too far off. You must have done really well Kris, don't undersell yourself.

The section I was concerned about was listening as, although I found the examples quite easy I found the questions on them unnecessarily difficult. I found the reading and speaking sections easier, so I feel that a level 4 here is fair. The writing was not hard but not an issue I have ever written about so was not my best work.

Overall, I'm pleased but I think that the results are fair. Maybe in 2 years I'll brush up and go for the 5, but for now the only Thai studying I'll be doing will be on topics of my choosing.

Withnail

Edited February 14, 2009 by withnail

[kriswillems]

Congratulations Withnail!

Your score seems to be in line with what was expected, but I am still confused.

It was the first time I did such a test. I've been studying for about 1.5 years in Thailand in several schools (and about 6 months in my home country), with a lot of interruptions.

Do you feel you're are at M3 level (in the skills you got a 4)?

I don't think I am at M.3 level in any of those skills. My niece is in anubaan (last year). She uses some words that I don't even understand. So, I don't understand how I should interpret the test results.

I am on a forced break now, but I would like very much to go to study again. Hope we can meet in 2 years again at the test.

Edited February 14, 2009 by kriswillems

[withnail]

I don't think that I've ever seen language competency graded according to the academic year levels of native speakers anywhere else, but I think that I agree with the Thai language descriptions on the back of the certificate. I think they choose to use them because they are familiar to them although, really, the levels we've achieved are relevant to learners only. I'm sure that only very young Thai children or illiterates wouldn't achieve straight 6s.

When I took the P6 test last year I thought of it more of a test that I, a non-native learner of Thai, could be tested using material commonly given to a student of that age, not that I am comparable to one.

Personally I feel that on some levels I am above the average Korean/Japanese student that you see in Thai language schools here. Although, for neither exam was I able to take an exam preparation course so, consequently, I didn't feel that confident for either. And I've only actually studied in school here for 5 months here full time and that was a couple of years ago now. Studying for a year full time with no previous knowledge of Thai would probably prepare you for the exam more so than if you stayed here for many years and became a more proficient speaker IMHO. After all the practice you would receive would cover many areas whereas being fluent might only really enable you to ace the speaking (and possibly listening) if you hadn't had that specific practice.

Edited February 14, 2009 by withnail

[kriswillems]

I agree with that. I did 6 full time months (and the rest about 4 hours/week). I feel I need time to become more fluent and more courses will not help that much. But I would like to continue studying anyway (I think it's interesting).

Edited February 14, 2009 by kriswillems