Thursday, October 14, 2010

Passing Tests

Finally, after a nearly a week of grumbling that my English tests aren't here, they were in my mailbox when I arrived home tonight. Three of the scores (speaking, listening and writing) are as expected. I thought I might have missed a listening point or two. The speaking test finished ten minutes early, and writing essays with a pencil for the first time in more than twenty years is harder than you'd think since you can't correct large swathes of what you write after the fact.

But the reading score I'm bewildered by. The implication, from various practice websites, is that I got at least two answers wrong. And it just isn't possible. Those passing through, thinking it might be a bit of hubris, don't know me well enough; part of my job is not being convinced about things, not believing things until you are absolutely sure about them. And even then couching your results in language that might get you out of trouble if someone proves you wrong. I had 30 minutes to check and re-check and re-re-check the answers. Impossible.

Still, at least it means the application documentation is now complete. A check-through tonight, photocopy it all tomorrow, one more check and off to the post office. Five months of hassle, now over. Now the waiting begins.

2 comments:

AngryChem1st said...

Ha ha. I've got 9 on listening and 8.5 on reading three years ago. Overall the same score as you. :D
That kinda shows that the test is flawed.

AG said...

No, if you did the academic version, you're probably better at English than I am, seeing as I did the 'general training' one which is supposed to be easier :D