2011 Chinese SL Exam

[vea]

How did you guys all find it?

Overall it was a pretty good exam though there were a few open ended-ish questions. They reverted back to the normal format for the Chinese reading component also.

For the question that asked which country was most engaged in the competition, most people I asked said they put 美国. I put 澳大利亚 and said that although the US had the highest number of participants in 2010, Australia has had a lot of participants since 2002. I also said that Australia's population was lower. Am I most likely gonna lose these marks? :S

[Faye]

I found it okay...not as easy as some from previous years, and definitely not as hard as ones I've seen from XJS.

Listening section: straightforward, but when asked what the speech told you about the father, I wasn't sure what to write. I talked about how he was willing to learn about modern technology...but wasn't sure whether or not they only wanted factual information, or inferences as well. 

R&R: Did you guys put Niulang as Herd-Boy, or just Niulang? And same for Zhinu - Weaving-girl or just Zhinu? Because I doubt Niulang was the boy's actual name, but they specifically said that the girl was called Zhinu. Ahhh, this was so confusing!
And then for the interpretive question, I said that it shows that Chinese people perceive love as everlasting, unchanged by time and space. I didn't say anything about marriage though.

Translation: Yeah, this was pretty easy in comparison to previous years. Umm, the topics were Canberra, (something else), and a job advertisement for a private Chinese tutor right?

Essay: I did the persuasive speech, "encourage students to use the school's new facilities", but I felt that it wasn't a really strong essay at all, and I didn't have enough time to check. What did you guys do?

Hmm, Vea, that was the first thought I had too. But in the end, I put America because:
a) I doubted that the assessors would really take the relative populations into account, because c'mon, it IS VCAA CSL after all, and the right answers are usually the most straightforward ones.
b) I've always been taught to just answer questions based on the given information, and they didn't give the percentages of students who had participated in the "Chinese Bridge Competition" for each country.
c) And I couldn't be bothered doing the maths. ;-)
But, that being said, I'm not sure what the right answer is. And I reckon your argument was well reasoned, so I doubt that they wouldn't really take off too many marks. It is true, the popularity of the competition should be a percentage of how many students competed out of the general population.
Hope I helped somewhat. :-/

What are everyone else's thoughts? I'm just sooo glad it's over.

[vea]

Thanks for your thoughts Faye.

Listening: I wrote that the father was very mindful of the time, caring enough to call the mother and tell her that they would be late and also that he was quick at learning things, evident in his ability to learn how to message when his daughter taught him. Who thought that the male voice in the listening component wasn't as clear as it could have been?

R&R: You were meant to just write Niulang and Zhinu as their names- I know this because my friend did her detailed study on Qixijie haha. For the interpretive question, I wrote that it shows how parents in traditional Chinese families have a lot of control over the love and marriage of their children.

Translation topics were Canberra, traffic and the advertisement.

Did the same essay as you, thank god I prepared for both persuasive and evaluative, the evaluative topic was weird as!

And yeah, I'm really hoping they see the logic in my response and not take off too many marks
Anyone know how I can contact the chief assessor for Chinese to propose my solution?

This exam was definitely not as easy as past years, possible A+ cutoff as 64-65/75? Some of the questions were really open to interpretation which was a bit annoying.

[Faye]

No problem! Thanks for yours.

Ahh, that was definitely a better answer than mine. Yeah, I didn't like how it was open to interpretation as well. I mean, sure, it means that we have to put some thought into it, but I sure hope they don't deduct marks for "incorrect" interpretations.

Haha, that means my dictionary lied to me. XD Hmm, that's a good answer too, didn't think of that. Ah, that's at least 1 mark extra off...add that to my other 5+ marks off and yeah, it's not looking too good. :/

I know right?! Lol, I saw that and was like "No. Way. Am I doing that."
I'm sure they will, because there'll probably be a few of students who answered that too.
Haha, who IS the chief assessor?

Hmm, I never realised that there were cutoff grades for the exam. Do you know how the SACs are letter graded?

I think that often in CSL, doing well just boils down to how many stupid mistakes you made, or, in my case, what interpretations you fail to make. And how your assessors react to your essay, and how strict their marking is. Anyone know what the marking process is?

[vea]

Whoops sorry, I pulled that A+ cutoff from out of nowhere, thinking that 66/75 was the previous year's cutoff

Here is the grade distributions for last year though, note that your SACs may scale depending on your cohort strength.
http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vce/statistics/2010/section3/vce_lote_chinese_2nd_lang_ga10.pdf

Yeah, besides the essay Chinese is really based around being perfect and not making silly mistakes.

[t5am94]

This exam was alright. I made one mistake and that was leaving that 6 mark question on the first reading to last which i didnt finish on.

[jgv115]

mmm.. The exam was not hard but definitely wasn't easy.

Did anyone else find the reading part on the Chinese Competition hard? I found myself struggling for a bit and I hardly ever struggle in reading tasks.

[ilovenoodles]

Relatively easy exam. Had heaps of time to check for stupid mistakes.

for the question that asked which country was most engaged in the competition, I put 美国. As it asked the question directly from the table...additionally, It seemed like the most straight forward answer as well, which is what is always go for in Chinese... They dont usually try to trick u....usually.

The very first question abt what they BOTH wna buy may have tricked some ppl....  tricked some of my friends. =[

Evaluative essay was interesting as well... another translation problem/trick with the topic. The english part didnt say 'water theme park' but it was stated in chinese..

Altogether, i found the exam, refer to first line of post.