the NEW Test of Practical Chinese (C.Test) 使用中国语言水平认定考试

[heifeng]

C-Test. (A-D Level)

We were basically guinea pigs on Sunday afternoon at BLCU after the Advance HSK and were thrown into this exam without any clue how to take it, so we actually had to listen to the instructions a bit which ate up some critical preparation time. (for the listening sections at least)

I do have the test booklet for those who are interested b/c it's not masked in secrecy like the HSK but I’m typing some stuff here anyway…

1/2 of the exam is listening comprehension, the other is a combination of zonghe & reading comprehension.

Listening

1. 1-10看图回答问题: 每道题，你会听到一个陈述和一个问题，同时在试卷上看到一幅图表和abcd四个答案。请你根据所听和所看到的，从四个书面打案中选出一正确的答案。 My overview is that the crappy pictures are foggy and unclear and I didn’t have enough time to decode them, listen to the speaker, and read the 4 choices. Relatively hard.

2. 11-30听简单对话问题。每道题都是两个人的简单对话，后面有一个问题，请你根据对话的内容，从四个书面打案中选出一正确的答案。This was similar to the 初中HSK, but with a bit more attitude an maybe slightly quicker. Not really hard, but there were 20 of them! Boring….yawning in between

3. 31-50听长对话问题。这部分实体都是两个人的一段对话。后面有若干个问题，请你根据对话的内容，从四个书面打案中选出唯一恰当的答案。This was similar to the 高等HSK since it was longer but minus any heavy accents or background noise . Not really hard either.

4. 51-70听文章做笔记。 泥浆听到几段演讲，请你一边听一边记，根据听到的内容将每段演讲后面的笔记补充完整。。。。ok I don’t even feel like writing the rest, here’s an example (10 characters or less and you have 1 minute after they read it to finish filling in the blanks, it’s basically like madlibs….in hell)

题目：沙眼的原因，危害及————————51

导致沙眼形成的原因是——————52——————感染。

沙眼会使我们弹道眼睛发痒，——————53————，和灼痛

沙眼多发生于——————54————时期。。。

ok so anyway there was 1 dialogue like this up to 60, and then 61-70 was another dialogue. This section was evil, I don’t think anyone (sitting around me at least) was able to fill in all the blanks! It makes me wonder how sections 2-3 are so easy but then someone can just listen to this and pick out the critical info and write (somewhat neatly) on the answer sheet. I wrote my notes on the booklet but couldn’t transfer them quickly enough to the test sheet in that measly minute, and then the next question started. This was very difficult!!!

The rest was the ‘zonghe’ section I’ll just give you examples

1. QUESTIONS 71-80

Select the right word(s) to fill in the sentence correctly

EX _____那一刻____我喜欢上了我的新学校。

A) 往。。。。就

B) 在。。。。上

C) 连。。。。都

D) 从。。。。起 （CORRECT）

---Similar to intermediate level HSK work, not that hard.

2.

A,QUESTIONS 81-90

pick which sentence the indicated words are used correctly

A 每个人对自己的故乡(都)应该很熟悉 （correct）

B每个人对(都)自己的故乡应该很熟悉

C(都)每个人对自己的故乡应该很熟悉

D每个人对自己的故乡应该很(都)熟悉

ok, I have no comment, some of these should just be pretty obvious.

B,QUESTIONS 91-100

Finish the rest of the sentence correctly

EX 他还没______________

A 找到一份满意得工作 (correct)

B一份满意的工作找到

C满意的一份工作找到

D找到一份工作满意的

3. questions 101-130词汇和阅读

朱小分最讨厌把自己的好事说给丈夫，她喜欢告诉他一些(倒霉)。

EX A 新鲜

B开心

C不幸 (correct)

D复杂

Mostly reading type questions, maybe more similar to the Intermediate HSK in range of material and difficulty. With the last question similar tot the example above, approx 5 questions per short 1-3 paragraph article/story.

4. 131-140综合挑错：same as 高等HSK part 1 of the 综合

5. 141-150 similar to the高等HSK part 4 of the 综合, but it can be a 词，not just a single 汉字。 Ex: 人体的最佳睡眠143应该放在九点至两点半之144 (143=时间 144=间)

6. 151-160 造句: basically a sentence is left out of a paragraph and you need to fill it in so that it makes sense in the context of the rest of the paragraph.

Overall thoughts:

Listening:

Part 1 & 4 were the most difficult. Mainly, since I wasn’t really sure what I was doing for part 1, it was a bit confusing. Part 4 was too fast. I think I need 2 minutes after the entire article is read to fill in 10 answers to the questions even if it was less than 10 characters per answer. Sections 2 and 3 were ok. Except for section 4, I finished all of the listening.

ZongHe

Basically you have something like an hour+ to just go at this section on your own. (the overall exam is only 140 minutes). I did the all the multiple-choice sections except for the reading relatively quickly. Skipped to the character/ sentence writing portion, and then back to the multiple choice reading section. I think I had to guess on 1 question because I was out of time.

Overall:

Time isn’t really a terrible issue on this exam if you are use to taking the 高等exam. I think overall, except for the 2 listening portions I mentioned this exam is easier. If there are actually cram classes for this exam, anyone who actually prepares for it (and thus knows what to expect --unless us) and has advanced level Chinese should be fine (although some of the zonghe reminded me a bit more of the 初中hsk time questions with measure words, etc). I personally don’t know how I did (although we will get our results along with our Advanced Exam results and this was an actual exam, not a practice test) simply because I was really tired and having been taking exams since 9am, at around 5:30 you are pretty close to not caring that much..hehe)

I thought that this exam had a speaking section too, but it doesn't, which I don't understand because how can you give someone a 水平认定考试 and have no idea if they can actually speak and be understood. I don't know if I actually want to pay money and take this exam. I think I would be more proud of just getting a good HSK score...

Hope this offers some insight to this exam.