Taiwan gets its own Chinese proficiency test

[wix]

Taiwan has developed its own Chinese language proficiency test similar to the HSK.

Link to an article about it in the Taipei Times is below.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2005/11/03/2003278504

[roddy]

Interesting. The official website about the test is here. Be careful though, as I tried to start the sample test and it took ages to download all the listening files, and then proceeded to play all of them simultaneously. Which was kind of amusing until my browser crashed.

Roddy

[Guest]

If you ask me, it's a test nobody wants. The HSK is already the entrenched standard. I think it would do more good for Taiwanese schools in the long run if they just gave in and let us take the same test everyone else does, instead of making their own.

[pandaxiongmao]

Weixiaoma, did you actually take the test? The HSK's grading seems to have a lot of problems, not to mention it does not seem to be a very good metric of actual Chinese ability.

It could be like the TOEIC/TOEFL (USA) vs. IELTS (UK). The TOEIC/TOEFL don't really seem to test English ability in any important way, whereas the IELTS does. Even if the aim is to learn American English, I'd argue from experience the IELTS does a far better job of testing and promoting English, despite it being British English.

Just for my own sake, I'd like to try and take Taiwan's test. I am curious how it compares to the HSK, and more importantly, if it actually tests Chinese ability in a way that is relevant to real-world usage.

[anthony_barker]

Which are more similar to characters in HK. For me in particular almost all the content (books etc) I can find in Toronto Canada uses traditional chars.

[anthony_barker]

Do they still use the Red book over there? If the test is based on their teaching materials it should be fairly good.