In today's article I'll tell about how the academic year in Poděbrady ended, or more precisely - about final exams. As usual, I'll tell about what I took in my humanities group and about what they took in the master's technical group.
All of May students prepared for exams. All topics were already covered, so we were reviewing what we learned. Most of all time, of course, we devoted to preparing for Czech language, because if we didn't pass this exam, the year would have been wasted.
So, I'll describe all subjects in order.
Introduction to specialty
May 26th, Monday, all humanities groups wrote a test on introduction to specialty. The test was extensive and consisted of 4 parts:
- history of literature (Mr. Čejka's subject)
- reading literature (Mr. Bednář's subject)
- Czech grammar (Mrs. Kostelecká's subject, which started only in the second semester)
- film history (Mrs. Jankulíková's subject)
The test had about 100 questions in 4 parts. For history of literature and Czech grammar you could score 30 points each, for the rest - 20 each. The exam was mainly in the form of a test with answer choices, with rare exceptions - you had to write your own answer. An hour and a half was given for everything, but most students handed in work much earlier. The questions themselves weren't difficult, essentially, we reviewed everything in advance, just sometimes everything got mixed up in the head due to the large amount of information.
Personally I wrote this test for 87 points, although I thought it would be worse.
History
The very next day, Tuesday May 27th, we wrote a history test.
As far as I remember, the test consisted of 30 questions, each had 4 answer options to choose from. Despite the fact that we studied not only Czech, but also European history in general, the test had questions only about Czech Republic. A week before the test we reviewed again all those topics that were planned for the test, so for most students history caused no problems. For some questions you can prepare even now, for example, every year there's a question "Name the correct order of Czechoslovak presidents".
An hour was allotted for the test, but this was more than enough. Personally it took me about 10 minutes, there were no difficulties, I wrote for 100 points.
Czech language
The most important exam was, of course, Czech. I remind you, if you don't pass additional subjects, but pass Czech, the center still issued a certificate of your language level, which is enough in most universities. However, if you don't pass Czech, they won't give you anything, you'll have to retake, once for free in summer, then for money.
Already in early May we wrote a trial test. In my opinion, it was even harder than the real one. In any case, students knew their strengths and weaknesses in advance.
The exam consisted of 2 large parts - written and oral. We wrote the written one on May 23rd, and took the oral one on different days - for example, I took it on May 28th.
Written part
- Listening
- Reading (text comprehension)
- Grammar part
- Writing
For listening they played us a disc with several texts. Tasks were different - choose 1 of several statements, write the answer in words. You must definitely follow the time - very little time is given for entering answers in the form, about a minute, which is catastrophically not enough.
So for the future, don't put this off until the very end, those answers you're sure of, try to mark immediately. For this part I got 20 out of 20, although personally some questions seemed controversial to me.
Reading is one of the most controversial parts this year. Tasks were standard, read the text and choose the appropriate answer option. But the answer options themselves were often controversial - sometimes the meaning overlapped, sometimes what was in the answers wasn't 100% in the text. After this part many students came out and argued among themselves what would be more correct, but no one came to a common denominator :) I got 19 points out of 20, just making a mistake in one of such questions, but I didn't deal with this - I was too lazy, to be honest.
The grammar part, in my opinion, was the easiest. It had standard grammar questions that we solved every day in lessons. Answers were essentially obvious, serious problems shouldn't arise. I scored 20 out of 20 in this part.
The written part - as usual, the most interesting. You had to write your opinion about one of two problems to choose from. You need to write at least 150 words in the text.
There were 2 topics to choose from, I chose the topic about mass media. The second was a topic about life in the future.
By the way, topics depend on specialty, technical students could write, for example, about mobile phones. 4 questions for discussion were offered for each topic.
There are many evaluation criteria. First - this is the number of words, second - literacy, third - compliance with the given topic.
We trained to write topics all year, but for many students this part still remained the most difficult. Despite this, I managed to write a text without serious flaws, so I again got 20 out of 20.
This ended the written part, the exam lasted a little less than 3 hours, with breaks.
Oral part
For the oral part all students came on a pre-determined day and time. After every fourth student, results were announced.
Having entered the classroom, you need to show your passport, sit at the table, choose 2 papers with topics. From two topics you need to choose the one dearer to your heart, prepare a brief story about it. You can write a plan, but looking at it often is not recommended. 3-4 minutes are given for preparation.
Then you sit down with the examiner. Part 1 begins. You talk for a minute about yourself - where you're from, who you are, why you are. The examiner asks a couple of questions.
If there are no problems, you move to the second part. In it you should talk about your topic.
Again, if everything's fine, you move to the next task. You need to adequately react to prepared examiner questions on several topics. Essentially, you don't need to tell the truth, smart things, the main thing is to speak competently and confidently.
If you speak little - teachers will ask leading questions. If everything's fine - the exam will be extremely short, no one will keep you long.
Then you go out and wait until they call you for results. There you'll learn everything. If you disagree with something - it's not so easy to fix, because this is a serious exam. For example, at the exam in January I noticed an obvious mistake in my test, it was fixed on the spot. Here though - more difficult.
For the oral part I got 19 points out of 20, which meant that I passed the whole test at 98%. The result, of course, is good, but not perfect. It's a pity that just a little bit wasn't enough.
Having come home, you can rest for a couple of days, but don't relax. Because university admission is coming soon, and there, exams are usually much harder.
After a couple of days you can look at your grades in the information system. If everything's fine, grades will be there already a few days after the last exam. Then you can rest with a clear conscience and wait for your certificate :)
Bonus: English exam in technical master's group
The exam, overall, was quite standard. As always, they prepared for the test in advance, so there were no surprises. In the written part there were tasks to correct sentences, several grammar tasks, putting words in the correct form. There was also listening, 2 texts, five questions for each. Serious problems didn't arise, and, overall, master's students have fewer questions - they mainly need to know Czech and what they already studied.