Leaving Cert German: a demanding exam which pushed students to ‘think outside the box'
Students were forced to 'think outside the box' for a Leaving Cert German exam at higher level which contained some steep linguistic challenges.
The exam started well, says Orla Ní Shúilleabháin, German teacher at The Institute of Education.
The first comprehension on the rise of a 15 year old gaming star was 'accessible with straightforward questions'.
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Classroom to college: our essential Leaving Cert guide for parents, guardians and students
]
'It was an enjoyable story with some humour and some students will relate to the final question's theme of periods of change,' she says.
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'However the grammatical tasks based off this text were notably harder than previous years as students were asked on labelling tenses and adjectival endings. While there is choice in this section, neither would lie within the comfort zone of the average student and weaker students will find themselves challenged.'
Leaving Cert German, higher level
Second comprehension
The second comprehension was on a much more 'alien' than students might expect, she says: life as a research assistant in the Antarctic.
'This was tougher as the vocabulary was dense and very specific to this scenario,' Ní Shúilleabháin says.
'This then has the knock-on effect for the opinion pieces that followed as one option asked students to see themselves within such extreme circumstances.'
While some of the necessary vocabulary could be plucked from the text, students may have struggled to adapt on the spot.
'The piece on diaries was much nicer and will be more popular with students but again demanded them to be inventive,' she says.
Students would likely have the requisite vocabulary to discuss the value of a diary in modern life, she says, but would need to take the time to arrange their thoughts creatively in order to convey this effectively – something that is easier said than done during a stressful, time-tight exam.
Schriftliche Produktion
The final Schriftliche Produktion was 'definitely challenging', she says.
The first option of the letter to the German friend had manageable tasks but peculiar framing devices.
'The only thing that really made these prompts cohere was the underlying linguistic challenge as the topics ranged from 'breaking' in the Olympics to a morning techno club and on to automated shops,' she says.
'The odds of any of these being part of a student's prepared work are low and while they should have been able to adapt, they really needed to draw excerpts from disparate areas of their vocabulary.'
The other option focused on the elderly and modern living conditions. Some students may have prepared pieces on voluntary work or the housing crisis and so will be in relatively familiar territory, says Ní Shúilleabháin but again this needed to be applied creatively.
Aural
The aural was nice and accessible to all levels, she says, and used broad and general vocabulary delivered at a comfortable pace.
The first topic was BrotZeit a volunteer organisation providing breakfasts to underprivileged children – promotes community and integration.
Section 2, the note, tasked them with finding language expressing happiness, and they would have 'found loads of options,' says Ní Shúilleabháin.
Section 3 had the 'quirky' topic of a clothes exchange party and a typically interesting angle of the topic of sustainability.
Section 4's news items covered a range of accessible topics with the occasional challenge mixed in.
'This paper will certainly push students to think outside of the box more than they may have anticipated based on previous years,' concludes Ní Shúilleabháin.
'While some of the questions may have been standard or straightforward, the linguistic challenges posed by novel topics make for a very demanding exam, particularly for the weaker students.'
Leaving Cert German, ordinary level
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Leaving Cert German, higher level, page 19
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