Anne & Gina,
In my experience vocab not found in the core list has appeared in the
listening exam, which can catch pupils out. For example - I used to
just teach that reading was 'kan shu' or 'du shu', as they are the ones
I was taught and are widely used. But in the listening exam a few
years ago they used 'yue du'. In the same set of pictures that pupils
had to choose from was a picture of art, which I had taught as 'mei
shu'. In the listening they used 'yi shu', which is of course also
art, but I hadn't taught that one. The word 'shu' confused pupils, as
they thought it was book, not knowing that art was 'yi shu'. They were
also waiting for 'hua hua' to come up! So the majority of them
selected reading when they heard 'yi shu'. I have learnt my lesson and
now try to teach as many variations of words as I can, though this
takes time and such words do not appear on that list! Can't win, it
seems, on the listening.
Great news that Edexcel have given their word that they won't use
extra vocab on the reading and writing papers, though. That's a
relief!
Michelle
----Original Message----
From: [log in to unmask]
Date: Sep 30, 2005 17:02
To:
Subj: Re: GCSE
Gina
I queried the list of core vocab with edexcel and
they confirmed that is is the core vocab for both reading and for
writing -about
1,000 characters . They told me that only characters listed in the
core vocab
will be used in the exam.
Regards
Anne
----- Original Message -----
From:
Gina Edens
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Friday, September 30, 2005 10:56
AM
Subject: GCSE
I think Oliver's point about the boudaries
compared to Japanese is very important one. I also agree that the
syllabus for Chinese is OK as it does list grammar required and
there is a
core vocabulary but this will only get a student a C grade (I
believe - I am
still quite new to this so I may be wrong.) Would a comprehensive
vocabulary and character list (one for reading, another for writing)
be
useful? As a beginner teacher in Mandarin I find it very hard to
prioritise characters for reading and writing. I am constantly
aware
that when characters come up in the exam that students don't know, I
will be
the only one at fault for not having covered them in my lessons. I
don't
want my lessons to become a mad race to cover hundreds and hundreds
of
characters at the expense of pupils' enjoyment, cultural studies,
etc.
But at the moment as I have little guidance I am inclined to cram my
schemes
of work with what is really an unreasonable amount of characters
(which I
struggle with, let alone the students!!)
We have just had our open morning and parents
were far more interested in Mandarin than Japanese. I wonder how
this
will change, however, when we have our first cohort take the GCSE in
2008 and
parents compare our Japanese results of nearly 100% A* most years
with
possibly very deflated Mandarin results unless changes are made. I
am
worried to say the least!!
Gina Edens
Whitgift
School
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