Málfríður - 15.05.1993, Blaðsíða 10

secondary and pre-university
education and leave the vocat-
ional schools out of considera-
tion. As can be seen in the dia-
gram there are three different
types of general secondary edu-
cation for students aged roughly
between 12 and 19. These types
are more or less equivalent to
the Icelandic “efri-grunnskóli”,
parts of the “fjölbrautaskóli" and
the “menntaskóli":
1 MAVO: junior general sec-
ondary education (age group: 12-
16) . A sort of “efri-grunnskóli”.
2 HAVO: senior general sec-
ondary education (age group: 12-
17) . Like parts of “fjölbrauta-
skóli”.
3 VWO: pre-university educa-
tion (age group: 12-18). Like
“menntaskóli”.
It is only at the end of the 4, 5
or 6 years of schooling that the
students take a national, stand-
ardised examination. This
school-leaving examination is
very important for students and
educators alike. For the students
it not only marks the culmina-
tion of many years of hard work,
it is also a passport to the job
market or to further education.
For the Ministry of Education it
is a way to check and safeguard
the quality of education and the
effectiveness of the educational
objectives. For the teachers the
final exam helps to show what
level of student competence
they need to aim for in their
teaching. (The exams are not
meant to dictate how to teach,
however. The teachers are free
to choose how they plan to
achieve the required level of
competence.)
Depending upon the school
type the students are tested in
six to eight subjects during the
final examination period. The
final examination consists of two
parts:
a) an “internal” examination,
i.e. oral and/or written tests pre-
pared and marked by the indivi-
dual schools, and spread out
over the final year.
b) the national examination.
This examination is the same for
all students of the same type of
school throughout the country,
and all candidates take it simul-
taneously at a designated time.
The tests for the various sub-
jects are constructed at the Na-
tional Institute for Educational
Measurement, known by its
Dutch acronym CITO, in Arn-
hem. (The elementary school
test mentioned above is con-
structed there, too.) For some
subjects they are in the form of
open questions, i.e. those to
which the students formulate
their own answers. For the sake
of objectivity these are marked
by a teacher from their own
school (who is not necessarily
their own teacher) and one from
another school. Whenever the
subject allows it (and such is the
case with modern languages) the
exam takes the form of closed,
or multiple choice, questions.
These are all checked by com-
puter at CITO. The advantage of
the multiple choice form is ob-
vious: the marking is totally ob-
jective; there is no danger of a
subjective teacher’s judgment
playing any part. The final grade
is the average of the marks for
the “internal” tests and of the na-
tional exam, with the national ex-
amination counting for 50%.
Thus for the subject of Eng-
lish the national standardised
test, which is the reading com-
prehension test, constitutes 50%
of the final mark. The other half
comes from the tests administer-
ed by the schools during the last
year. The Government require-
ments are that the teachers
themselves test the student’s
listening, speaking, and writing
skills, pronunciation and his/her
knowledge of and insight into
English literature. This part usu-
ally includes an interview, with a
second teacher present to in-
crease objectivity in judgment,
and a listening comprehension
test. CITO annually makes a list-
ening comprehension test in
multiple choice form for this
purpose, but the schools are not
obliged to use it; they can test
listening comprehension in a
different way, if they so prefer.
Most schools use this test, howe-
ver.
The reading comprehension
test is designed to test the stud-
ent’s general understanding of
the text. It consists of 50 multi-
ple choice questions (with a
variable number of answer
possibilities, ranging from three
to five choices) on four or five
long texts and some short
“newspaper clippings”. The texts
are selected from British and
American newspapers and maga-
zines (only occasionally from
books), on subjects that are ex-
pected to be of interest to the
students. Authentic texts are
used; small changes are made
only when absolutely necessary.
For example, a sentence or para-
graph may be left out, or a word
that is vital in the text but defini-
tely unknown to the students
may be replaced by an easier
synonym. Of course the subjects
vary per school type. For MAVO
they are in a lighter vein than for
VWO, where the students are
supposed to be able to read rat-
her high-level political, cultural
and philosophical articles.
The first ten questions of the
MAVO-test are based on short
newspaper fragments; these
questions are in Dutch, (but the
example here is given in Eng-
lish). The remaining forty ques-
tions are based on four or five
longer texts; these questions are
in English. In the HAVO- and
VWO-tests all the questions are
in English.
Below are some examples.
The first example is a short new-
spaper fragment from the 1992
MAVO-test.
The next example is a short
newspaper fragment from the
1991 VWO-test. The difference in
level should be clear.
Andrew Allen apparently
looks upon an honorary degree
as a symbol without substance,
something without real value,
and clarifies his view by quoting
Galbraith (lines 4-8). Galbraith’s
words show that even though
you are aware of its uselessness
it is hard to resist an honorary
degree when you are actually of-
fered one. (Answer: C)
How is the level of the texts
determined? The texts are first
carefully selected by a commit-
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