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should fluent foreign language speakers be able to study it at a-level?

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Reply 20

Emma Watson7946

Original post by kerisx

In that same sense, English people have an unfair advantage when doing English GCSE and A level

Agree...

Reply 21

Dadadavavaakxx

I am fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, and I took the A level Spanish exam and got an A. It's not exactly a competition, so why is it unfair? Exams are for people's own success, not anybody else's. This idea that you have to get a higher grade than your peers is ridiculous.

Reply 22

username4313572

Original post by steamed-hams

e.g. if you speak french should you be allowed to study french a-level? this is on the assumption they will get an A*

You are allowed to, I've done it 🤷 loads of people do which is why all of A* and most of As go to native speaker. I got 86% overall and that wasn't even an A* 🙁

Reply 23

stereotypeasian

Original post by steamed-hams

e.g. if you speak french should you be allowed to study french a-level? this is on the assumption they will get an A*

yes
this is what I did with Chinese more specifically Mandarin

Reply 24

Emma Watson7946

Original post by stereotypeasian

yes
this is what I did with Chinese more specifically Mandarin

I thought you were Scottish tho??

Reply 25

stereotypeasian

Original post by Emma Watson7946

I thought you were Scottish tho??

can a person be Scottish and Chinese

Spoiler

it was offered at my local Chinese school so I sat it along with my nat5, higher, GCSE and HSKs
the more qualifications, the better for my UCAS lol

I thought this was supposed to be arguing whether or not people fluent in a certain language should be allowed to sit the language to earn an (extra) qualification.....

(edited 3 years ago)

Reply 26

aconstanthamlet

I think this is an interesting problem and needs to be considered from a variety of views. From a native speaker's perspective, the option of being able to utilise your abilities on an exam paper designed for B1/B2 level speakers is definitely tempting as your chances of achieving an A or an A* are undoubtedly higher than someone who hasn't even had the chance to visit a country where the target language is spoken. Considering that the papers are designed for those learning the language then in theory, yes it is unfair that native speakers are able to sit GCSE and A-Level. Whilst a lot of people on this thread are saying that the cultural modules, film and book studies can be challenging for native speakers these are really in place to help facilitate your language learning because at the end of the day, the exams themselves test your comprehension of the target language; only a small percentage tests your cultural knowledge which is assessed in the IRP. So in theory, most native speakers wouldn't have to worry about the language element of the course which is essentially what you're being assessed on. However, I had a native speaker in my A-Level French class who struggled with essay structure and was constantly marked down in speaking for using 'slang' or 'grammatically incorrect French' despite being the accepted dialect in France. Furthermore, they found some of the reading tasks difficult as they kept inferring the 'wrong' information, so whilst I agree that most native speakers would find the A-Level much easier than those learning the language, the assumption that all native speakers can easily obtain an A or an A* without any work is certainly incorrect. Besides, I think it would be too difficult to categorise the definition of 'fluent' to be able to ban 'fluent speakers' from taking exams. How would they define it? Someone who has been living in a country where the target language is spoken for ten years? Five years? Three? What about bilingual families living in the UK? What if someone from a British family has been living in the target country for five years but has attended an international school, so is far from fluent in the target language? Would they be banned from taking the A-Level exam? It would be too difficult to define who is considered 'fluent', and whilst the exams might be exploited by some confident native speakers who find it easy to adjust to the exam board's expectations, this is certainly not always the case with every 'fluent' speaker.

(edited 3 years ago)

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