- Joined
- Apr 27, 2007
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- Behind the windmills of your mind
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- www.linguisticworld.com
I just took four hours worth of language testing- over the phone for a federal agency. One 2 hour exam was in my target or secondary language and the other was in my native language (English). Despite knowing that the latter exam had to be given in the interest of fairness to all applicants, I found it a very humorous experience. So I offered to be tested in a southern drawl with as many idiomatic expressions as possible. And the feds laughed ( I probably failed the test by making them laugh) But the point of this thread is that the "test" was simply a two topic conversational and thus didn't seem very coordinated to really test for levels of proficiency with a variety of tenses, syntax and yes idiomatic expressions. I find that communication is interrupted as a result when people who have learned English as a second language lack some of these skills. When it comes to public service- I believe the language skills need to be absolutely thorough. Has anyone had a similar experience?