Unicert IV Part 2
How the course works
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Office hours
• Wednesday from 1700-1900 in G40C-253.
• Website:
• www.ovgu.de/evans
All the information you need about this course is here.
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Attendance
•
Attendance at all lessons is compulsory. Absence
for genuine reasons such as illness, a Blockseminar
or urgent family matters is permissible on two
occasions, but a copy of, for example, the relevant
doctor’s certificate will be required, unless you
attend a parallel lesson in the same week. Please
consult with me in advance if at all possible.
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Communication
• I will normally inform you of the material we will be
using in class by e-mail.
• You should consult my website every weekend
before the next class as I shall post reading texts,
tasks or provide information for the following week
then.
• Link: class readings
• Please print the texts we will be studying and bring
them to the lesson. Working from memory is neither
convincing nor useful.
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Exams
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There are 3 separate exams plus one presentation
Listening Comprehension (2 parts, 45-60 min)
Reading Comprehension + Summary (2hrs 15 mins)
Writing / Academic Essay (2hrs)
Presentation (minimum 30 mins speaking time +
10/15 mins discussion)
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Reading/Writing Exam
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The reading/ writing exams will be in June/July.
Dates and rooms will be announced closer to the
time.
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Listening Exam
 The listening exam will take place in June.
 Times and dates and rooms will be announced.
 Most probably the listening exam will take place in
your class time and in your class room.
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Weekly timetable
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There will be 9-10 weeks of lessons, starting in the
2nd week of the semester and finishing mid-June
In June-July you will have the presentation
examinations and the reading/writing/listening
examinations
You will do your own presentation and you will
attend 8 other presentations during the exam
period.
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Practice essays
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There will be 1 timed practice essay in the lesson
time.
Week 6 – exact date will be announced.
Please allow a full 100-110 minutes for this
practice and bring a dictionary. Paper will be
provided.
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Essay tutorials
• After the practice essay in the following week class
will be replaced by individual tutorials so that we can
look at your essays and discuss any issues related to
your presentations.
• Tutorials will be in our teaching room unless
announced otherwise.
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Presentation dates
 Presentations will run in June/July (dates to be
announced), taking place mainly in the class times
(Bateman/Evans/Harper/Abraham)
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Exam Administration
 You will be informed about completion of the registration to
the UNIcert 4 exams.
 Once you are registered, you must take the exams. If you miss
the exams without good reason, you will be recorded as a
“fail”. If, for any reason, you are forced to withdraw from the
exams - or any single one of them – in this semester, you
must apply for permission to withdraw in writing to the Exam
Board of the SPRZ.
 Please note that it is possible to retake UniCERT exams twice
if you fail at the first attempt. However, a second retake must
be applied for officially (and can be refused).
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Reading Comprehension exam
 You are allowed up to 135 minutes for this exam.
Comprehension questions have to be answered in
English on an unseen text (or texts) of up to 1500
words approx.
 Dictionaries, mono- and bilingual, are allowed for
this part of the exam.
 Question types may include pure comprehension,
vocabulary in context, and short summaries.
 A summary of approx. 90-100 words must also be
tackled.
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Reading Exam tips
 Most answers need to be short. In previous exams,
some candidates have read the texts too slowly or in
too much detail; others have written overly long
answers: answers should be concise and relevant.
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Writing Exam (1)
 You are allowed 2 hours for this exam.
 You have to write ONE essay of min. 500 words,
quoting, where relevant, from the reading text(s)
given you for this task.
 Essays shorter than the minimum word count will
fail.
 At the end of the exam you must count the words
written and write the word count at the end of the
essay.
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Writing Exam (2)
 There is a choice of titles. You can bring both a
bilingual and a monolingual dictionary (e.g. an
Advanced Learners‘ Dictionary) to the writing exam.
 Electronic dictionaries are now officially not allowed.
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Listening Exam
• This consists of two parts:
• a) Cambridge Proficiency, sections 2 & 3 of a
Cambridge Proficiency test.
• b) Radio news (BBC Radio 4 or BBC World Service).
The exam lasts around 50 minutes in all.
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Academic Papers
 For those of you who are waiting for results:
I will respond to e-mail enquiries and will inform
people as and when papers are ready to be picked
up and discussed. It usually takes a while for all the
papers to be corrected.
The Academic Paper counts – as do each of the other
exams – for 20% of the final mark for UC4.
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Presentations
o You are required to attend 8 presentations in all
(plus your own).
o You will be given a card at your first presentation
visit. Keep this card and bring it to every
presentation you attend. You will receive a stamp
on the card for each presentation attended.
o If you do not have 8 stamps at the end of the
examination period, this will have consequences
for your final result.
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Presentations
o Please dress appropriately for your presentation
exam.
o Despite variations in opinion regarding what
“appropriate” might ultimately mean, we rely on
you to exercise your own judgement in this and
not come looking as if you have just come off the
shelf or out of bed, as if you were getting married
or slumming.
o This simply means that the presentation is a
special occasion, though not comparable to
getting married or a funeral, of course.
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Presentations
• The total time of your presentation should be 45
minutes, consisting of 30 minutes of you talking and
10-15 minutes of questions and discussion.
• You must organise the discussion to make sure that
it goes well. It can partly take place during the main
presentation, though you are advised to keep such
phases of discussion very much under control. The
main discussion will take place at the end of your
talk.
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Presentations
• An astonishing proportion of the candidates in past
semesters were simply not in control of their talks.
• They were mostly unable to adjust their talk to the
situation.
• As a result, their talks were not what they were
planned or expected to be.
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Presentations
o If you exceed 45 minutes, we will stop you and
you will probably lose marks for poor structure,
tempo, lack of discussion etc.
o If you speak for anything at all less than 25
minutes, you will automatically be given a fail.
More than 25 and less than 30 you will receive a
lower mark than if you had gone the time.
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Presentations
o It must be stressed that a weak point of all
presentations is the almost total failure to reflect
critically on the material being presented.
o The idea of the presentation is to come as close as
is reasonably possible at this stage in your studies
and life to the "academic talk".
o This means: critical preparation, critical
presentation and critical understanding of the
material.
o Consider what „critical“ means.
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Presentations
o It goes without saying that the norm for
presentations is the use of powerpoint or some
similar presentation format. All rooms have a
white or blackboard and an OHP. We will provide
a projector where it is not already a fixture, but
normally you should use your own laptop.
o Since this is an oral examination, you are
permitted a maximum of 10 slides (or overhead
transparencies). Do not use excessive text or
notes on slides.
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Presentations
o Video clips should be used sparingly, unless there
is a very specific need for them (e.g. a
presentation about TV commercials). Please
always discuss this in advance with your teachers.
o It is worth noting that they often do not work on
the day. You risk being "thrown" by your own
technology right from the start if you rely too
much on this kind of effect.
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Presentations
o You must produce a handout which should consist
of one sheet of A4. Please do not simply replicate
your powerpoint slides on the handout. Your
handout should include some sources, a
summary, perhaps some tables or definitions of
key words. See also below.
o Semester info, personal info, title of talk, abstract
(90 words), outline of talk (aligned with the
structure of ppt), brief bibliography (major
sources)
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Presentations
o Natural speech is the ideal. Notes should be kept
to a minimum (e.g. prompt cards). Lengthy notes,
especially if read, will result in a reduction of
marks and possibly a fail. Learning by heart is also
easy to spot and can lead to severe problems for
the presenter.
o If the worst comes to the worst, you should be
able to do your talk without media and notes. This
is the ultimate test …
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Presentations
o Content. The presentation should deal with an
academic topic, usually from the fields of
economics, business, current affairs or
international relations. Please discuss this with
your teachers. In a way, the presentation should
be like a less formal, oral academic paper,
carefully structured with logical arguments, an
introduction and conclusion. Sources should also
be given in the handout and should be usefully
referred to in the course of the talk.
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Presentations
o Originality. Please do not simply recycle
presentations, academic papers or lecture notes
from previous Unicert exams or other university
courses (e.g. block seminars). We will check if we
have reason to be suspicious.
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Presentations
o To help you with the development of your
presentation, you should consult regularly with
your teachers. John Bateman will practise the
technical aspects of giving a presentation, but
please talk to RE about the basic title/topic or if
you are looking for sources.
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Presentations
o Please send your provisional topic/title with a
short outline (10-15 points) to me for inclusion in
the list of presentations online. I will discuss this
with you in the tutorial in May.
o I will ask you to send me your handout by e-mail
at least a week before the presentation exam.
o I will willingly look at your ppt to advise you on
layout, language, etc.
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finis
If you have any questions, mail or ask.
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