2015 Notes from the Marking Centre – Chinese Beginners
Introduction
This document has been produced for the teachers and candidates of the Stage 6 Chinese Beginners course. It contains comments on candidate responses to the 2015 Higher School Certificate examination, indicating the quality of the responses and highlighting their relative strengths and weaknesses.
This document should be read along with:
- the Chinese Beginners Stage 6 Syllabus
- the 2015 Higher School Certificate Chinese Beginners examination
- the marking guidelines
- Advice for students attempting HSC languages examinations, and HSC Languages oral examinations – advice to students
- Advice for HSC students about examinations
- other support documents developed by the Board of Studies, Teaching and Educational Standards NSW to assist in the teaching and learning of Chinese in Stage 6.
Oral examination
Characteristics of better responses:
- candidates elaborated on their response with adequate and relevant information
- appropriate vocabulary and sentence structures were used
- pronunciation and intonation were clear and accurate.
Characteristics of weaker responses:
- the questions asked were misunderstood
- insufficient or irrelevant information was provided
- short and abrupt responses, constructed using limited vocabulary and incorrect sentence structures, were provided
- incorrect pronunciation and intonation were used.
Written examination
Section I – Listening
Characteristics of better responses:
- responses were supported with relevant information where appropriate.
Characteristics of weaker responses:
- some aspects of the questions or the aural texts were misunderstood
- candidates translated the texts without addressing the requirements of the questions.
Section II – Reading and Responding
Characteristics of better responses:
- the ability to analyse or compare texts was demonstrated
- opinions were supported by relevant information where appropriate.
Characteristics of weaker responses:
- the requirements of the questions were misunderstood
- insufficient or inaccurate information was provided
- candidates translated the texts without addressing the requirements of the questions.
Section III – Writing in Chinese
Characteristics of better responses:
- correct language structures and a range of vocabulary were used
- relevant information was included
- development of the elaboration was lucid and logical
- the correct text types were used.
Characteristics of weaker responses:
- the requirements of the questions were misinterpreted
- unrelated or insufficient information was included
- incorrect characters were used
- incomplete or incorrect sentence structures were used.
NSW Government