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Jlpt 2015 december


I felt like the pieces of conversation that simulated radio/news were a lot easier to follow than conversations between 社員. The speed, the vocabulary used and the long sentences said in one breath made me search just for hints and keywords.

Passing or not, improving my ears is definitely my new objective in japanese.
 

I agree with your assessment of the differences between the two types; it was quite noticeable. I have to say, though, the dialogues were all at very normal and natural speaking speed. If anything, they were easier to follow than most daily real-life speech because they were all pronounced clearly and the actors were working from a script.

I noticed that the answer options were pretty much universally listed in the order they appeared in the conversations. I just went along marking a small "x" or "o" next to each one as the audio played: "x" if it absolutely wasn't the answer; "o" if it was a possibility. The main thing they did was to introduce one seemingly possible answer into the dialogue, only to later negate it while rephrasing it a different way. Other times they would include a phrase from the answer list and not negate it....but it wouldn't be germane to the question being asked.

I thought the questions with nothing given to you in the question booklet were interesting. Do the other levels also have those?
 
Yup, they're a jlpt standard during the listening phase.

Maybe its only me but I dont write メモ in those questions, I feel like I cant risk splitting my attention between writing and listening.
 
Kraise said:
Yup, they're a jlpt standard during the listening phase.

Maybe its only me but I dont write メモ in those questions, I feel like I cant risk splitting my attention between writing and listening.
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I only made a few little notes, such as "ski +" or "ski -" on the last question to help keep straight which of the four mayoral candidates had which policy.
 
@Mike Cash
Interesting that you thought the listening was far easier than the other sections. Since I have mostly learnt by myself outside Japan, before I started preparing for the JLPT (N2, my first try at a JLPT) I thought it would definitely be my weakest section. But doing practice tests I was surprised to find I got about 70% of the answers right. I went into the test thinking the main difficulty would be finishing all the reading passages in the allotted time.

Then to my surprise, the reading was okay but the listening was FAR harder than any of the practice tests I did - I did about 4 or 5 of them. To the point where I wanted to give up even trying on one section because I couldn't even understand the possible answers they gave (it was the section where you have to grasp the "main point" of what the person is talking about, rather than the conversational pieces).

I hope my marks on the other sections will be enough to outweigh the dismal listening - or that everyone else found it as hard as I did (I heard quite a few people grumbling after the test was over).

On another note, my invigilators were very kind and tried to put us at ease, but that probably comes from doing the test outside Japan!
 
Yes, Mondai 3 and 4 of the listening test had questions that didn't had anything written down

3
Conversations you had to listen to and then answer the question.

4
Listen to a sentence and choose the right reply to it. Which was pretty easy until some keigo came by.
 
Kraise said:
@madphysicist
N2's 聴解 was unexpectedly difficult for some people I know too.
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I have to agree with that. I practiced a few times with mock tests but the actual one did feel more difficult. Still a lot easier than the first part though hehe
 
Did those of you taking the test outside Japan find a paper envelope at your seat when you arrived?
 
Mike Cash said:
Did those of you taking the test outside Japan find a paper envelope at your seat when you arrived?
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Not a paper envelope but at least here , every test taker had to bring his ID in order to receive the test voucher; Is it somehow related to your question/?
 
Kraise said:
Not a paper envelope but at least here , every test taker had to bring his ID in order to receive the test voucher; Is it somehow related to your question/?
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We had brown paper envelopes at our seats. I thought they must be for putting our answer sheets into.

It wasn't enough to tell us to turn off our cell phones. It wasn't enough to tell us to put them in our bags. It wasn't enough to tell us to put our bags under our seats and not just next to our seats. We were told to put our phones inside the envelopes. I thought they were going to call out Penn & Teller to entertain us with a magic trick or something. what?
 
How are they going to handle everybody's smart watches next time? Maybe they'll need to provide electromagnetically shielded envelopes. Or maybe the watch will go in there too...
 
Yeah the envelopes really made me laugh!
 
Davey said:
I have to agree with that. I practiced a few times with mock tests but the actual one did feel more difficult. Still a lot easier than the first part though hehe
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Actually I thought the first part was fine, the reading went better than I expected and I managed to finish all the questions in time, just about. But as I said above, I learn mostly by myself so grammar / reading / kanji are all much easier to me than listening and responding, especially when the topic is not everyday conversation.


LOL, it seems like there's really a big difference between taking it in Japan and outside. I took it in London. We had 3 invigilators, 2 Japanese and 1 Brit, and they were pretty relaxed. Although they read out the "official rules" like turn your phone off, don't have water or glasses cases on your desk etc., they didn't really check or ask us to put our bags/water/whatever out of our reach. No envelopes for us.

When I first got into the room it was crazy hot in there so I asked them to turn the heating down and they were also pretty helpful about sorting that (since we had to get there 40 mins before the test starts there were quite a few people already falling asleep on their desks in the lulling warmth....)
 
I took N5 in Columbus, Ohio. It was my first time taking the JLPT but I went in there pretty confident because a few native speakers I talk to occasionally had encouraged me to try N4 instead. There were a few words I didn't remember and a couple questions I know I got wrong. Overall I feel I did well though. We'll see in early February. Also no envelopes for us, just reading through the rules and over and over again mentioning to make sure our phones were completely off.
 
mdchachi said:
How are they going to handle everybody's smart watches next time? Maybe they'll need to provide electromagnetically shielded envelopes. Or maybe the watch will go in there too...
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Why bother with a tiny smart watch? Just bring a second phone...
 
They also told us that erasers must be removed from their cardboard sleeves. We were further instructed that those using mechanical pencils would only be allowed to have spare leads on the table out of the box and that the tiny box the pencil leads come in must be stored in our bags beneath our seats. I halfway expected them to bust me for having an unauthorized pair of prescription reading glasses on the table. (I'm fifty...give me a break).

I also didn't care for them coming around and individually comparing our photos with our faces.

But....

I heard that portions of the N2 were up on the net in China almost as soon as the test was over. There have been problems in the past with (primarily) Chinese having someone else sit exams for them and there were so many Chinese people in the room where I was taking the test that I found myself wondering if they remembered to turn the lights off in China when they left...there couldn't possibly be anyone left in the country. Thanks to a few bad apples we all got treated as suspicious characters.

Edit:

And I probably should have taken a watch instead of just optimistically counting on there being a clock on the wall....there wasn't one!
 
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Mike Cash said:
I heard that portions of the N2 were up on the net in China almost as soon as the test was over.
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I had been wondering how they could make sure no one put up the answers for their friends in a different time zone. "They don't" is at least a satisfyingly simple answer.

I wonder if they should consider making multiple tests each session for different time zones, but that would involve effort on their part.
 

You can find comments around the web from people marveling over test takers outside Japan often having higher passing percentages than test takers in Japan. A common theme is a suspicion that some portion of them are making use of the materials which magically appear online immediately after the testing in China. There are other plausible theories as well.

I take it you share my poor opinion of the JLPT organization?
 

Honestly I doubt cheating is widespread enough to have a significant effect on the percentage pass rate. I suspect rather that foreigners in Japan tend to overestimate their own abilities and go for too high a level, as well as not prepare specifically for the test - because in general passing the JLPT is as much about getting used to the format as it is knowing Japanese. Whereas people studying outside are more likely to go for a lower level they'll be sure to pass, especially if they don't "need" the certificate for anything like getting a job etc. Well, that's my theory anyway - I don't think N1 has ever had a higher pass rate overseas, and that's the one for which people would have the most incentive to cheat.

I did think how easy it would be for me to copy the answers from the people around me - not that it would have been a good idea because I don't know their ability, but I could easily see 3 or 4 people's answer sheets.

This is the first time I took the JLPT, only because I have no other proof of my Japanese skills. I realise there must be difficulties inherent in administering the test to such a huge number of people at a cost that's not too unreasonable for developing countries, while making sure it's as fair as possible for everyone. For example, some people say there should be a written portion to test whether you can actually string a sentence together - well, but that would give a massive advantage to Chinese-speaking candidates, and while I can type perfectly well I still struggle to write by hand because it's simply not something that I need to do often. Similarly, a speaking portion would make sense but the sheer number of candidates would make that fairly impossible (not to mention subjective).

What they could do instead of the rigmarole you had to go through is provide each candidate with 2 HB pencils and a rubber and/or make sure everyone left their bags etc. at the side of the room. Equally they could make a few different tests for each session - there are enough candidates that it could still be scaled fairly, and you could adjust the start times in some countries by an hour or two. But the fact remains that unlike English where we have several recognised proficiency certificates, JLPT has a monopoly and it's not likely they'll see any serious competition any time soon, so what incentive do they have to improve at their own cost?
 
But they don't have a monopoly! They're just the 800 pound gorilla of Japanese proficiency testing and as far as the bulk of learners are aware they're the only test out there. There are others.

J.TEST実用日本語検定

This is probably a far more realistic assessment of real-world Japanese proficiency than the JLPT is. It contains sections where, as you suggest, examinees are called upon to compose Japanese sentences. It tests over a wider range of proficiency as well. There is a growing list of schools which will accept this test as an alternative to the JLPT for admissions purposes. Check out the list at the bottom of the front page. Also check the list of companies which accept it for hiring/interview purposes.

日本語検定-ビジネス,就活,学力アップ。日本語力を高める検定です。

The test I have already mentioned here in this thread quite a bit. JLPT is like handicap golf while 日本語検定 is like scratch golf. You play against the native speakers and you don't get topped out at some artificially high level which is really nothing more than a way of saying "That's about all we could expect from a gaijin..." Level 3 on this thing is where the bulk of native speakers who try it will top out. Level 1 has a pass rate of under 2%.

ことばを、チカラに。 語彙・読解力検定

Again, for natives, but there is no reason foreigners can't take it.

公益財団法人 日本漢字能力検定協会

Look at some past tests and you'll quickly see that for the non-native speaker it will require a lot broader knowledge of the language than merely the kanji it is ostensibly testing for if you hope to pass any meaningful level.

BJTビジネス日本語能力テスト

Testing for business Japanese
 
Does this Jtest have an English equivalent of their site? I know for me the draw of the JLPT was it's recognized well in Japan and also since I'm a beginner to intermediate beginner it was easy for me to register for the test. Also what kind of levels do they have? Is it something like the JLPT where they start with a low understanding and progressively work their way up?
 

No, bless them, the site is only in Japanese.

Rather than hand you the answers to your questions, I'm going to encourage you to first put your several years of Japanese study to work by looking at the site menu and seeing if you can't figure out some of the basic points regarding the test for yourself first. You should be able rather easily to find the test dates, locations, levels of the test, practice questions, and sample exams. Remember, this is the 実用日本語検定, so let's try out a little 実用 in search of the info.
 
I wasn't by any means asking for an answer handed to me. I was stating why I thought it would be either less known or taken than the JLPT. Beginners often like to have things adapted to their skill level to feel special rather than searching themselves on something that is complicated. I appreciate the information on this test though as I was not aware it existed and am much more likely to want to struggle through even applying to take the test as opposed to other beginners.
 
OoTmaster said:
I wasn't by any means asking for an answer handed to me. I was stating why I thought it would be either less known or taken than the JLPT.
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I must have mistaken the following for questions....

OoTmaster said:
Also what kind of levels do they have? Is it something like the JLPT where they start with a low understanding and progressively work their way up?
Click to expand...

Did you make any effort to find the answers on the site?

If I thought you couldn't figure out the answers to those two questions yourself I wouldn't have suggested trying.

Look on this page: J.TEST実用日本語検定 » J.TEST基本情報

If you can read the English alphabet and Roman numerals you can make a very good guess at the answers to your questions.
 
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