Dear ENTIers, Well another Bagrut has come and gone. Although the exams were, for the most part, fair - (the glaring exception is the C exam, which I found to be totally unreasonable in relation to the targeted student population) the point that stands out most for me as a Bagrut teacher is the the fact that these exams continue to vary in their level of difficulty / predictability from year to year. Why are the exams so unpredictable? Why should there be such a difference in difficulty from exam to exam in the same module or from module to module when considering the students tested? For example, why should a C exam be relatively more difficult than an F? And if we are speaking about the F exam I felt that question 6 was very deductive - to the point that many of the students felt the response was more of a guess than an answer interpolated from the context. It also bothers me that the focus of the G exam remains a matter of higher level thinking skills rather than of English ability. I have also followed the discussion about the oral exam with great interest. I am a supporter of projects, but do feel that the weight of the project in the oral exam is exam is too heavy. Why aren't the two parts of the exam equally weighted? I agree with Adele that the roll play was somewhat intimidating for the less gregarious students, but I think that the main focus of the exam today should be the conversational aspect. After all, in the future our students may find themselves in a position to engage in a discussion in English about themselves or their lives as they travel around the world ( or around the country); but - let's face it they are not going to speak about the rationale behind their research project. I also wish there was a better way to run the whole thing. Although I have had wonderful experiences as a tester and with the colleagues who have tested my students, the test remains rather subjective. There will always be a student who feel that if she had been on list A instead of list B her grade would have been better. I am proud of the fact that English teachers make the effort to improve their students' research skills, often before they cover the point in L1; yet I can only guess how much better it would be if the student had mastered these skills in their mother tongue first. I hope that everyone can breathe a sigh of relief and get a good night's sleep before we go back into the frey to prepare for the summer exam. Best, Ariella Kopels --------------------------------- Expecting? Get great news right away with email Auto-Check. Try the Yahoo! Mail Beta.