Is there a relatively objective way of telling how much you know?

[Mymar]

I've often wondered this, and occasionally searched for tests, but most of the things the "tests" test you on are things that any beginner student might know, I consider myself intermediate to advanced with French, but that doesn't mean I have any idea of the my knowledge of the language. I went down a list of 1000 most common French words, and only didn't know 2 or 3, but that doesn't really tell me how much I know of the language. For all I know, those 900+ words are all I know. Any ideas on what I can do?

[tomgosse]

Here are some sample test for DELF test. You can find others by searching Google for CEFR A1 French tests.

Bon Courage,
Tom

[Cavesa]

Do you mean overall tests of just vocab?

There are the official exams. Some are the kind "sign up for one of the levels and either pass or fail", but there are others as well, that continue stuff from the beginnings up to advanced and place you on the scale according to the score. TCF for French, TEFL or something like that for English, a new exam like that is being piloted for the Spanish learners, and so on.

Another, but less reliable method,are the sorting tests+oral exams in a langauge school or testing center, but those are always always just approximate, but usually still good. Often paid (reasonably) for people not actually signing up for classes.

Some of the internet tests are not that bad, but there are huge limits. Dialang is actually quite good, especially at the vocabulary assessment.

Real life is a good test too, but not too practical for some self-assessment and planning purposes.

Out of online tests, I found the Erasmus one (only available to students going for an exchange) to be the only quite reliable one. Of course, there is no speaking part. Their "key structures" are sometimes crap at the advanced levels, as some of them didn't ring any bell and I have very developped comprehension skills, it doesn't normally happen to me to not have any clue about a sentence. There is no active writing part, and listening is easy even at the C2 level, I'd say. But the grammar was not bad at all (but that is not bad in many online tests), and the vocab test was the first one to trully have a value ever. Most vocab tests are flawed, as their creators believe advanced vocabulary=medical vocabulary. Of course I score high in those, but that doesn't have anything to do with my langauge skills. The Erasmus test is much more balanced.

Or there is the cefr self-assessment list with "can do" statements, sorted by level. No, it is not the vague short wikipedia description (before any one starts arguing against it), it is a long "can do something" list sorted both by level and skill.

Or you can look at the contents of a coursebook, grammarbook, vocabulary book with a cefr level, and make a good, self-critical assessment of what you know or don't know, what you can or can't use.

[Mymar]

Do you mean overall tests of just vocab?

There are the official exams. Some are the kind "sign up for one of the levels and either pass or fail", but there are others as well, that continue stuff from the beginnings up to advanced and place you on the scale according to the score. TCF for French, TEFL or something like that for English, a new exam like that is being piloted for the Spanish learners, and so on.

Another, but less reliable method,are the sorting tests+oral exams in a langauge school or testing center, but those are always always just approximate, but usually still good. Often paid (reasonably) for people not actually signing up for classes.

Some of the internet tests are not that bad, but there are huge limits. Dialang is actually quite good, especially at the vocabulary assessment.

Real life is a good test too, but not too practical for some self-assessment and planning purposes.

Out of online tests, I found the Erasmus one (only available to students going for an exchange) to be the only quite reliable one. Of course, there is no speaking part. Their "key structures" are sometimes crap at the advanced levels, as some of them didn't ring any bell and I have very developped comprehension skills, it doesn't normally happen to me to not have any clue about a sentence. There is no active writing part, and listening is easy even at the C2 level, I'd say. But the grammar was not bad at all (but that is not bad in many online tests), and the vocab test was the first one to trully have a value ever. Most vocab tests are flawed, as their creators believe advanced vocabulary=medical vocabulary. Of course I score high in those, but that doesn't have anything to do with my langauge skills. The Erasmus test is much more balanced.

Or there is the cefr self-assessment list with "can do" statements, sorted by level. No, it is not the vague short wikipedia description (before any one starts arguing against it), it is a long "can do something" list sorted both by level and skill.

Or you can look at the contents of a coursebook, grammarbook, vocabulary book with a cefr level, and make a good, self-critical assessment of what you know or don't know, what you can or can't use.

I'm fairly advanced with vocabulary, and I want to kind of take stock of what I know, so I know what I need to work on. I know listening is still something I struggle with a bit, do a search for my last post, but as far as vocabulary and grammar go knowing what I know will help me learn new things and not waste time. I agree that specific field does not equal skills. There are things I don't know, mostly because I was learning specific vocabulary. My end goal now is to spend extended time in France and using my French skills on a daily basis. At the very least I'd like some sort of thing somewhere where I use it every day.

[reineke]

I've often wondered this, and occasionally searched for tests, but most of the things the "tests" test you on are things that any beginner student might know, I consider myself intermediate to advanced with French, but that doesn't mean I have any idea of the my knowledge of the language. I went down a list of 1000 most common French words, and only didn't know 2 or 3, but that doesn't really tell me how much I know of the language. For all I know, those 900+ words are all I know. Any ideas on what I can do?

Talk to a tutor.

"What does it mean to say you know a word? While most non-linguists would answer that knowing a word entails knowing what it means, Folse points out that the implicit knowledge of a word possessed by literate native-speakers includes much more than just this. It includes knowledge of the word's polysemy (multiple meanings), connotation, spelling/pronunciation, part of speech, frequency, usage/register, and collocation."

http://esl.fis.edu/teachers/support/folse.htm

When can you say you have reached Intermediate level?
http://forum.language-learners.org/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1990&
Vrais Amis
"One of the great things about learning French or English is that many words have the same roots in the Romance languages and English. The 1,700 words on the following pages are spelled (although not pronounced) identically in French and English and are true or semi-true cognates."
http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/vraisamis.htm
DIALANG
https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/researchenterprise/dialang/about

[rdearman]

You can try the defence lang one: http://oda.dliflc.edu/

[tomgosse]

I came across this website today: CNED Services. I haven't tried it myself, but will most likely take a shot at it this afternoon.

[William Camden]

If I happen to understand random L2 statements by people I pass in the street, talking to others in person or on the phone, I see it as a sign that my listening comprehension in the relevant L2 is good. I call it the passerby test.

[Ari]

If you want to know how many words you know, get yourself a dictionary. Look up a random page and count the number of words you know and the number of words you don't know. Do this a few times. Take a percentage and multiply it by the number of words in the dictionary. That should be reasonably accurate. If you want to be more accurate, try it with a few dictionaries (some large, some small, but not smaller than your approximate vocabulary, of course) and average the results.

[DaveBee]

I've come across a website to estimate the size of your english vocabulary. But I've not seen anything like that for french.