For those who have taken (or know about) the Goethe B2 Exam

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smallwhite
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Re: For those who have taken (or know about) the Goethe B2 Exam

Postby smallwhite » Tue Jan 10, 2017 6:59 am

vogeltje wrote:Brexit makes me veyr stressed and upset because...


Then why bring it up to stress and upset all of us?
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Re: For those who have taken (or know about) the Goethe B2 Exam

Postby Soclydeza » Tue Jan 10, 2017 11:08 am

vogeltje wrote: Brexit makes me veyr stressed and upset because I'm an EU citizen in London.


I never hear about Brexit when I read German news (usually from DW.com or watching shows on ZDF). It may be all over the news in the UK, for obvious reasons, but from what I've seen, news outlets from other countries (at least the US, Germany and France) never really talk about it unless there's some new development or something with it.
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Re: For those who have taken (or know about) the Goethe B2 Exam

Postby Jar-Ptitsa » Tue Jan 10, 2017 9:22 pm

aokoye wrote:
vogeltje wrote:No, sorry, not tongue in cheek. Brexit makes me veyr stressed and upset because I'm an EU citizen in London. I'm with my parents who said that we can decide if we stay or not, but nevertheless, I'm so sad about this and it's just the feeling. I know that Londoners voted Remain and are upset as well. I don't want to hear about the suffering all the time, like in the news or the nasty things. Life is difficult enough.

Yes, we need to know the offensive words so that we could understand them, but I don't agree that it should be the whole exam. How about birds, animals, music, the stars, yoga, trees and flowers, and other nice things.

Maybe the Germans offer another language exam that isn't based on the news and politics?

I get that news and politics are stressful. I'm a black, transgender, queer identified person living in the US. It is, for a few reasons, more stressful for me not to watch the news so for the first 10 to 14 days after the US election I could only watch the news in German because I just could not deal with it in English. That said there are other ways to find information about immigration, women's rights/lives, and the environment than the news. I mean think - you listed birds, animals, trees, and flowers among things you would rather be tested on. Those are all environmental in nature. I also, in general, often bristle about my living as the various identities I listed above as a political act - that said there are ways to learn about gender, race, etc without reading the news or without reading an overtly political text.

Honestly I doubt all of the reading, writing, listening, and speaking in the Goethe Institut exams is political in nature. Is it probably topical, but that doesn't mean political or sad. I'm pretty sure there is, once you get to B2, always a at least one news article, but I don't think news articles make up the majority of the readings.

The other main German tests that test at B2 and above are the TestDaF and the Telc. I know next to nothing about the telc tests other than there are a lot of them and some of them are accepted at some German and Austrian universities. The TestDaF is aimed at people wanting to go to school in Germany or Austria and is what I should be preparing for as I want to take it in September of this year. From what I can tell it is different in content to an extent from any of the Goethe tests in that it is aimed squarely at skills and vocabulary you'll need for university studies. It's also accepted at all German universities if you get 4s (though some programs require all 5s or a mix of 4s and 5s) whereas the Goethe C1 test is only accepted at some of them. The Goethe C2 is accepted everywhere.


Hi aokoye

thanks for your extremely helpful reply.


smallwhite wrote:
vogeltje wrote:Brexit makes me veyr stressed and upset because...


Then why bring it up to stress and upset all of us?


sorry, i won't mention it again.


Soclydeza wrote:I never hear about Brexit when I read German news (usually from DW.com or watching shows on ZDF). It may be all over the news in the UK, for obvious reasons, but from what I've seen, news outlets from other countries (at least the US, Germany and France) never really talk about it unless there's some new development or something with it.


Yes, every day a billion times. of course US politics as well, and Syria also Germany etc in connection with their refugees and brexit. I don't want to hear about Le Pen or AfD either, or the injustices worldwide because I haven't got any resilience at all against injustice. anyway, I better stop writing about it and them because I can't avoid them like this.

Sorry as well, I didn't mean to make your German B2 exam thread change topic. please talk about the exam again. sorry and thanks.
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