FCE 2011 (IOR)

Why are you planning to sit this exam?

Because, when I was 13 years old, my parents told me that I had to study English for my future. I didn’t agree with them. So I didn’t put in a lot of hours studying English. In the last years, I have come to understand how important it is to study this language. It’s necessary for my future career. I want to study “International trade”. Besides for travelling to other countries and communicating with people, learning about their cultures, seeing new places, everything is easier knowing English.

·         How do you think it can help you in the future?

As I said before the exam will help me for my future career. The most important thing in a company that wants to trade with a foreign one is know how to communicate. So I need to know English to work. It’s great for a letter of application. Also, for situations in life. The universal language is English.

·         What do you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level?

Well, I think that my strengths are the reading and the grammar exercises. But my weakness is the listening exercises because It is more difficult now. The speaking is not my problem, I need to study more vocabulary and the practice will help me.

·         Anything else you’d like to share with us:

I’m really happy because it is the last year. I will study hard to pass this exam. It’s something I’ve been waiting for for a long time and it’s a great experience for everyone.

Marlén Demarco

You are right Marlen: in the field of foreign commerce, knowing English is a must, since this is the international language of business. I’m glad to hear that learning English will prove useful to you in your future and wish you the best of luck. (Mary)

1st assignment: My expectations about this exam

• Why you are planning to sit this exam?

The main reason to sit this exam is simple… I LOVE ENGLISH! and I want to know as much as I can. Nowadays it is very important to have a second language and in my opinion, English is the most important of all the languages. Another reason to sit this exam is because (in my opinion, again) the FCE exam is one of the most difficult and challenging exams in English.

• How you think it can help you in the future?

The FCE is very helpful to get a job or a “workandtravel” job. Personally, I am studying for a degree in Information Systems Engineering and lots of books are written in English.

• What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level?

Maybe, the greatest strength is that I am really fond of learning English, it makes it easier. But my weakness plays against me… I am very lazy and sometimes I don’t have enough will to sit and study hard.

• Anything else you’d like to share with us?

I want to travel to England! :)

Ayelen Marilu ♥

Dear Ayelen, I don’t think you are lazy. On the contrary, you take such an active part in class,  and in our FB group, for example. I’m sure you’ll make all your dreams come true!

1st assignment: My expectations about this exam

I enjoy learning English more than anything in my life. In my free time or to be honest when I have a few free minutes I try to read or listen to something in English, for example: when I’m driving I put a CD in English in my Car stereo. I watch films in English as well.

I regret wasting my time when I was young, instead of studying English. In addition I used to live behind the Institute for a long time.

This year I expect to learn a lot and try to be successful for the final exam but I feel I´ll fail because I don´t have enough time to study.

Nancy Cespedes

Dear Nancy, don’t say that! Even if you don’t have so much time to study, all the other things you are doing to improve your knowledge of the language will surely help you a lot. Besides, your determination and enthusiasm are a great plus to achieve your goals. (Mary)

My expectations about this exam

• Why are you planning to sit this exam?

So many reasons! First because nowadays it’s very important to have a degree in English, it helps you to be considered as a more qualified applicant for any kind of job. Secondly, because I’m planning to follow a career in English. I’d love to be an English teacher in the future. Another reason is that my life won’t be complete until I visit England, and the stay there will be much easier if I know how to express what I want to say and I can also understand what other people are telling me. Last but not least, I love English, I even prefer talking in English rather than in Spanish, so I really enjoy learning a bit more every class and I’m looking forward to getting a really good grade at FCE.   

• How do you think it can help you in the future?
  

As I said before, it will help me a lot in my future. I want to be a teacher and then a translator, so my life will be surrounded by English! Besides, I am also planning to sit for the CAE next year, so it will mean a lot in my CV. Nowadays, most of the most important companies are looking for people who are able to communicate with other people all over the world, and English is the way that I can use to do that.   

• What do you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level?
  

That’s a very difficult question. I think that my strengths are the listening, the reading and the writing papers; I don’t usually have problems with those exercises. Of course I’ll need a lot of practice because the listenings are getting more and more difficult and now it isn’t so easy to understand them.

My weakness could be the speaking part, because I lose the notion of time while I’m talking and I just can’t say all that’s in my mind in just one minute. But teachers say that if I practise, I’ll be able to do it. I hope so!   

• Anything else you’d like to share with us:

I just want to say that I’m really excited about this year, because we’ve all been studying for so long that I hope that we all pass this exam. I just can’t believe that I’m finally in the last year! I’m sure that the teachers will do everything they can to prepare us properly for the exam. Well, that’s all. Wish me luck! :D

Lucía

Very well done, Lucía! You manage to communicate what you feel and expect from the future quite successfully. We are sure you will not only pass the exam but also make a good teacher and translator in the future :-) (Your teachers)

1st assignment: My expectations about this exam

• Why are you planning to sit this exam?

Well, I’ve been planning to sit this exam since I started English, because in my opinion this is the last stage of all these years, I mean if I have been studying for 6 years, why not sit the First Certificate Exam? It might be a once in a life time experience, and I think that if I do not do this now, I won’t do this anymore.  

• How you think it can help you in the future? :

It will help me a lot in the future for so many reasons. One of them is that nowadays it is very important to have the First Certificate with an A, B or C to be taken into accountover others that don’t have it. And another of them is that in the future I’d like to be a Translator, and with the certificate it may be easier to enter.

• What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level? :

My main weakness is the Listening part, in fact, although we practice a lot, I have difficulties to understand when I am nervous, and we can listen just twice! For me, it’s very complicated… but I’ll practice more and more this year to feel safe.

And about my strengths, I don’t know if I am better at one of the parts than at the others, but If I am responsible , I mean do the homework, paying attention in class and study I believe I won’t have serious problems with many of them.

• Anything else you’d like to share with us:

I’d like to share that I have so many expectations to pass this exam. I’m very anxious to sit it and see how it is and it’ll be too difficult for me to wait to know my mark! Those months will go by very slowly!

Nara B

Thanks for letting us know about your expectations. I agree with you that holding this certificate will open many doors for you, both when applying for a job and at university. You know that at many universities in our town, they excuse you from taking English if you present your certificate. I also agree that it is kind of nail-biting to wait until you get the results. It is for us, too!

MY EXPECTATIONS ABOUT THIS EXAM

Firstly I want to thank the institute for all the support given when I decided to sit this exam.

* Why you are planning to sit this exam

I am planning to sit this exam because of my job and also for my own satisfaction. I never thought about learning english and even though at secondary school I hated it, the subject was easy and I got really good marks. When I started working I realised I needed to improve it if I wanted to become a complete professional.

* How you think it can help you in the future

Nowadays, Although I am not a native I can speak and understand other people speaking in english very well and it will help me if I want to travel or for working too. Several english speaking countries are requiring the FCE if you want to live and work there so it is really necessary these days.

* What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level

I have already taken an FCE exam in December as a sample of the original exam, and I passed the exam with a medium mark but without any practice so I think my strengths are in: Writing (because of my imagination) and Reading. I get on well with conversation so I think it will not be a problem with more practice this year.

But my weaknesses are in listening I think. I find listening really difficult at this level. I think I need more time to get used to it and more practice. Another thing I noticed as a possible trouble is the time given to complete the exercises. One hour for 3 readings for example… You have to fly.

* Anything else you’d like to share with us

Starting with the new book this year I find everything unclear but it is just the beginning. I am sure all my classmates have the same feeling as me but working together we will improve soon.

I think we will have to do the practice exercises timing ourselves but I suppose you will give us all the examinations soon to decide who is prepared to sit this exam now.

MANY THANKS AND WE KEEP IN TOUCH.

VICTOR WIDMER.-

Hi Victor! Thanks for posting and for your kind words. Listening is indeed a bit tricky mainly because, together with Speaking, it’s a paper in which it’s quite difficult to control your nerves. And you’re right: time is another issue! However, as you say, you’ll have lots of practice and I’m sure you’ll eventually get the hang of it. (Mary)

Homework!

• Why you are planning to sit this exam

Well, how can I start?, I think I’m planning to sit for this exam since I started here, I mean, it’s like all the work I’ve done will be reflected in this test. On the other hand, this exam is very important nowadays, and is supposed to help me to find a god job someday

• How you think it can help you in the future

I’ve already answered this question, it is very useful when is time to find a job, and i’m sure it will help me to improve in my career.

• What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level

I really don’t know, we have just started and I’m doing good by now, but perhaps the nerves play a trick on me, I’m freak out about the speaking part, but it’s just a matter of practice

• Anything else you’d like to share with us

I think I will follow the previous posts, please we want videos where the singer actually sings! ajaja sometimes they’re just indecipherable!

Eliana Poggi

Hi Eliana! I couldn’t agree more with you. There’s a saying in English that goes “practice makes perfect” , meaning that the more you practice, the better you will become - do you recognise the comparative structure? ;-)  By the way, video seems to be quite an issue here. Let’s see how it turns out this year. Let’s hope for the best! (Mary)

Why blogging?

teacher how can this blog help us to improve our english???

Gastón, one of the good things about posting here is that you can see what others are writing and can therefore learn with and from your partners. Of course, we could also do that in class by writing collaboratively and editing each other’s work, but that would mean taking up f2f time that we can use in other activities for which direct contact is more important. Please, do give it a try! You’ll see that this will help you a lot in improving your writing skills. (Mary) 

MY EXPECTATIONS ABOUT THIS EXAM

•  Why you are planning to sit this exam:

Well, I’ve been expecting to sitting the exam since like 2nd Adol! At first, English wasn’t a priority in my life, but then I got more and more interested in it. I really want to take this exam and pass it because it will mean a huge achievement for myself and at the same time I realise that it will be really useful in the future.

• How you think it can help you in the future:

I’m conscious that the FCE is one of the most recognised exam around the world, so it’ll be a relief when I get my degree. As some of you know, I really want to travel to England sometime, so I guess the FCE will make things easier.

On the other hand, getting this degree means a lot to me because I’ve really put a lot of effort every year at the institute and at home, too, so I’d be extremely happy if I get it.  

• What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level:

My main weakness, sincerely, is the oral part. I find a bit difficult to express an idea if the topic isn’t interesting to me or when I’ve to improvise. However I’m glad I’ve found that out last year at the Trinity exam, so now I know how it’s gonna be at the FCE and I can practice based on that.

Considering the papers at the exam, I’d say that Writing is my best area, apart from the Reading. I was very good at Language at school and at the Institute, too when it comes to writing letters and papers. I think I can express myself much better this way.

I’m also very good at remembering vocabulary, its spelling and pronunciation as I spend many time reading English texts and if you play my MP3 you’ll find out that more than a 90% contains songs in English! :)

• Anything else you’d like to share with us:

According to the previous post, I hope we have interesting songs this year at Video, and I’d like to say that I’m really excited about this ‘cause English is a huge part of my life.

Paula Pascuali 

Paula, I can see that you’re highly motivated to take this exam and that’s great because it’s always so much easier to do things when we really like them. Besides, that makes the teacher’s job a lot easier as well :-) I’m sure you’ll pass your exam with flying colours! (Mary)

Our homework (?)

• Why you are planning to sit this exam

I’m planning to sit this exam because it is very useful to my career and also because I’d like to do another career related with English.

• How you think it can help you in the future

I will say it again. In my career it’s very important to know languages, specially English. The one of us who get the degree and also speak English are consider below other people who doesn’t speak English.

• What you consider your strengths and weaknesses in connection with the level

My main strength, I think, is I’m very good with vocabulary and pronunciation. My weaknesses is that awkward moment when I’m not able to say a phrase I have in mind properly and I end up saying anything else but that.

• Anything else you’d like to share with us

I want to see good music videos this year 8-)

Andrea, thanks for starting the ball rolling. I don’t know what career you’re studying for (please tell me in class!) but you are right: knowing English is a plus in most of them these days. As for the music videos, I do hope we can see good ones this year, too. But, you know, that’s up to you now :-) (Mary)