Welcome to the Listening Time Podcast.
Hey everybody, this is Connor and you're listening to episode 225 of the Listening Time Podcast.
I hope you're doing well and that you're excited to practice your English listening comprehension with another episode.
Today I want to talk a about the tests that people take to evaluate their English level, such as the TOEFL test and the IELTS test.
There are other ones, of course.
These are the two most famous ones, probably the ones that I'm most familiar with.
And I want to talk about whether or not the score that you get on these tests is important in determining your English level.
So I'm sure this is an interesting topic for all of you.
I'm sure some of you have taken it the TOEFL test or the IELTS test, depending on the country you live in or your career, your school, etc.
So this is something relevant to many of you, I think, and I want to talk about the importance of these tests.
The reason why I want to talk about this today is because I recently had a conversation with an English teacher for my US Conversations podcast and he has a lot of experience training English learners to pass these types of tests so he is somewhat of an expert here, if I can say that and I was asking him about these tests and if people's scores on these tests reflected their real-life level, their level of English.
So I thought his answer was pretty interesting, and I'll talk about that in just a bit.
And if you want to listen to that conversation and learn more about ramon the person who i was talking to about that who has a lot of experience helping people pass these tests if you want to hear that conversation, make sure to check out my us conversations podcast that link is down below And also make sure that you're challenging yourself.
If these normal episodes have become pretty comfortable for you, a little bit easy, then you need to move on to harder content.
And so you should try my advanced podcast episodes in which I speak at normal speed.
Those will help you improve your listening and get accustomed to real English spoken fast.
So the link to sign up for those is also down below.
All right, let's get started.
Are your ears ready?
You know what time it is.
It's listening time.
Okay, let's talk about English tests like the TOEFL test and the IELTS test and other tests that are similar to those.
So when I was talking to that English teacher Ramon, he told me a little bit about his experience teaching English, particularly in Spain.
And he mentioned how there these types of tests are often really important for people, perhaps for their career, because I think he worked a lot with students, people that wanted to be English teachers.
So he taught a lot of students who weren't native English speakers, but they wanted to be English teachers in Spain.
If I'm not mistaken, that was a big demographic of the people that he taught.
And I was curious to ask him about the test results and whether or not they reflected the person's real-life level.
So, for example, if someone was able to pass a C1 test, meaning they officially have a C1 level according to that standard, whether or not that person's real-life English level really is C1.
So I asked him that question and he said that it was very common for people to pass the C1 test in order to become an English teacher, I think, and they would actually have between a B1 and a B2 level in real life.
That's a big difference.
Having a C1 level and having a high B1 or a low B2 level.
That's a big difference in the field of language learning.
So he said that that was pretty common.
He would talk to these students in real life and see that their actual level didn't match up with the level that they supposedly had because they passed the test.
When you supposedly do something, it means that this is what is supposed to be true or correct, but perhaps it isn't so.
The level that they supposedly had because they passed the test didn't match up to their real-life level.
Sometimes it did, but he said oftentimes it didn't.
And this is a very important piece of information, right?
Because many people base their idea of their English level on these tests.
For some people, this is the only way that they feel like they can know what their level is, and it makes sense because there are certain standards for these tests, and so it seems natural that if you are said to have a C1 level because you were able to pass a test, that you actually have that level.
But in reality, that isn't the case for many people.
So let's talk about some of my takeaways from what Ramon told me.
A takeaway is a lesson that you extract from some experience or some information.
So let me talk about some of the things that I thought about when Ramon told me that.
So the first thing I wanted to mention is you shouldn't evaluate your level of English purely based on the results of an English test that you take.
And this could be in a good way or a bad way, meaning some people don't might not do very well on one of these tests.
And so they think that their level is lower.
But in reality, if they were to talk to someone in real life, their level would actually seem higher than what it's said to be.
And the opposite is also true.
Like I already mentioned, Someone might get a high score on one of these tests, or they're able to pass the C1 exam or something.
And, in reality, when they talk to an English teacher, that English teacher might evaluate their level as being lower.
So this could happen in both of those different ways.
You might seem to have a higher or a lower level than you actually do. based on your test results.
And so I don't think that we should only base our evaluation of our level on these tests.
I think that they can be helpful for determining your level.
They can give you a general idea of what your level might be be, but there are other factors and other things that we should consider when determining your level.
So I think that's important to know that your level, that the test says you have, isn't necessarily your real life level.
Another takeaway that I got from what he told me is that studying for these tests isn't the best way to learn English or learn any language.
Of course, when you study for these tests, you're probably going to get better at technical aspects of the language, and that's good.
And you're probably going to train your skills in different areas like reading and writing, etc.
And so, of course, this is all helpful.
But if our goal is simply to reach a fluent level in English or whatever language studying for the test, passing the, this type of test, isn't the number one way to do that.
It can help, like I said, but in general, your language learning routine will probably look significantly different from the routine you would have when you study English for one of these tests.
So if you're not concerned with passing a test for academic or career purposes or immigration purposes, then you might not need to do this, because you're just trying to reach a certain level in English and studying for these tests and passing these tests isn't the best way to just improve your overall level.
It helps, but there are probably more efficient ways, and targeted ways, meaning there are methods that can target your specific goals right.
So that's another thing.
Another takeaway is that test taking is a skill in and of itself, okay?
When we say in and of itself, we're saying just by itself, right?
Just that thing.
So, test taking is a skill by itself that is separate from language learning.
So I can think of other examples of this.
When I was in high school, the big test that many people took was the SAT test, this big standardized test.
That was important if you wanted to go to a good college after high school.
And I remember that I had a certain friend who spent like two years going to SAT preparation classes, like once a week or something, to train and get better at taking that test.
And so because he did so much preparation, he was able to get a high score on that test, whereas I didn't do any preparation and I took the test and just got an average score.
However, in real life...
I got better grades than that friend.
I did better in my classes than that friend.
And that friend would probably say that overall, I was a better student than him.
But because he was trained specifically to take that test, he was able to outperform me, meaning perform better than me.
So this skill test taking is very significant and important when it comes to taking language tests too.
Some people just simply don't aren't very comfortable in a test taking environment, and so they get a lower score than other people who are more trained to do this and, as a result, it seems like this first group of people have a lower level of English because of their test score, whereas in reality they might have a higher level of English than people in that second group.
I've taught students before and I've given formal lessons to these students where we do test-like activities and it seems like they just can't can't answer a lot of the questions.
Right, but in reality they speak well.
It's kind of curious, like they just can't perform these tasks well, that you might have to do for these tests, even though their level of English is pretty good.
And I've known other people that can probably get a pretty high score on these language tests.
But it's because they're good test takers, not because their English level is really high.
So that's something important to note.
And it's also important to know that if you need to pass these tests because of immigration purposes or career purposes or academic purposes, you should practice specifically for these tests.
You shouldn't just rely on your overall English skills.
You need specific practice.
So I'm not an expert on helping people pass these tests.
Maybe one day I'll have the desire to become more of an expert on this, but right now I'm not, whereas Ramon, the person I talk to He, is more of an expert when it comes to this.
He has trained many people to pass these tests.
And so if you're someone who needs to pass one of these tests, you should train specifically for these tests and not only rely on your overall skills.
So you should take classes with someone like Ramon.
You can go listen to that US Conversations episode that I did with him and I included the link to his teacher profile online on that transcript that I provide for that conversation.
So you can go and check that out if you need to practice specifically for one of these tests or use the preparation materials that are out there for these tests.
Whatever it is, you need specific practice for these tests And just know that you will be able to do better if you don't just rely on your general knowledge of English and you actually practice specifically for these tests.
And another takeaway is that your English level, the English level that people claim to have, is very subjective.
It's based on people's own perception of what is advanced, what is intermediate or specifically, what is C1, what is B2, etc.
Two people may say that their level is B2, but one person actually has a B1 level and the other person actually has a C1 level.
Maybe one person overestimates their level and one person overestimates, underestimates their level, and so the two people claim to have a b2 level, but in reality, one person has a b1 level, one person has a c1 level, and that's a big difference, right?
So be aware of this, we all have different perceptions of what it really means to be B2, for example.
Does it mean that you passed the B2 test?
Or does it mean that you went to a professional English teacher who evaluated your level after seeing your skills, or does it just depend on your own comfort with the language?
What factors go into determining your level?
People have different ideas about this, so be aware of this and don't just assume that it's super clear what B1 is for everyone.
People have different perceptions of this.
I've been evaluated by tutors who I think have overestimated my level, meaning they thought my level was higher than what I think it is.
And I don't really know who's right.
So this can be tricky.
And one other takeaway is that, when it comes to the field of education educating people to learn something, When we talk specifically about language learning and education this is a tricky field and we see a lot of problems with this just by the fact that people can pass a C1 English test but in reality have like a high B1 level.
That's a significant difference.
So how is it that that person can be said to have a C1 level by academic standards but in reality not have a significantly lower level?
I think this points to the issue with language education in schools in the academic sphere today.
Most of you know that when you take language courses in school, They are not very effective.
You don't finish those courses with the ability to speak English or whatever language.
I'm sure many of you have had that experience.
And all of this shows that, when it comes to the academic teaching of, of English or other languages, there is still a lot of room for improvement.
We can all agree that our language schools, our language courses, all of this can definitely be improved to help people learn better.
And lastly, what are the benefits of taking these tests?
So I already mentioned that these tests might not be the best indicator of your level, and it takes separate practice to actually train for these tests.
So why should you take them?
Why should some people take them?
So if you need them, then you got to take them.
Some people need them for different reasons.
So, of course, they need to take these tests.
Some people just want to be able to put it on their resume, their CV, and say, I passed this test.
English test or I got this score on this test, and that can make them more attractive candidate for a job.
Perhaps that's a good reason.
It can also help you improve your technical skills when you're studying for these tests.
You might learn more grammar or reading comprehension skills or writing skills.
And that's good.
It can help you see deficiencies that you have, meaning weak points, things that you need to improve on.
So the test might say that you are fairly weak in your writing, and maybe you didn't really know that.
And that test helped you see that your writing skills are significantly lower than the other skills that you have.
So tests can show you your deficiencies.
And, like I mentioned before, they can give you a general idea of your level.
They can kind of give you a ballpark idea, meaning a very broad general idea.
They can help with that.
But just know that it might not reflect your exact level and that determining your exact level can sometimes be tricky.
It's a little subjective in many cases and I myself hesitate to say what my level is in different languages because I don't really know exactly.
It's kind of hard for me to determine this.
So I hope that all of this was interesting for you.
I'm sure it was relevant for a lot of you.
And I want to remind you, If you want to listen to that conversation that I had with Ramon.
We talk about a lot of other things in that conversation.
He's a really interesting guy.
He travels around the world and doesn't live in one particular place.
He has a unique life and lifestyle.
So if you want to hear that conversation, make sure to sign up for my US Conversations podcast.
That link is down below.
And a lot of you should start using my advanced podcast episodes, because I know that for a lot of you this normal podcast has gotten pretty easy.
So the link to sign up for my advanced episodes is also down below.
All right, thank you so much for listening to this episode and I'll talk to you on the next episode of Listening Time.
