HKAL 2002 USE OF ENGLISH

ADVANCED SUPPLEMENTARY LEVEL

Section A Listening Test

This year’s listening paper built on the progress made in the past three years
with the inclusion of semi-spontaneous spoken text, a widening of the range of
task types used, as well as efforts to increase the visual attractiveness of the
paper. This involved using items constructed around pictures, maps and
diagrams and task types including note-taking, table completion and visual
multiple choice. The topic choice and setting were also varied a little this year
to make them closer to everyday life and more motivating for students.

Performance statistics

The mean score of the test was 48% and the standard deviation was 18.9%
compared to 49% and 20.1% respectively in 2001.

Candidates’ performance

Markers’ comments on candidates’ performance did not vary significantly

between Parts 1 and 2. As in 2001, they reserved the majority of their
comments for students’ weaknesses in spelling and/or confusion between
similar sounding words (e.g. lake/leg; attack/attract). There was also a
considerable amount of comment on the grammar of students’ answers which,
when weak, did not allow them to focus on key points. Another point widely
commented on was that candidates failed to include key words such as ‘action
verbs’ in their answers. Many markers indicated that candidates did not seem
to understand questions, lacked a sufficient vocabulary range and did not make
use of meaning-making strategies, but instead treated the listening text as if it
was a dictation.

General comments and recommendations

Markers’ comments were very similar to those of last year, i.e. that candidates
need more practice in spelling, pronunciation, dictation, neat handwriting,
note-taking, paraphrasing, grammaticality, vocabulary extension, the
importance of reading headings and instructions carefully, and proofreading.
Many markers also suggested that students should be encouraged to deduce
meaning from context, to use their common sense/knowledge of the world to
make sense of what they hear, to expose themselves to a much greater range of

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natural language use through radio, TV, reading, and conversation; and to
broaden their knowledge of the world.

From their comments across the sections of the report the markers give the
impression that they do not think that candidates approach the paper in a
helpful way. Candidates do not appear to try to understand the general
meaning or context of the listening text. They plump instead for using
strategies involving local retrieval and the deciphering of sounds, i.e.
bottom-up strategies. This approach leads candidates into making errors.
Candidates need to develop a greater awareness of context and better global
understanding, and use their common sense and knowledge of the world, i.e.
they should employ top-down listening strategies in conjunction with those
bottom-up strategies already employed.

Conclusions

The statistical data on candidate performance and the markers’ comments

indicate that this year’s test achieved its aims well. It operated at a level
which allowed for good discrimination amongst candidates, and it was able to
test an appropriate range of listening skills in an interesting context.

Section B Writing

Section B sets out to test candidates’ abilities in discursive and argumentative

writing. Usual topics in recent years have included educational issues, current
affairs, and matters of universal concern. This year a total of 125 markers
judged some 35,935 writing papers. A clear majority of markers judged all
four questions to be suitable for candidates. All in all, the response of markers
to the paper as a whole was extremely positive. The popularity of questions
varied somewhat, with question 3 proving least popular and questions 2 and 4
proving most attractive to candidates.

Table 1
The popularity of essay questions and general comments

Question Popularity General Comments

(1) Improving one’s 13% Candidates’ tended to do less well on
family life this question than on all other
questions.

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(2) Internet learning 55% The most popular question, which
vs. attending attracted a wide range of abilities.
school
(3) The popularity of 3% This was the least popular topic, and
Hong Kong films attracted only a small minority of
candidates.
(4) Young couples 29% This was a fairly popular question,
choosing not to and attracted a good spread of
have children answers.

Problems with individual questions

Question 1

– A number of candidates found this question ambiguous.

– Many candidates wrote rather generally on the topic.

Question 2

– Some candidates wrote largely on the benefits of the Internet, and failed to
tackle the core argument.
– Many markers thought this a very suitable topic for candidates, with much
room for discussion.

Question 3

– Only a small minority of candidates attempted this question.

– Many markers commented that candidates lacked both the background
knowledge and the vocabulary to do well on this question.

Question 4

– Some markers noted that candidates focused on their own preferences, and
failed to answer all parts of the question.
– Otherwise this question attracted a wide range of abilities.

Language errors

According to markers, the most salient errors among candidates are those
listed as follows. Here the percentage in brackets indicates the proportion of
markers commenting on a particular error: spelling (68%), agreement (38%),
word class (25%), incorrect choice of verbs (25%), tense/aspect/verb-form

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(23%), ‘confusion’ of vocabulary items (21%), pluralisation of uncountable
nouns (21%), prepositions (20%), determiner-noun agreement (14%),
auxiliary verbs (13%)

Three of the error types mentioned by markers related to vocabulary and

spelling. Frequently-cited examples of spelling errors were alway for
‘always’, adventage for ‘advantage’, bady for ‘baby’, convinient for
‘convenient’, develope for ‘develop’, futhermore for ‘furthermore’, nowaday
for ‘nowadays’, slove for ‘solve’, studing for ‘studying’, and wheather for
‘whether’. Instances of the incorrect choice of verbs were to learn knowledge,
to born a baby, and to enhance the problem. Examples of ‘confused’ words
were broad for ‘board’, image for ‘imagine’ and trials for ‘triads’.

At the grammatical level, the following sets of examples were quoted as

instances of the various error categories: (i) Many people is my friend, One of
the reasons are, She like (agreement); (ii) He wants to be success, rapidly
development, when people get marry (word class); (iii) The internet develops
to a mature state, as I have mention, will be improve (tense/aspect/verb-form);
(iv) much homeworks, informations, knowledges (pluralisation of uncountable
nouns); (v) take care their children, in the Internet, pay attention on
(prepositions), (vi) a children, many time, every students (determiner-noun
agreement); and (vii) They not work hard, I afraid, They are not like to use
(auxiliary verbs). Other types of error that were mentioned included voice,
determiners, modals and -ing forms (gerunds vs participles).

Memorisation

Only a few memorised answers were reported, and this was not a problem in
this year’s exercise. Some markers also reported that the use of ‘clichés’ and
‘stock phrases’, such as students as ‘the pillars of society’, were also less
frequent this year.

Conclusion

This year the marking of the examination once again went very smoothly with
the assistance of the highly experienced and efficient Assistant Examiners and
markers. Many of the markers’ reports were very positive.

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Section C Reading and Language Systems

General comments

The mean percentage correct for all of Section C was 49 in 2002; in 2001 it
was 51.

Candidates did comparatively better on the multiple-choice parts of the paper

(reading comprehension, cloze and theme) with a mean percentage correct of
53 than on the non multiple-choice parts of the paper, which had a mean
percentage correct of 45. The most difficult part of the paper this year proved
to be the summary cloze with a somewhat disappointing mean percentage
correct of only 34.

Part 1 — Reading Comprehension, Questions 1–16

Candidates achieved a mean percentage correct of 52 in this part of the paper.

The passage was an online magazine article which argued, somewhat counter-
intuitively, that the Internet has been ‘destroying our ability to communicate
effectively’.

Candidates handled straightforward word-definition questions like items 11

(57% correct) and 14 (62% correct) quite well as well as referential questions
like items 4 and 5 (41% and 75% correct).

Candidates did worse on questions where they were asked to interpret what the
writer of the article feels, e.g. items 2, 3, 8, 10 and 12 (39%, 27%, 38%, 28%
and 22% respectively). When the question specifically refers to ‘the writer’s’
opinion or view, candidates should take care to find the writer’s slant, not the
view of someone else (e.g. not the definition of Trenholm and Jesen in
question 2 and not the feeling of the major computer companies in question
10). The most difficult question in this part proved to be item 12 (22%
correct). This was certainly a demanding question, as it required candidates to
correctly judge the cynical and scornful mood of the sentence: ‘How easy,
albeit cowardly, it has become to send a critical email liberally filled with
coarse expressions when your return address is nothing more accessible than
coolguy@hotmail.com.’

Part 2 — Language Systems

Multiple-choice Cloze, Questions 17–33

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Candidates managed to do well on the m.c. cloze (mean percentage correct:
48). However, they had particular problems with item 26 (only 11% correct)
and 27 (15% correct). For item 26, many candidates chose C. ‘always’ or D.
‘worrying’, but for either of these possibilities, the article ‘the’ would need to
be added (i.e. ‘always the possibility’ or ‘the worrying possibility’) for that
answer to be possible. For item 27, some 41% of the candidates wrongly
chose option D ‘with luck’.

The other ‘difficult’ items were ones involving the use of common phrases or
collocations, e.g. to answer the call of the wild (item 17), to succumb to the
call of Africa (item 20), to cling to power (item 25) and a fitting finish (item
33). To ‘learn’ such phrases or collocations, candidates have no choice but to
read widely; memorising wordlists seems futile; exposure is a more effective
and enjoyable method of expanding one’s vocabulary.

Part 2 — Theme exercise, Questions 34–47

Candidates had little trouble with this exercise, achieving a mean percentage
correct of 61. Once the candidate established that the subject of the article
was the expanding and coordinating role of the new Environment and Food
Bureau (EFB), they found it easy to identify the threads of meaning running
through the article. They did a commendable job of answering the question.

A minor change in this year’s question paper was the use of the symbol ‘¶’ to
identify the start of each new paragraph. Because of the layout of the
questions in this part of Section C, it is sometimes hard to clearly delineate the
paragraphs. It is hoped that the use of the paragraph symbol will help.

Part 2 — Summary Cloze, Questions 48 –67

Candidates’ performance on the summary cloze this year was very weak
indeed, with a mean percentage correct of only 34%. One possible
explanation for the poor showing is that the items in Version 2 appear in a
very different order to the information presented in Version 1. In other words,
to locate the information needed to complete Version 2, candidates had to be
familiar with the whole of Version 1 and to search back and forth through the
text to find what they needed. Candidates should realise that the order of
information in Version 2 may, in fact, not be parallel to the order in Version 1
and they must be prepared to deal with that difference.

As might be expected, the most difficult items, with a mean percentage correct
of less than 20, involved necessary changes to the language in Version 1 so

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that the answers would ‘fit’ in Version 2. For example, for item 48 (10%
correct) the answer ‘alarming’ is an adjective formed from the phrase ‘Many
experts note with alarm ……’ in Version 1. Similarly, item 50 ‘ten times as’
much dust (8% correct) comes from Version 1 ‘one-tenth of the dust’. The
answer to item 63 (17% correct) ‘indoors and outdoors’ or ‘inside and outside’
comes from Version 1 ‘inside the house or in the garden’. Similarly, the
active form in Version 1 ‘people who use pesticides indoors may expose small
children to significant contamination’ had to be changed to the passive in
Version 2, item 66 (11% correct): ‘children whose parents use these chemicals
inside may be exposed to high levels of contamination.’

Understandably, candidates found easier those items which involved straight

copying from Version 1 to Version 2, such as item 52, heavy ‘metals’ (64%
correct). However, they must be ready to make any changes necessary to
allow the information to fit grammatically in Version 2.

Part 2 — Matching exercise, Questions 68–79

Candidates did very well on the matching exercise this year with a mean
percentage correct of 65. All of the items were about China. As in past years,
candidates had to make use of a wide variety of ‘clues’ to make correct
matches such as pronoun and article references (e.g. K. ‘It plans ……’; J. ‘The
site ……’), adverbials (B. ‘So far, ……’), lexical coherence (M. ‘units sold
……’), etc.

Part 2 — Editing, Questions 80–98

Candidates didn’t do too badly in this part of the paper, with a mean
percentage correct of 43. However, some of the more ‘difficult’ items were
surprising.

For example, the use of the word ‘lack’ was tested in items 80 (14% correct)
and 81 (12% correct). In fact, the word ‘lack’ was also tested in the 2001
Section C examination (item 94). The various uses of ‘lack’ as a verb, a noun,
and an adjective (lacking), and prepositions used with the word (e.g. a lack of,
lacking in, to lack integrity (no preposition) commonly causes problems
among learners of English.

Item 86 (13% correct) required candidates to change ‘the followings’ to ‘the

following’. It is important to note that ‘following’ has no plural form and can
be followed by one thing or a list of many things.

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Item 88 (13% correct) tested candidates’ spelling of the homonyms ‘waste’
(‘material which is not wanted or rubbish’) and ‘waist’ (the middle part of the
body’). Candidates should be aware that similar vocabulary/spelling items
have appeared in this part of the paper before and may well be included again
in future.

Another ‘difficult item’ was item 84 (18% correct) where candidates were
expected to change the modal verb ‘can’ to ‘should’. Modals can be hard to
learn to use properly. Here, the word ‘should’ is used to mean ‘recommended’
whereas ‘can’ would wrongly convey the notion of ‘permitted’.

Conclusions and recommendations for candidates

As has been noted time and again in previous reports, the only way to
effectively prepare for the Section C Examination is to read as widely as
possible in English.

Although many candidates will reject such a recommendation as ‘impractical’

or ‘boring’, in fact it need not be either. Sources of English writing are
widespread in Hong Kong and easily and cheaply available to all. If a
candidate chooses a subject that interests him or her, reading about that
subject can give hours of genuine pleasure, as well as painlessly improving
his/her command of the English language.

Section D Oral English

General comments

This paper consists of two parts, a brief presentation by individual candidates

followed by a discussion in groups of 3 or 4 candidates. Most candidates were
familiar with the format of the examination. In general, candidates were able
to give a coherent presentation, could initiate a conversation, spoke audibly
and asked appropriate and relevant questions. Although the weaker candidates
lacked mastery of some aspects, the stronger ones showed themselves to be
proficient in all areas of oral presentation and discussion.

Part 1 Individual Presentation

(a) Time

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 Candidates are given 10 minutes to read the passage and take notes
for the oral presentation. Most of the candidates were able to make
an effective presentation with confidence, but a small portion relied
too heavily on their notecard, copying portions of text instead of
making notes. Even some strong candidates fell into this trap.
Candidates should refrain from presenting large chunks of sentences
copied from the original text.

(b) Passages

The passages are on average 300 words long. This aims to give
candidates sufficient material for their presentations while
discouraging them from attempting to copy or memorize the passage.
The moderation committees have an increasingly difficult job to find
new topics that are familiar to the candidates and yet avoid repeating
material from previous years. Examiners this year were generally
satisfied with the range of topics and language level of the passages.

It is also worth remembering that the examination is not a test of

comprehension, and unfamiliar topics should not therefore be a
barrier to good performance. However, candidates are expected to be
aware of recent world developments and current events.

(c) Problems

Once again, examiners found that the most common problem for
candidates was pronunciation of individual words. This problem was
evident not only in new and unfamiliar words, but also in more
common words such as ‘soccer’, which was pronounced as ‘saucer’,
‘betting’ pronounced as ‘beating’, ‘chef’ pronounced as ‘chief’, and
‘kitchen’ pronounced as ‘chicken’. In contrast, students are not
expected to correctly pronounce unfamiliar proper nouns used in the
passages, and alternative expressions are usually provided in the text
to assist candidates.

A number of examiners noted that candidates spent a lot of time

looking at their notecards, even when they were not actually reading
from them. The reluctance of candidates to look up and make eye
contact usually leads to an unnatural presentation lacking in
expression and fluency.

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 Examiners also noted widespread problems with intonation and
grammatical constructions.

Part 2 Group Discussion

(a) Time

Candidates continued to show that they benefit from the two minutes
preparation time provided after the individual presentations to
prepare for the discussion.

(b) Discussion topics

Examiners felt that the range of discussion topics this year was
generally accessible.

Candidates are encouraged to read extensively to improve their

knowledge of general topics and the associated vocabulary.

(c) Problems

The material contained in the passages for presentations is relevant to

the topic of the group discussion. However, sometimes candidates
failed to make use of the material in the reading passages to inform
their discussion.

Examiners noted poor performances in debate topics, with candidates

seeming to be unaware of how to properly handle such topics. Some
candidates failed to follow the instructions properly, for example
discussing a presentation when they had been asked to talk about an
exhibition.

Some of the weak candidates adopted a passive role in the discussion,

which may affect the flow of the discussion. These candidates also
tended to use stock phrases patterns like “I agree.” or “What do you
think?” during the discussion. Many of the discussions were on a
very superficial level.

General recommendations

Candidates are advised to be more socially aware of what is going on in the

world. General understanding of social and topical issues will help them to

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contribute to the discussion. Reading English-language newspapers and
magazines, and watching news and documentary programmes in English on
the television can assist in this.

Candidates should not rely too much on the use of the notecard during
individual presentation, and should aim for a more natural approach. In the
discussion they should look at the other candidates from time to time while
speaking, and listen to others’ contributions so that they can fully explore the
topic.

More attention to pronunciation and intonation is essential.

Section E Practical Skills for Work & Study

In this year’s paper, candidates had to assume the role of a student who was a
member of a School English Club which was invited to help in preparing the
Anniversary Newsletter of the school.

Candidates had three tasks: to write an article, to complete a timeline and to

correct a fact sheet. They had a variety of sources, in both written and
graphical forms, from which to select information to complete the tasks.

Task 1

In Task 1, candidates were asked to write an article about the school for the
Anniversary Newsletter. A specific title, ‘Wah Fu College – Yesterday and
Today’, indicating what was expected in terms of content was provided.
Candidates had to write about the founding of the school and then contrast the
school at the time of its founding with the present situation in three major
areas: school premises; people; and school mission and philosophy.

The task was set in a familiar context for the candidates and the majority of
them managed to extract relevant information to complete the task as required.
Performance in identifying content points and relevance of the information
was generally satisfactory. Most candidates also seemed to know how to write
an article but quite a number of them included a complementary closing and
the writer’s name at the end of the article. These students seemed to be
confused between the conventions of a newsletter article and those of a letter.

As stated in the rubric, candidates should ensure that their comments could be
understood by readers who do not have copies of the Data File to refer to.

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Many candidates failed in this regard because of their wrong use of tenses and
lack of clear time references. This rendered unclear the contrast between
‘Yesterday and Today’, which should have been the main focus of the article.
The problem was worsened by the carelessness of some candidates, e.g. giving
1976 instead of 1967 as the year when the school was founded.

Candidates’ organisation was generally satisfactory as they grouped similar

points together according to the task instructions, though inappropriate use of
signposting devices was observed. Some candidates relied on headings to
improve their organisation but such a strategy sometimes also weakened the
readability of the article when information was included under the wrong
heading.

One of the major skills assessed is the skill to synthesise. Instead of

appropriately synthesising and generalising the information collected, many
candidates tended to copy chunks of material from the sources, resulting in
very ‘reader-unfriendly’ articles and/or the presentation of inaccurate
information. For example, when comparing the facilities of the school in 1967
and in 2002, candidates simply copied the long list of available facilities
without generalising what they were listing and why such information was
being presented. Weaker candidates copied indiscriminately – without
changing the tenses, the word forms, etc. as necessary. It was very difficult to
follow such articles.

Though the articles were largely intelligible, the majority of candidates

demonstrated fundamental grammatical errors (e.g. tense, subject-verb
agreement, number agreement). More serious grammatical problems were
observed when candidates presented their interpretation of graphs and charts,
e.g. ‘the students are half male and half female’. Such a description is unclear
because of the candidate’s poor language accuracy.

Markers also noted a number of spelling errors, leading in some cases to

ambiguity and difficulty in interpretation of meaning. For example, the
‘principle’ of the school is not its ‘principal’ and the school subject ‘Art’ is
different from ‘Arts’ subjects.

In general, candidates need to learn how to organise and synthesise selected

information to improve the readability of their written work. It is the duty of
the writer to present his/her ideas in a way that the message is clearly
conveyed. Copying without synthesising will only result in ‘reader-unfriendly’
texts.

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Task 2

In Task 2, candidates had to complete a timeline of major events in the history

of the school. The task required candidates to locate the right information and
present the information in a consistent style, by writing a complete
grammatical sentence beginning/ending with the words provided. Sometimes,
they had to locate the year when an event happened.

To complete this task, candidates needed to scan the material in the Data File
with the help of the clues provided to locate the appropriate year and
determine the appropriate fact to be reported. This task seemed to be
relatively demanding but discriminated well among candidates. Weaker
candidates were either unable to include the appropriate information in the
timeline or unable to locate the relevant information.

Some candidates failed to consider the readers when incorporating information

in the timeline. Therefore, the information that they included may have been
valid but was inappropriate since it did not indicate the precise information
needed by those readers who did not know much about the school.

e.g. When the impact of a typhoon on the school was the expected
answer, some candidates wrote: ‘Students did not go to school’ for
more than a week due to typhoon damage. When the focus of the
event was the moving of the school to a new location, some
candidates wrote: The school held ‘an open day’. When the fact that
a specific American President gave a talk was the expected answer,
many overlooked the importance of clarity and precision and
provided the following answer: ‘Mr Clinton gave’ a talk about
international business at Wah Fu College.

Poor language proficiency also undermined the clarity of information

presented in the timeline. Some specific and commonly found mistakes are
listed below.

The use of punctuation and capitalisation:

X The school newsletter, Cascade was published. (√ The school

newsletter, Cascade, was published.)

* An X indicates a wrong answer or an answer with a grammatical mistake.

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X ...... won the international school dragon boat races (√ ...... won the
International School Dragon Boat Races.)

The use of definite article ‘the’:

X ...... won International School Dragon Boat Races (√ ..... won the
International School Dragon Boat Races.)

Instead of providing the exact name of the principal, some candidates wrote:

X Mr Abraham retired ...... (√ Mr Abraham Lee retired ......)

In general, candidates may have paid too much attention to the content without
considering the reader and hence produced sentences that were imprecise,
ambiguous and ungrammatical. More time should be spent in the pre-writing
stage to ensure that the register in the answer is correct.

Task 3

In Task 3, candidates were given a draft of a fact sheet to be included in the

Anniversary Newsletter. They were asked to check the correctness of the facts
and when correcting the factual errors, candidates were reminded to check the
grammatical accuracy of the final product and correct it where necessary.

Of the three tasks, most candidates performed relatively better in this task.
The majority seemed to have successfully evaluated the correctness of the
facts. But many did not proofread carefully and produced factually correct,
but grammatically inaccurate, statements. Those who performed badly in the
task may have exercised poor time management and hence did not have
enough time to complete the task.

Common mistakes observed by markers included the following:

Statement 6: The WFC Orchestra will play ...... in 2002.

The year is inaccurate here. When candidates changed the year from 2002 to
2000, they also should have changed the verb in the sentence to the past tense
but many did not make this change.

Statement 8: WFC’s NET, Miss Summers, is British but she was educated in
Australia.
The name, the gender and the place of education are inaccurate here. Some
candidates did not read the heading of this statement – ‘Current NET’ –

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carefully and hence provided information about the previous NET. Some
changed the factual information and included the correct surname and where
the NET was educated, but did not change the gender of the pronoun.

Statement 9: Most WFC classrooms have at least two computers.

There is at least one computer in all the classrooms. Many candidates spotted
the inaccuracy in the figure ‘two’. However, having corrected the statement
factually, some candidates failed to change the word ‘computers’ to
‘computer’.

General comments

As reflected in candidates’ performance, it is evident that they should ensure

that they include a pre-writing stage before starting to write. They need to
analyse the requirements of the tasks and determine who their audience is and
write in a way that is sufficiently reader friendly. Only by going though
careful pre-writing preparation will candidates be able to synthesise
appropriately.

Many candidates managed to organise their articles with an introduction and

an appropriate conclusion but the body of some articles seemed a bit
confusing, which also reflected candidates’ weakness in synthesising. It would
be useful if they could learn to spend time on grouping their ideas logically
and to include summarising statements that reflect the direction of the
discussion.

Markers expressed their concern regarding inaccuracy in language use found

in the scripts. The grammatical errors described already are mostly
fundamental and need to be addressed.

Many candidates managed their time well but others seemed to need to learn
to budget their time better. The design of this examination, in view of the
number of tasks to be completed and the amount of information to be
processed, requires candidates to spend their time wisely. Candidates with
poor time management may become careless and overlook the requirement of
some tasks. They are reminded to save time for adequate proofreading as
well.

Markers suggested that candidates should endeavour to write legibly so that

they can accurately assess the ideas presented.

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