Tuesday, 10 November 2009

AEP Course Objectives

The AEP Course at AUA has much in common with the new iBT TOEFL exam. As anyone who has recently taken it can tell you, one major difference with its past is that unlike the old paper based exam, there are no longer any grammar questions in TOEFL - not even one.
What do you think about this change? Write your response in a comment below.
  • What might the reasons for this change be? Do you agree with them?
  • Does this change make TOEFL better or worse? Why?
  • Do you think that it make the test more or less difficult?
  • How is it relevant to what we do in AEP? Do you agree with my comment above about AUA's AEP course?
  • This is a response writing activity, so you can make any other comment that comes to mind on the topic.
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12 comments:

  1. liu10 November 2009 at 08:37

    I agree with you that the structure of AEP course is very similar to that of TOEFL and it can help me a lot in preparing for TOEFL. I think the reason why TOEFL is changed is that it requires student to have more practical knowledge in English that they can use in real academic life which includes reading, writing, speaking and listening. However this change make TOEFL a lot more difficult, especially in the speaking and writing section because foriegn students have less opportunities to practice. We can practice reading and listening by ourselves but we want someone to correct our writing and speaking.

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  2. TAKA10 November 2009 at 08:39

    I think TOEFL exam was changed to be very organized. While I'm taking this exam, I feel that it examines me for my skill of every abilities of English. TOEFL ibt focus on the organization of essays, instead of grammer. In my opinion,this change is good for student who plan to study in abroad because important things in academic essays are the idea and the supporting the opinion.

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  3. Roong10 November 2009 at 08:40

    Before I went to study the AEP course at AUA, I didn't really pay much attentions about TOEFL because I looked through it once and thought there were too many grammar tests which I was very bad at. I thought I'd rather take IELTs. But now that I know about the change. I really am exciting about it and thinking that I should give it a try.
    I'm not sure why they changed it but I think the new version would be more efficient in judging wheter a student is ready to study thier subjects in English or not. A student who knows grammar well may be couldn't survive in English environtment after all.

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  4. Q10 November 2009 at 08:40

    Even though there are no specific pure grammar questions in IBT TOEFL exam, but examiners can always check our grammar in writing task and speaking task. So I think the new approach is more appropriate because students can use integrated skill in there exam which is required when you are going to study in university. And I think students who can do these tasks well without concerning about grammar too much are more likely to get a good result and can continue their further study effectively than those who only do grammar questions.

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  5. MamiJung_Mimi10 November 2009 at 08:40

    In my opinion, TOEFL test is the test to evaluate English skill all four skill. This test does not have a grammar part because grammar part can also see from your writing and your speaking.For me,it does not necessary to have a grammar part.

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  6. Peter.AUA10 November 2009 at 08:40

    I think that the move to remove grammar questions from TOEFL was an excellent idea. Under the old style test, it was difficult for native English speakers, even university graduates, to get a really high score, and that seems weird. I think it was weird because the purpose of TOEFL is to test how well you can use English in an academic setting. The old grammar based tests did not test that at all: they just tested how well people knew English grammar. Now, grammar is a fascinating subject to study, but a perfect knowledge of the grammar or a language doesn't mean you can use that language. The iBT TOEFL actually tests how effectively you can use English to communicate ideas, and that is what is needed to do well at university.
    Of course, it is useful to know grammar. In fact, it's essential, because grammar is what you use to link your words together into meaningful sentences that accurately express your ideas. That is why in this course we do spend some time looking at and worrying about grammar, but that is also grammar is not our primary focus.

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  7. ING10 November 2009 at 08:40

    I agree that the new iBT TOEFL exam is relevant to what I am do in AEP course. The fist reason is that there is no grammar question that I do not have to pay attention to work with grammar all the time in my class, however the TOEFL exam can be used to check the ability of the test takers by checking at the writing part.
    This change is worse for Thai student because grammar is a principle which student can remember and practice easier. But they have to create the idea and work with grammar in the essay in the new TOEFL. I think that is more difficult than the old one.

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  8. Pin10 November 2009 at 08:40

    For me, I have never taken the TOEFL exam before. The new iBT TOEFL exam with no longer any grammar is the good idea because student don't have to worry about their grammar, but they will pay attention with the idea and structure. I think this change makes the exam more difficult for Thai students because the student study English in the school by focusing grammar more than how to organize the structure. I think this new version will help students worldwide in the better way.

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  9. An_lma10 November 2009 at 08:41

    In my opinion, the TOEFL was changed to TOEFL IBT because it may not be good enough to evalue the english skill of student. For this kind of new TOEFL IBT, it is much better to evalue student's ability, because for the old one there were many invidual gramar questions so it was easy for student to do it but they may not know how to combine it in paragraph, it is also less listening skill.
    It is common AEP because we also dont do a lot of gramar but we do it through our writing
    Toefl ibt is much difficult for students who take it. but i think it evalues student's ability.

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  10. chie10 November 2009 at 08:42

    I think it is good change. Because, for example, most of Japanese students think much about only grammar matter but think not important about how to tell their idea. Though grammar is basic

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  11. Peter.AUA24 February 2011 at 21:53

    Since this continues to be such a popular topic, you might also like to check out the following source from Educational Testing Services, the people who create and administer TOEFL. It's full of useful explanations and suggestions.

    Educational Testing Services. (2008). TOEFL iBT Tips: How to Prepare for the TOEFL iBT. Retrieved February 24, 2011 from http://www.ets.org/Media/Tests/TOEFL/pdf/TOEFL_Tips.pdf

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  12. Peter.AUA1 March 2011 at 23:36

    Also the page on this blog, "AEP, Academic English and TOEFL: common threads".

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