Test your English with the TIE exam
TIE exam is an excellent choice for SEDA’s Elementary and Pre-Intermediate students who want to test their English and prepare for more advanced examinations like Cambridge or IELTS.
By Holly Byrne
We are very excited to be able to offer the TIE exam to SEDA students. This exam is available to students of all levels; however, we recommend it for students studying at elementary and pre-intermediate level. This is a very enjoyable exam for students to prepare for as they don’t have to study in the traditional sense. The exam has a speaking section and a writing section, but most of the work must be done before exam day.
There are 3 parts to prepare:
The investigation
This is a small research project that students do on a topic of their choice. This could be anything from research about their own city to a project about their favourite museum or about their favourite type of music. Students compile all of their information in a notebook and print pictures to add to it. On exam day, they bring their project and either talk about it in the speaking test or write about it in the written test.
The book
Students have to prepare a review of a book they have read in English. If they have not read a book in English, we have many, many, many graded readers in the SEDA library that the students can borrow. They read the book and write a short review. On exam day, they bring the book to the exam and discuss it or write about it.
The news story
This is a very practical part of the exam. Students have to choose a news topic and follow it in the news for that week to keep track of the changes within the story. They do this through news websites, the newspaper, TV and radio so they are exposed to as many news sources as possible. They also prepare a journal called a Logbook which tracks their progress.
On exam day
On exam day, the student and a partner have a 30-minute speaking exam. In the exam, they discuss general topics about where are they from, their interests, their family etc . They must discuss their investigation and then either their book or their news story.
Then they have a 1 hour written exam. They must write about either their book or their news story and one unprepared writing task which is usually an email or a postcard. In the exam, you are allowed to bring original material and a dictionary, so it is a very manageable exam.
Students who have sat the TIE exam have found it to be very interesting and very rewarding. You get to study material that you are interested in, which is a flexibility you don’t get with other exams. It is also a great opportunity to do some extra reading in English which is always beneficial and to discover something that you didn’t know before with your research project.
