12-10-2015, 10:20 PM
(06-10-2015, 10:43 AM)asrisaku Wrote: Regarding the undigestable information, because I did not have sufficient time to familiarize all objectives due to too much information, poor English interpretation(Using time longer to read, sometime misinterpret meaning), and my poor background in Safety as you said. I do not have quite good memory as well to remember it one time so I have to repeat it frequently. Often I have to challenge myself until I get it at the end.
Thank-you for that; I feel I understand what you meant better now.
I think it is undeniable that it must be far harder for non-native English speakers to assimilate information fully within a limited time period. About 10 years ago I was helping a Thai (who had lived in UK for some years) with the exam and she said that in the 5 minutes reading time (which was the standard then) she had difficulty in reading fully more than a couple of questions and therefore was well behind from the very start of the 90 minutes of exam.
I aimed to get the 5 minutes reading time extended to 10 minutes for non-native speakers only, but this was deemed impractical to implement; however it was extended to 10 minutes for all (intention was that the extra time would help all but assist proportionally more the non-native speakers). The exam should not be a language test, but it is hard to see how to improve the situation.
It is also true that many native English speakers often do not "get it" at all easily; I think this is partly because lack of practice as the IRSE exam is perhaps rather different to other exams done by people previously, but mainly because of limited experience base- "cannot see wood for the trees".
PJW