About the GESE

 

Trinity’s GESE exams are designed to complement general English language courses, and exam preparation focuses on the development of communicative skills and building confidence among candidates.

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Assessment

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GESE exams take the form of an unscripted conversation with a Trinity examiner and tests take between 5 and 25 minutes depending on the grade. At each stage, candidates carry out a number of speaking and listening tasks that show their fluency, accuracy and ability to communicate in English. Task components include:

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• The Conversation: An opportunity to demonstrate a realistic exchange of information, ideas and opinions at an appropriate level for the grade.

• The Topic: Before the exam, the candidate prepares a topic of their choice – this is used as the basis for discussion and as the basis of a presentation at Advanced stage.

• The Interactive task: A prompt from the examiner initiates candidate-led speaking and listening interactions – requiring an authentic exchange of information and opinions.

• The Listening task: Short, spoken passages prompt the candidate to demonstrate prediction, deduction and inference skills (only at Advanced stage).

As they move up the grades, candidates undertake tasks that require a more advanced use of language. At higher grades, they are expected to take more responsibility for developing and directing the conversation, rather than simply responding to a series of questions.