Fide Exam

I had my fide exam today for German B1. It had 3 parts to it:

1) Speaking
2) Listening
3) Writing

Speaking part: 15-20 min. Two examiners, one of whom will be your speaking partner while the other
evaluates you.

They began with an outline of what would happen. In the first half, they would start the conversation at
A2 level and depending on how it goes, for the second half, they would go down to A1 level (if you're
having difficulty) or up to B1 level (if you're doing well).

She showed me just a picture of what seemed like a girl with a bike that broke and was on the phone.
She asked me what I saw and explain the situation. She asked who the girl would be talking to. Your
answer is important here because it will determine the rest of the conversation. Then she role played as
the other person on the phone and spoke for 5 min.

Once finished, the examiner and her discussed and told me they were going to B1 level. At this point she
asked me to choose one of two topics: 1) Post or 2) Health. I chose Post and she asked me several
questions about my experiences at the Post Office, like sending letters, buying stamps, paying bills etc.
Was easy. Then came the toughest question: Imagine the post office 20 years from now and explain how
things would be different. At this point, I knew my future tenses are all over the place but I managed
some how with short sentences. I was done.

Listening Part 15-20 min One examiner plays audio from the computer and you have to answer multiple
choice questions. There are 5 such questions. Then the next part, there are 5 fill-in-the-blanks questions.
Again, audio is placed but this time you have to complete the sentence by filling the blanks. I did OK, but
some of the audio questions had people with a bit of Swiss German accent, which made it difficult for
me.

Writing Part This is for one hour. I was given the A2/B1 test and the rector told us that if it is too
difficult, I can switch to A1/A2. I decide to brave it. In total it had 3 letters (2 formel and 1 informel). It
also had reading comprehension, where you have to read a large passage and choose the correct
answer. Be careful here because the options are too close to each other. The last exercise was to look at
various advertisements and then answer a question for each of them.

Overall, I think it went well. Fingers crossed!

Today I had my Fide B1 exam in Zurich. Firstly they put me in a room and there were two woman
examiner. They ask me, can u introduce yourself and I did. They asked me questions about my job, can u
give detail what you do, how you get the tasks, what about customers etc.. Total it took 5 mins I think..

then they said, we are done, please go to next room for writing test. I did and there was another
woman. She said me, choose one of the 3 topics. One was about Fiber-Internet offer from a company,
other one was about take care service for old people and other topic I do not remember..

I've chosen internet topic. There were an offer on the paper and on the second paper, they asked 3
multiple choice questions regarding the text.

And on the third paper, they ask me that write an email that I accept their offer and about your
permission ( they can come and install the new technology, fiber in this case)... Min 50 words that
mentioned. So I wrote a proper email..

I was expecting that she will say, you pass or not. But she said, next week.. So I dont know whether i've
passed the exams or not..

thats all. It was not difficult.