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Assessment

Your performance on your chosen pre-sessional course will be assessed in a variety of different ways.

Successful completion of your course is defined as:

  • at least 90% attendance/engagement
  • completion of all assessments and tests
  • an overall pre-sessional assessment score of
    • at least 40% for academic programmes requiring 6.5 IELTS
      (20, 12 and 8 week programmes)
    • at least 50% for academic programmes requiring 7.0 IELTS
      (10 week programme).

Assessment methods

Your final pre-sessional score will be based on the following four summative assessments:

An extended academic style essay

The essay, which must follow a model provided by the course tutor, should be between 1,200-1,300 words, and contain a discursive element.

25% of final mark

Speaking assessments

There are two spoken assessments to be completed during the course.

In the first of these students will be required to give an individual presentation of 5-6 minutes in length which will be formally assessed. The topic of the presentation will be related to students’ onward programme of study.

10% of final mark

In the second spoken assessment, students will be required to participate in a group seminar of 20-25 minutes and will be assessed on their contributions. The topic will be provided beforehand and notes can be used to support discussion.

15% of final mark

End-course test

Based on the academic and study skills learnt during the course, this test consists of reading comprehension, listening comprehension, and an essay in which the writer uses the arguments from the listening and reading material of the test together with their own ideas to explain their viewpoint on a given topic.

50% of final mark

The following formative, practice tests are compulsory but do not count towards your final score:

Practice test – all courses

This provides useful practice for students ahead of the end-course test. This consists of listening comprehension, reading comprehension and an essay in which the writer uses the arguments from the listening and reading material of the test together with their own ideas to explain their viewpoint on a given topic.

Language and skills task – 20 and 12 week courses only

This task will consist of:

  • language evaluation – exercises to practise grammar and vocabulary areas used within academic English
  • skills evaluation – exercises to assess students’ ability in listening and note-taking, reading and note-taking, written production and oral presentation of opinions.