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Exam Process

Written DSH

The exam consists of three parts in the following order: reading comprehension, listening comprehension, and text composition.

For the reading comprehension part, you will work on tasks based on a reading text that enable you to demonstrate that you have properly understood the content of the text. In addition, you will be asked to perform tasks pertaining to the area of “academic language”—here, you will be required to demonstrate that you are able to deal with more complex linguistic structures. You will have a total of 90 minutes to complete these tasks.

For the listening comprehension part a text will be presented to you orally which you will be required to take notes to. After the presentation, you will receive the tasks and have 10 minutes to develop an overview of the text's content. During the subsequent second presentation of the listening comprehension text, you will be able to complete your notes. After this, you will have another 40 minutes to work on the tasks and to show that you have understood the main content of the text.

For the text composition part, you will be required to show that you can write up your own text, appropriate in content and form, on a previously assigned topic for which you will be given a total of 70 minutes to complete. For this task it is advisable that you use 60 minutes of the time given to develop the text and 10 minutes to edit it.

The entire exam thus takes 230 minutes in total. There will be breaks between the individual parts of the exam, so you should plan on the DSH taking a total of 5 hours.

You will find out the results of your exam five to six days later.

Oral DSH

If you achieved a DSH level in the written portion of the exam a time will be scheduled for the oral test. In the oral exam you will need to demonstrate that you are able to communicate with the examiners on a previously assigned topic in a way appropriate to the content and language level.

Preparation time is 20 minutes. The exam itself also takes about 20 minutes. You will first have the opportunity to give a short presentation, and afterward you will hold a conversation with the examiners.

After a short wait you will be informed about the result of the oral exam on the same day.