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The Ultimate New York State LOTE Chinese Exam Study Guide

Sishu Mandarin

How do I prepare for the New York State LOTE Chinese Exam?

For most of the students who started learning Chinese from scratch, preparing for the Chinese Regents exam in a short amount of time is nearly impossible. Many New York State public school Chinese teachers believe the LOTE Chinese exam is notoriously hard to prepare for. We couldn’t agree more.

However, there are still ways and strategies to prepare for it, given that high school students have a year-long Chinese study period. Test preparation can still be done if you start preparing yourself early and strategically.

Key Chinese Vocabulary Words and Topics You Need to Know

  • Numbers. You should not only be able to say the numbers but also know how to read and write the numbers in Chinese characters. You will hear and see numbers numerous times in all four parts of the exam, guaranteed.

  • Subjects. Make sure you can recognize all high school subjects in Chinese, including math, English, physics, chemistry, history, economics…These subject words are highly relevant to high school life and have been seen in the Regents exam multiple times.

  • School-related words: You need to know all the expressions about different grade levels (kindergarten, high school, college, etc.) and places in a school (gym, lab, cafeteria, etc.).

  • Chinese festivals. You should know the customs of the most popular traditional Chinese festivals, such as the Chinese New Year, Mid-Autumn Festival, Qixi Festival, etc. These Chinese festivals can be easily found on the Internet. Spend 20–30 minutes each week to become familiar with these cultural aspects.

  • Chinese zodiac. Why not? It’s fun to know about the 12 zodiac animals and figure out which animal belongs to you.

  • Job- and career-related words. You’re expected to read a job posting in the Chinese Regents. It has appeared before and may appear again in the future.

  • Exhibition-related words. Many times, the Chinese Regents will ask you to view a poster or flyer from a certain exhibition.

New York State Regents (LOTE) Chinese Test Structure

Chinese Checkpoint B Exam, created by OHM BOCES, has 4 sections worth 100 credits: Speaking (Part 1) with two role play conversations (24 credits), Listening (Part 2) with 15 questions in English and Chinese (30 credits), Reading (Part 3) with 15 questions using long and short passages (30 credits), and Writing (Part 4) with 2 questions (16 credits).

Cut Score Required: 65

  • Part 1: Speaking (separate test time and location). The speaking test will take place before the written test, usually in May. Students will be taking their tests at their school.

  • Part 2: Listening (multiple choice questions)

  • Part 3: Reading (multiple choice questions)

  • Part 4: Writing (Interpersonal & Presentational)

    • Interpersonal: Email

    • Presentational: Two story or text-based writing prompts

The speaking section is inherently impossible to hack since a student will be asked to randomly pick a topic. However, remember that time is on your side. If you put in the effort consistently, you will triumph. Your teacher should prepare you with some common everyday conversational scenarios, such as showing a friend around the city, inviting a guest from China to your home, promoting the Chinese language to a friend, etc.

Where Can I Get a Sample NYS Chinese Regents Test?

Before 2011, public schools were allowed to keep a physical copy of the Chinese Regent Exam. You might find one by asking your Chinese language teacher or school's foreign language AP.

For the electronic version of the test, the one and only one available on the Internet, click here to access the PDF version of the Checkpoint B exam, a.k.a. the Chinese Regents exam.

You might wonder why the New York State Department of Education doesn’t release the newer versions of the test. All the other foreign language tests are available to download on the Internet. Other subjects of Regents exams are also out there for teachers and students to use.

Why not Chinese? Our guess is that the Chinese Regents tests have been poorly created, and it would be controversial for the public to question the effectiveness and legitimacy of the test. Another possibility is that the Chinese assessment team is not well equipped for the task, and they have very limited resources.

How Do I Study the Sample NYS Chinese Regents Test?

We wouldn’t recommend you over-study the sample test because it’s very unlikely you'll see the same or even similar content in the next exam. What you can do is familiarize yourself with the test. Get to know the structure and difficulty of the test and be mentally prepared for it.

Do You Offer Chinese Regents Tutoring in New York City?

Yes, we do. We provide private Chinese language tutoring for all New York-based high school students. We have a team of professional Chinese teachers who are experienced with NYS LOTE Chinese test prep. Please feel free to email us at info@sishumandarin.com for more information. Online tutoring is also available.

Please see the class rates and sample class schedules here.

New York State Chinese Regents Exam Study Materials

NYS Chinese Regents Writing Template 

Below you will find an email template for the LOTE Chinese exam. This is a generic template that can be applied to nearly all email prompts. Click here to download the full writing template.

你好 (name of the recipient),

谢谢您联系我！很抱歉没有及时回复！你最近怎么样？我最近很好。我很喜欢你的建议……

…...

我们保持联系！ 期待您的回复！

谢谢，

(Your name)

Chinese Regents’ Reading Strategies

  • Find the main idea: Browse all the questions first to find the main idea of the selection before you read the passage.

  • Locate the question: Mark the keywords in each question and its four answer choices. This will help you locate the sentences related to the answers in the passage.

  • Find the answer: Read the questions again after you’ve skimmed the reading selection. Analyze how the sentences are related and choose your answer.

  • Mark the questions you are not sure about. You can come back to these later.

  • Practice scanning and skimming skills and learn to spot the subject, verb, and object of longer sentences in one second.

  • ​For the reading selections, read the question, write down the keywords on scratch paper, and find the corresponding sentence or keywords in the context first. Do not spend too much time on one question.

Chinese Regents’ Listening Study Materials

Although it’s impossible to predict what questions will appear in the listing section, we can still prepare students for it by having them complete HSK practice tests.

The listening part of the NYS Chinese Regents is roughly equivalent to HSK level 4. To prepare for it, we recommend students start at HSK 1 and gradually move on to level 4 as they approach the test date in June.

Study Timeline:

January: HSK 1 (three listening practices per month)

February: HSK 2 (three listening practices per month)

March: HSK 3 (three listening practices per month)

April: HSK 4 (three listening practices per month)

May: Enhanced listening practices and mock listening tests