How to Pass the HSK 6? - A Guide on How to Do Well in Your HSK 6 Test (November 2021 Update)
Since last year’s blogpost on passing the HSK 6 test, I’ve received a bunch of questions asking me for advice on how to pass the HSK 6 examination. Since most of the questions asked somewhat overlap, I’ve decided that instead of answering each question separately, I’ll write a quick summary on here. Please note that everyone’s approach to learning a language (or in this case, studying for an exam) is different, and my understanding of good exam preparation might differ to yours. Nevertheless, as the saying goes: 三人行必有我师焉 and during the course of this we might as well learn from each other!
I understand that language tests are only a partial reflection of one’s language capabilities, and a language as complex as Chinese is indeed very difficult to systematically categorize into different levels – in most cases, achieving a certain level is the “foot in the door” to your further ambitions – nevertheless, passing an exam of that caliber and one you’ve studied for hard, is definitely an achievement worth celebrating and may further motivate you to excel during your studies or your career.
What is the HSK test?
The Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi (Chinese: 汉语水平考试, Pinyin: Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì), or better known as the HSK, is a Standard Chinese (Mandarin Chinese or Putonghua) language proficiency test administered by Hanban, which is an agency of the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China. The HSK (levels 1-6) is a written test you can either take on computer or on paper, and the HSKK (or 汉语水平口语考试) being the oral test which you have to sign up for separately - HSKK--汉语考试服务网 (chinesetest.cn).
Photo: Unsplash
Changes to the structure.
With that being said, I am aware that from 2021 onwards, Hanban has changed the structure of the HSK examination, introducing a “Three Stages and Nine Levels” structure where levels do no loner range from 1-6, but are classified into “Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced”. This shouldn’t discourage anyone who has taken the test prior to those changes, since old scores stay valid for an unlimited time and the new structure is designed to highlight those candidates who have scored particularly well during their exam. As far as I’ve heard, the content and the difficulty of the newly structured exam still matches the old one. Also, most (if not all) institutions will continue to acknowledge your old scores, and I assume that it’ll take a while for anything to happen that might prompt you to re-take the test. Please note that it is likely that a Chinese university will be among the first asking you to sit the new exam as part of their admissions process. So, if you do plan on studying in China sometime in the future, then make yourself familiar with the new test and consider taking it in due course.
General study advice.
Most people who have studied Chinese full-time for somewhere around five years will have the ability to pass the HSK 6 exam. However, being able to speak Chinese fluently doesn’t mean that you’ll automatically do well during the exam. You need to acquire certain exam skills/techniques and acquaint yourself with the content of the exam in order to perform well under exam conditions. As with any other important exam, its best you find a routine that suits you and stick with it. I’d say it’s a marathon, NOT a sprint and you should at least give yourself a couple of months of preparation depending on your other commitments. Some people, including myself, work full time while studying for the exam, so the exact amount of time you’ll need to get fully prepared for the exam comes down to you. I hope my advice is still accurate and useful to some of you preparing for the HSK test. Let’s take a closer look at the content of the exam...
What is the structure of the test?
I am sure that most people who are reading this are either currently studying for the HSK 6, or are planning to do so sometime in the future. Either way, you’ll likely to be somewhat familiar with the structure of the test. In short, the HSK 6 test is divided into three sections: Listening, Reading, and Writing, each having a maximum score of 100, thus 300 being the maximum total score.
Photo: My HSK 6 Score - All Rights Reserved
Listening.
Having worked in a professional setting for several years where Chinese was the main language of communication, I found that the listening part of the test was in fact the least challenging of all three parts. This might not be the case for someone who hasn’t lived in China at all or doesn’t use Chinese daily. Therefore, I encourage you to familiarize yourself with the test by doing past papers, which will also help you avoid some common traps.
Pitfalls: Firstly, all audio recordings play once only! Different to prior levels where some passages would repeat themselves for a second time, the passages during the HSK 6 examination won’t. I encourage you to be ready from the get-go and not daydream inbetween question. My experience was that this was as much a test of one’s ability to concentrate as it was a test of your ability to understand Chinese. Some questions try to fool you, while others are fairly easy to answer once you are familiar with how questions are formulated.
Tips: Most answers are consistent with the content of the question. Pay attention to key words used in the question which tend to pop up in the answers. Especially questions 1 to 15 try to trick you and challenge your logical thinking skills. Stay focused and follow threads without losing track of them. Listening to Chinese daily helps, but you MUST do your fair share of mock exams to get a feel of the kinds of questions they tend to ask.
Reading.
I found that reading was tricky, not because of the content, but because of the total amount of reading you have to complete in a short period of time. Many texts are about Chinese history and culture, and you will encounter words, especially technical ones or ones related to some historical object, which you’ve never heard before in daily life. Again, taking mock papers helps you prepare for the amount of reading you will have to do. Make sure to study past papers thoroughly after you’ve completed them.
Pitfalls: Again, there are some things to watch out for. First, don’t get too bogged down with a single question you might find difficult to answer, since you run the risk of running out of time. This is important since the text in later sections tends to get longer.
Tip: I left the infamous 病句 (finding the grammatically incorrect sentence from a list of four sentences) until last. This might or might not work for you, so please trial this method during one of your mock attempts. I found that this way my brain was still fairly fresh when answering questions I was likely to get higher marks at. I encourage you to do plenty of reading throughout the day up until the exam in order to improve your reading speed. You need to work on attaining a fast reading speed which stays consistent throughout the entire exam. Ideally, once you’ve become quite confident about your ability to read Chinese, you can train yourself to skim read and filter parts that might not relevant to the question. This requires a lot of practice and some gut instinct. Also, do your reading under exam conditions and time yourself - You’ll thank yourself for this when taking the actual test!
Writing.
Again, this part of the exam doesn’t just test how well you can write Chinese, but really is a test of your reading speed and your memory. This is particularly difficult since by now you’ll have taken two-thirds of the exam and you’re bound to feel a bit burned out. Why do I say it is a test of your memory and ability to read? You’ll be given 10 minutes to read a passage containing roughly 1,000 characters, and then asked to summarize it in 400 characters. I remind you that you’ll only have 10 minutes time until the passage dissapears and you have to start writing.
Pitfalls: I find the nature of the task doesn’t particularly reflect how well one can write in Chinese. Nevertheless, we don’t have a choice but to give them what they want in order to score a high mark. The examiners want you to summarize the text, not to analyze it. Typical mistakes participants make are expressing one’s own opinion about the story as opposed to re-telling it, not giving your summary a title, and not using a writing style typical for Chinese essays. I encourage you to look up the correct spacing and punctuation guidelines for modern Chinese.
Tips: Again, don’t analyze the text, don’t add your opinion. Just summarize it the best you can. Also, add a title that best fits the story. If you don’t, you’ll get penalized for it. Most passages are a story of a character(s) that embark on some kind of adventure. Stories tend to have a clear beginning, middle and ending with some moral message to them. Do your best to understand and remember the thread of the story! Remember the beginning and the conclusion, as well as the names of people, time, and the sequence of the story! If you want to score high, try to pay attention to words used in the passage and use same or similar words. Do all of the above and you’ll be just fine!
Photo: Unsplash
Study Resources.
I’d prefer not to name specific books as to avoid anyone mistaking me for being associated with one. I encourage you to browse for “HSK 6” on Amazon or 汉语水平考试六级 on Taobao if you are in China. While there’s some useful stuff out there, resources on more recent HSK 6 tests are in fact quite limited! I encourage you not to get bogged down with what books to use – having too many may be detrimental to your studies. Stick with one or two books that do the job. I find that doing mock exams and past papers did help me the most, though be aware that papers tend to get more difficult and I found that older papers from years ago are far easier than the recent ones. You can also take graded mock exams on 模拟考试--汉语考试服务网 (chinesetest.cn), but be aware that they charge per paper that you take.
In conclusion.
In summary, I can’t stress enough that the HSK 6 examination is only a partial reflection of your real language skills and scoring well doesn’t mean that you’ve mastered the language! Having lived and worked in China for years prior to taking the exam, I think that the content of the exam is very much trimmed towards testing your reading and memory, as opposed to actually testing your understanding of contemporary Chinese. One may be a flawless speaker of Chinese who can entertain crowds and people at dinner banquets but have a difficult time summarizing a 1,000-character passage, thus only achieving a mediocre score in the HSK. Or perhaps one may be very knowledgeable of Tang poetry but struggle listening and understanding people speak Chinese fast. It really comes down to giving the examiner what they ask for! This is also the case with many other language proficiency tests, so no need to over-analyze the reasoning behind it. If in doubt, remember: Prior preparation prevents poor performance!
