16-03-2006, 07:02 AM
Life in the UK test!
The time had come for my other half and I to sit the Life in the UK test! We had booked the date, so we spent 10 of our hard earned pounds on purchasing the required book. After much searching very few local book shops either stocked the books or had even heard of it. (No surprise there!)
We set about learning Chapters 2, 3, 4 which totalled about 30 odd pages. Quite a daunting task since the last time had to study for any sort of test was many years ago.
So we set about reading this poxy book and learning all the good stuff about the UK. It's nothing we don't really already know. It's refreshingly neutral, like a book of stats. And there is a lot of interesting facts in it such as:
The majority of the people in the UK live in England, the majority of these in the south. The UK is 1000 km from top to bottom, 500 km wide at the widest point and you are never more than 120 km from the coast. St David's day (patron saint of Wales) is on 1 March, St Patrick's day (patron saint of Ireland) is 17 March, St Georges day (patron saint of England) is 23 April and St Andrew's day (patron saint of Scotland) is 30 November.
After a week of reading and more reading and hopefully remembering what we had read the day arrived. We headed to our local Learn Direct Centre we were had to sit our test. We were met by a very nice gentlemen who introduced himself as our examiner. After all the necessary checks we started the test. In 45 minutes you have to answer 24 questions which are chosen from a data base of 500 questions. The questions are a either multiple choice or true and false?
Going through the test I managed to answer the first 10 questions no problem and then came the inevitable problem question. Where we one fine a registered church called the “KirkÂâ€. A) Northern Ireland, b)Scotland, C)Wales or D)England. This one had been completely stumped but something reminded me that there is a lady with a very brood sottish accent who presents the weather sometimes in the morning by the name of Carol Kirkwood. I took a chance and thought sottish accent, surname a bit like Kirk the answer must be Scotland. (There is some logic there somewhere) and how right was I. I digress eventually we finished the test within the allocated time. Apart from one or two tricky questions the test was rather simple, my husbands questions seemed to be rather more difficult than mine.
The wait then began to find out whether we had passed the test or not. You have to pass with over 75%, my husband got his results and passed with over 80% I waited with bated breath until my results were printed. After what seems an eternity my results came through and I have also passed.
We were then given our printed results which had the important red stamp that is required.
Next step for us is the appointment with the National Checking Service and hopefully naturalisation.
The time had come for my other half and I to sit the Life in the UK test! We had booked the date, so we spent 10 of our hard earned pounds on purchasing the required book. After much searching very few local book shops either stocked the books or had even heard of it. (No surprise there!)
We set about learning Chapters 2, 3, 4 which totalled about 30 odd pages. Quite a daunting task since the last time had to study for any sort of test was many years ago.
So we set about reading this poxy book and learning all the good stuff about the UK. It's nothing we don't really already know. It's refreshingly neutral, like a book of stats. And there is a lot of interesting facts in it such as:
The majority of the people in the UK live in England, the majority of these in the south. The UK is 1000 km from top to bottom, 500 km wide at the widest point and you are never more than 120 km from the coast. St David's day (patron saint of Wales) is on 1 March, St Patrick's day (patron saint of Ireland) is 17 March, St Georges day (patron saint of England) is 23 April and St Andrew's day (patron saint of Scotland) is 30 November.
After a week of reading and more reading and hopefully remembering what we had read the day arrived. We headed to our local Learn Direct Centre we were had to sit our test. We were met by a very nice gentlemen who introduced himself as our examiner. After all the necessary checks we started the test. In 45 minutes you have to answer 24 questions which are chosen from a data base of 500 questions. The questions are a either multiple choice or true and false?
Going through the test I managed to answer the first 10 questions no problem and then came the inevitable problem question. Where we one fine a registered church called the “KirkÂâ€. A) Northern Ireland, b)Scotland, C)Wales or D)England. This one had been completely stumped but something reminded me that there is a lady with a very brood sottish accent who presents the weather sometimes in the morning by the name of Carol Kirkwood. I took a chance and thought sottish accent, surname a bit like Kirk the answer must be Scotland. (There is some logic there somewhere) and how right was I. I digress eventually we finished the test within the allocated time. Apart from one or two tricky questions the test was rather simple, my husbands questions seemed to be rather more difficult than mine.
The wait then began to find out whether we had passed the test or not. You have to pass with over 75%, my husband got his results and passed with over 80% I waited with bated breath until my results were printed. After what seems an eternity my results came through and I have also passed.
We were then given our printed results which had the important red stamp that is required.
Next step for us is the appointment with the National Checking Service and hopefully naturalisation.