The oral examination is better suited than the written to discover the range of a candidate's knowledge; it also serves as a test of his powers of expression in his mother-tongue, or in a foreign language, and may be used (as in the examination for entrance to the Osborne Naval College) to test the important qualities (hardly tested in any other examinations at present), readiness of wit, common-sense and nerve. It may be objected that candidates are heavily handicapped by nervousness in oral examinations, but this objection does not afford sufficient ground for rejecting the test, provided that it is supplemented by others. Oral tests are used almost invariably in medical examinations; and there is a growing tendency to make them compulsory in dealing with modern languages. Oral examinations are much more used abroad than in England, where the pupils during their school years receive but little exercise in the art of consecutive speaking.
_Abiturienten Examen_ (established in 1788).
Age only limited by condition of length of school course. The usual age is 17-18.
Candidates who have not attended the 9 years' school course may be admitted to the examination on special application.
Written. Oral. German essay. Latin. Mathematics. Greek. Translation into Latin. English or French. Translation from Greek into Religion. German. History. Mathematics.
Written. Oral. German essay. Latin. Mathematics. English. Translation from Latin. French. Translation from German into Physics or Chemistry. or essay in English or Religion. French. History. Physics. Mathematics.
Written. Oral. German essay. English. Mathematics. French. An exercise in French and in Physics. English (an essay in one Chemistry. language and a translation Religion. from the other into German). History. Physics or Chemistry. Mathematics.
The object of the examination is defined as being a test of whether the candidate has fulfilled the aims laid down in the curricula, &c., prescribed for a _Gymnasium_, _Real-gymnasium_, or _Ober-realschule_, as the case may be, and the subjects of examination are those prescribed in the curricula for the kind of school concerned.
The report on the school work of each candidate in his various subjects is laid before the Examining Board before the beginning of the examination.