NSSCO Namibian Sign Language 6107 common mistakes
NSSCO Namibian Sign Language 6107 · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
When watching a signed text, the candidate fixes their eyes on the signer's hands and misses the question facial expression (brows furrowed, head tilt, hold at the end) that marks the whole clause as a question, so they answer the comprehension item as if it were a statement.
Candidates trained mostly from vocabulary lists treat signs as the only carrier of meaning and do not yet know that non-manual features carry sentence-level meaning in Namibian Sign Language; the hands are visually salient, so attention is drawn there.
What to do instead
Practise 'face-first' viewing: before watching, decide that the first pass is only for face and body, noting brow position, head tilt, eye gaze, mouth morphemes and final holds on a tally sheet; do the meaning pass only on the second viewing. Build a personal checklist of non-manual markers and apply it to every recorded text in practice.
The candidate signs a narrative by translating word-by-word from a written English draft, producing English word order with signs slotted in (for example signing a full pronoun before every verb and placing time words in English positions) rather than using topic-comment order and established time frames.
Preparation is usually done in written English, and under exam pressure the written sentence is still active in working memory; the candidate has had little practice moving from an English idea to a signed plan.
What to do instead
Prepare productive tasks as a picture or keyword storyboard with no English sentences, then rehearse aloud-free from the storyboard. Drill the standard pattern: set the time frame once at the start, establish referents in space, then comment. Record yourself, transcribe what you actually signed, and compare its order with the English draft to see the interference.
The candidate uses pointing for third-person reference without first establishing the referent at a location, so the examiner cannot tell whether a point means 'he', 'she', 'there' or a specific person mentioned earlier; the narrative becomes ambiguous and coherence marks are lost.
Referential use of space is a spatial grammar skill that develops slowly, and candidates often point vaguely towards the signer's own body or the floor rather than to a consistent location.
What to do instead
Before any narrative, assign each character a clear location (for example left-front for one person, right-front for another) and physically touch or glance at that location on first mention. Rehearse short two-character dialogues where you must switch gaze and body orientation between the two locations on every turn; have a partner stop you whenever a point is ambiguous.
The candidate fingerspells a word letter-by-letter with long pauses and then repeats it several times, instead of producing a smooth flow with clear handshape changes, and does not mouth or otherwise mark the whole word as one unit.
Fingerspelling is often learned as an alphabet drill rather than as a way of writing words in the air, and candidates fear the examiner will miss a letter, so they over-articulate and break rhythm.
What to do instead
Practise fingerspelling in lexicalised chunks and short words rather than isolated letters, keeping a steady beat and moving the hand slightly across the signing space as a unit. Use a metronome or clapping rhythm, and have a partner read back only the whole word, not the letters, so feedback targets word recognition.
The candidate answers questions about Deaf community life in Namibia by generalising from what they have read about Deaf communities in Europe or the United States, for example assuming a single national Deaf association structure or ignoring the role of Namibian Deaf schools and regional groups.
Most accessible reading material about Deaf culture is imported, and candidates do not check whether the Namibian situation matches; local community knowledge is often learned informally and not revised for the exam.
What to do instead
Build a Namibian-specific fact file from local sources: schools for Deaf learners, national and regional Deaf associations, community events, and the status of Namibian Sign Language. For each claim, write the source and the year, and mark anything you cannot source locally as uncertain rather than guessing in the exam.
In a translation or interpreting-awareness task, the candidate translates a formal signed announcement into casual slangy English, or translates a friendly informal signed message into stiff formal English, without noticing the register shift.
Candidates focus on getting words across and treat register as decoration; they have rarely analysed how signers signal formality through sign size, speed, use of fingerspelling, body posture and mouthing.
What to do instead
For every practice text, first label the register and list the features that show it (sign size, pace, repetition, fingerspelling density, formal vocabulary, use of space). Then produce two versions, one matching the original register and one deliberately shifted, and justify the choices. Keep a register checklist for exam use.
When asked to compare a signed and a spoken language structure, the candidate claims that Namibian Sign Language is 'just English on the hands' or that it has 'no grammar', and then gives English examples as if they were sign examples.
Candidates may be fluent signers but have never studied their own language analytically, and the widespread misconception that signing is a manual code for a spoken language fills the gap.
What to do instead
Learn to identify three or four concrete structural contrasts and demonstrate each with your own examples: simultaneous versus sequential morphology, use of space for reference, non-manual adverbials, and topic-comment order. For each contrast, sign one minimal pair yourself and write a one-line gloss showing the difference.
The candidate retells a signed story or poem by summarising the plot in plain prose and omits the performed elements, such as role shift, character-specific signing style, rhythm, repetition and the visual punchline, so the answer shows comprehension of events but not of the signed literary form.
Candidates are used to treating narrative as plot and have little practice analysing signed literature as an art form with its own devices.
What to do instead
Analyse practice signed stories and poems in layers: plot, characters, use of role shift and eye gaze, repeated handshape or movement motifs, and how the ending is visually set up. Then retell the piece preserving at least two performed devices and explain why you kept them.
During a signed interaction task, the candidate prepares their own answer so thoroughly that they do not watch the partner's contribution, miss a clarification request or a question, and either answer the wrong thing or talk over the partner's turn.
Productive tasks feel like a performance to be delivered, and nerves push attention inward to the rehearsed script rather than outward to the interlocutor.
What to do instead
Rehearse interaction, not monologue: have a partner ask unpredictable questions and insert repair moves such as a puzzled face, a repeat request or a correction. Practise holding your answer loosely as bullet points and using back-channels (nodding, brow raise, brief hold) to show you are following before you reply.
The candidate reads a number or a time in a signed text as a fingerspelled sequence or as separate digits, and similarly produces quantities by spelling digits instead of using number incorporation and the correct movement for the value.
Numbers are taught early as a fingerspelling-adjacent skill, and candidates do not rehearse the distinct handshapes, orientations and repeated movements used for quantities, ages, times and money.
What to do instead
Drill numbers in meaningful contexts rather than in isolation: ages, prices, clock times, dates, scores and counts of objects, each produced with the appropriate incorporation pattern. Have a partner sign random quantities in context sentences for you to write down, then reverse the role.