TESTING IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING
Testing: measuring a sample of skils, behaviors, knowledge or performance in
language learning and teaching process.
Assessment: the process of gathering information of the learners’ development
and achievement over a period of time in order to improve taching and learning.
Evaluation: refers to the process of making judgements, assigning value or deciding
worth, deciding if the students fail or pass the course or class.
WHY DO WE TEST?
• To observe students’ performance and progress in language learning
• to diagnose students’ abilities and needs
• To provide feedback for learners’ progress
• To provide information for administrators with respect to whether the program
works well or not.
• To inform parents about their children’s progress
• To inform the students about their performance and learning objectives
• To observe the effectiveness of instruction given by the teacher
WAYS OF ASSESSMENT
1) Summative Assessment:
• It aims to measure whether a students has met learning outcomes, and to
what extent at the end of a unit or study.
2) Formative Assessment:
• This types of assessment are carried out during the learning process.
• It aims to monitor students’ learning, progress, to check understanding. Main
aim is to determine learning deficiencies and overcome them.
a)Self assessment and peer assessment
b)Project work
c)Portfolios: they are purposeful collections of students’ work that demonstrate to
ss and others their efforts, progress, and achievements in particular areas.
d)Learner diaries: ss reflect on their own learning and develop autonomy.
e)Standardized tests
TEST TYPES
A) Prognostic Tests:
• These types of tests are predictive tests that decide future success of students
considering their current knowledge or abilities.
• They are generally applied before the learning process.
A1) Selection Test:
• These tests are applied in order to accept people to a particular program or job.
In order to get the job or being chosen to the program, candidates should score
higher than the others.
A2) Placement Test:
• These tests are applied to place students into groups according to their language
level and aim to make students who have similar language level study together.
A3) Aptitude Tests:
* They are applied before the language learning process, to discover potential
language areas or skills of the learners that they are possibly good at.
A4) Diagnostic Tests:
• They are applied before the academic year starts or before a new content is
taught and they aim to diagnose/identify learners’ language proficiency level.
(what they can do and can not )
B) Attainment Tests:
• These types of tests are applied at the end of a learning process. ( at the end of
a unit, term, year etc)
• They aim to assess what students have learnt.
B1) Achievement Tests/Progress Tests:
• These tests are applied to evaluate how much of the objectives of a lesson have
been reached.
B2) Proficiency Tests:
* These tests are applied to assess whether learners have the necessary language
skills. They are mostly used in prep school and they are mostly integrative.
C) Criterion and Norm Referenced Assessment:
C1) Criterion-Referenced Assessment:
• This assessment compares a student’s knowledge and skills against a
predetermined standard, cut score or other criteria.
• Students are assessed according to these criteria and they are not affected by
each other’s scores.
C2) Norm-Referenced Assessment:
• Norm-referenced test compare a student’s performance against the
performance of others. There are no predetermined criteria. Students are
affected by each other’s scores.
C3) Individual-Referenced Assessment:
• These tests compare a student’s previous performance and current
performance. They aim to determine the progress the student has made.
• Other students’ scores or success are not considered.
D) Discrete Point- Integrative Tests
D1) Discrete Point Tests:
• This types of tests are prepare to measure particular linguistic units separately. (
grammar, vocabulary, phonology etc)
D2) Integrative Tests:
• This types of tests are prepared to measure language areas and skills as a whole
rather than separately.
(TOEFL)
E) Direct/Indirect Testing:
E1) Direct Testing:
• These tests require learners to perform the skills to be measured.
E2) Indirect Testing:
* These tests measure the skills and knowledge underlying the skills and abilities to
be measured.
CRITERIA FOR A GOOD TEST
1) Reliability:
• Reliability refers to how consistent or dependable a test is.
• A reliable test carried out in the same circumstances on the same participants
should always give the same results.
• Also, a test result should be similar when marked by 2 different teacher.
(interrater reliability)
2) Validity:
It is the quality of a test which measures what it is supposed to measure.
There are 5 types of validity:
Content Validity: A test is said to have content validity if it is relevant to and covers a
given are of content or ability.
It is about how much a test represents every single element of the lesson objectives.
**Backwash/Washback Effect: It refers to the impact of testing on teaching and
learning. It can be both positive and negative.
Face Validity:
• A test can be said to have face validity if it looks like it is going to measure what
it is supposed to measure.
Predictive Validity:
• A test can be said to have predictive validity if it accurately predicts performance
in future situations.
(LYS – final scores)
Concurrent Validity:
• A test can be said to have concurrent validity if it gives similar results to existing
tests that have already been validated.
Construct Validity:
• It is the experimental demonstration that a test is measuring the construct it
claims to be measuring.
3) Practicality:
• A test need to be practical to apply, time and cost effective, easy to score, easy
to interpret and grade to have practicality.
4) Discrimination:
• A test should discriminate between the ones that know and the ones that do
not.
Types of Test Items:
- Open-ended/Yes-no/Wh questions
- True or false questions
- Multiple-choice questions
- Matching questions
- Translation
- Writing composition
- Interviews
- Dictation
TESTING LANGUAGE SKILLS AND AREAS
Testing Grammar:
• Tests at Recognition Level: They assess if the students understand the meaning of
the forms and structures. ( matching, multiple choice questions, true/false
questions)
• Tests on Production Level: They assess if the students can accurately produce the
structures. ( fill in the blanks, transformation, )
Testing Vocabulary:
• Aims to measure students’ knowledge of words, chunks, collocations.
• They can measure both students’ active vocabulary ( the ones they use
productively) and passive vocabulary ( the ones they can recognize when they
see or hear).
• Multiple choice questions, antonym-synonym, cloze test, using words in
sentences, matching, writing definitions are the examples of tests that can be
used to test vocabulary.
Testing Phonology:
• Students’ ability to recognize and pronounce the significant sounds of a
language, ability to use the stress patterns, ability to hear and produce the
intonation of the language can be assessed.
Testing Reading:
• true-false questions, multiple choice questions, open-ended questions,
comprehension questions, inference questions, reference words, putting
sentences in order are the example test types to be used to test reading.
Testing Listening:
* A test prepared to measure listening skill includes several sub-skills such as
understanding phonemes, stress, words, grammar.
Different listening types can be tested in different ways. Ex: Discriminative Listening
can be measured by minimal pair test.
Testing Speaking:
• Conversations, interviews, role plays, discussions can be used.
Testing Writing:
• While testing writing, a scoring guide can be needed. Scoring guide describes the
components of quality of the writing such as ideas, organization, word choice,
sentence fluency.
• summarizing, dictation, completing sentences, dictogloss can be used.
