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What do we assess ? HANDOUT
1. Material for evaluation
Before T. selects the material for the test s/he needs to answer the following questions:
n What are the objectives of the course?
n What kinds of competences do I want my ss to be able demonstrate?
n Is the test to be the determining factor in placing a new student in a class at the appropriate level?
2. What does teacher assess ?
-pronunciation information accent
-vocabulary and spelling
-grammar (linguistic competence
-listening
-speaking (communicative competence)
-reading
-writing
-integrated skills
-learning – how to learn
-attitudes
-behaviorand and social skills
3. Pronunciation - Our aim is to develop phonemic hearing in ss and make them pronounce the words in such a way that they sound intelligible for the other users of English.
What two types of assessment are here ?
-tests of different acting the sounds
-tests of producing sounds
Those two types should refer not only to single sounds but also to accent, rhythm and intonation.
4. What does it mean to know the word / a piece of vocabulary ?
-recognize its sound and graphing form
-recall it form memory whenever it is needed
-understand its basic meaning
-know its other meanings if there are so
-can use it in correct form
-know the words collocation
-pronounce the word intelligibly enough
-spell it properly
-know when/in what situation/ context and who may use this word
As far as the vocabulary assessment teachers are interested in:
- receptive knowledge of vocabulary [ability to understand them when they are heard or read]
- productive knowledge of vocabulary [in other words, producing the words, either in spoken or written form]
5. Grammar
The aim of grammar testing is checking the students’ ability to
- understand a given utterance/text and intentions of the speaker/writer,
- and create and use the structures correctly.
So what does assessment focus on ?
-testing understanding and differentiating the structures
-testing the production of grammar structures
6. Listening comprehension
Active skill that includes such sub-skills as: predicting content, inferring meaning from content, listening for gist, and for detailed info, ability to get the message from the fragments of listened texts/conversations, ability to define the type of text/genre/style. Training ss to do this gives them a head start in their learning career. Assessment should, therefore, check progress in a variety of listening sub-skills.
7. Speaking - It consists of several elements such as pronunciation, intonation, and turn-taking. The overall aim of speaking is to achieve oral communication – to be successful in conveying messages.
What are the objectives ?
-to be able to start, continue and finish a conversation
-to be able to describe your thoughts and ideas
- to be able to initiate and react in different speech acts
[When assessing YLL, the emphasis should be on their communicative ability in basic functions, such as asking questions or introducing themselves.]
8. Reading comprehension
It involves various sub-skills: reading for detail (intensive reading), reading for gist (skimming), reading for specific info (scanning), predicting content, inferring meaning from content and context, ability to define the text’s type/genre, and ability to grasp the text’s coherence.
Ts must help to develop & assess these sub-skills regularly as they increase ss’ exposure to the target language.
9. Writing – why is it considered as the most difficult one – what does it consist of ?
-handwriting
-speaking
-syntax
-grammar
-paragraphitc
-presenting ideas
-ability to build coherent
-cohesive texts
-observing
[As for the YLL the most important writing skills are mastering the alphabet, copying, handwriting, spelling, and basic sentence formation.]
10. Integrated skills - Why we should assess skills together as integrated ones ?
Assessing skills separately often does not reflect red-life. All language skills are integrated in red-life and rarely used in isolation.
11. Learning-how-to-learn
The ability to:
- know how to learn in a most effective way (which means knowing you learning style)
- how to reflect on your own learning and how to organize it
- Get to know different learning skills
[where to find necessary info, how to use different sources of info (internet, dictionaries, etc.)]
is inevitable for ss to become autonomous and self-reliant, and thus ss develop useful learning habits, which influence the rest of their learning career.
12. How/when can we assess learner’s attitudes ?
Attitude assessment can be done during conferencing (short, private conversation with students) or through questionnaires and observation.
Although it is not possible to give objective marks for that, you can create profiles of individual ss, which will enable you to intervene if a child expresses over-negative feelings.
13. Why should we assess student’s behavioral and social skills ?
Teachers are charged with the education and development of the student as a whole person. Becoming a good team member being polite, sensitive to other feeling and appreciative of their efforts are some of the qualities all teachers should promote and assess.
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