1. ASTRID PAOLA PARADA CABALLERO

2. INTRODUCTION

When I started reading this chapter I found it interesting because it talks about three
essential components (testing, assessing, and teaching) we as a teachers should keep in
our minds and have a wide knowledge of them in order to help our students to leave
behind those fears, anxieties and self-doubts at the moment of facing a test. This article
also helped to comprehended that assessment is not only about giving a grade but it is
also about encourage students to learn from the weaknesses and strengths guiding their
learning process in an individual way.

there is brief interpretation of some important concepts I found out during my reading
activity.

3. What is a test?

It is a method of measuring person’s ability, knowledge or performance in
a given domain.
Method
Measure
It is an instrument, a set of
techniques, procedures, or
items.
General ability: Multi-skill
proficiency test
Specific competences: A quiz in
recognizing correct use of definite
article

4. A test measures…
o Individual’s ability, knowledge, and performance: Testers need to understand who the
test-takers are, what are their experiences & background? How should test-takers
interpret the results? Etc.
o Performance: It means competence, the knowledge about the language NOT the one’s
ability to perform a language( writing, listening, reading etc.)
o Domain: It means overall proficiency of the language.

5. ASSESSMENT & TEACHING
o Assessment: It is an outgoing process, the teacher subconsciously makes an assessment of
the student performance while he/she answers a question, offers a comment, tries to speak
or produce something new during the class.
 A good teacher never ceases to assess Ss.
o Teaching: It provides the opportunities for learners to listen, think, takes risks, set goals, and
process feedback from the coach to improve in their learning process. It also provides
observation in students’ performance. OBSERVATION=TEACHER INSTRUCTION.

6. INFORMAL & FORMAL ASSESSMENT
o Informal assessment can be:
o Formal assessment:
-Incidental, unplanned comment and
responses.
-Coaching & spontaneous feedback.
- Give Ss' some strategies suggestions.
-Example: very good! Good work!  Nice
job!
it is systematic, it means that there are
exercises or procedures designed to be
focused on Ss achievements in terms of skills
and knowledge.

7. FORMATIVE & SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT
o Formative assessment:
o Summative assessment:
It evaluates Ss in the process of
forming their competences and skills
with the goal of helping them to
continue that growth process
It evaluates SS at the end of the course and its
aims is measure, or summarize what Ss have
understood, how well Ss have accomplished
the objectives.

8. NORM-REFORMED & CRITERIONREFORMED TESTS
o Norm-Referenced tests:
 In these kind of tests each test-taker's score is interpreted in relation
to a mean(average score, middle score, extent of variance scores).

o
criterion-referenced tests:
The purpose is to place test-takers along a mathematical continuum
in rank order.
 These kind of tests are designed to give test-takers
feedback.
 Teachers spend more time and effort but they show
interest in giving useful feedback to the Ss.

9. APPROACHES TO LANGUAGE TESTING: A
BRIEF HISTORY
1950s:BEHAVIORISM
Testing focused onspecific language
elements such as the phonological,
grammatical, and lexical contrasts
between two languages.
1970s &1980s:COMMUNICATIVE THEORIES
“The whole of the communicative event was
considerably greater than the sum of its
linguistic elements”

10. DESCRETE-POINT AND INTEGRATIVE
TESTING
o Discrete-point tests:
It is based on the believed that language can be
broken down into its components parts ( writing,
listening, reading etc.)and those parts can be
tested successfully.
 Cloze test: it taps into all of these abilities(knowledge of vocabulary,
grammatical structure, reading skills and strategies etc.), which were said
o integrative test:
to be the essence of global language proficiency.
 Dictation test: It is an integrative test because it tap into grammatical and
discourse competencies required for other modes of performance in a
language.
 Unitary trait hypothesis: it suggested that language proficiency and the
“four skills” shouldn’t be separated.

11. COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE
TEACHING & PERFORMANCE-BASED
ASSESSMENT
 Abandoned arguments about unitary trait
o Communicative language teaching:
hypothesis.
 Bachman &Palmer: strategic competence(the
ability to employ communicative strategies)
 Real-world tasks.
o Performance-based Assessment:
 It typically involves oral production, written
production, open-ended responses, integrated
performance among skills, and group
performance.
 It is time-consuming and expensive but it is worth
it.

12. CURRENT ISSUES IN CLASSROOM
TESTING
o New views on intelligence:
o Traditional and “alternative”
assessment:
Gardner( 1832,1999)included 5 “frames of mind”
 Spatial intelligence.
 Musical intelligence.
 Body-kinesthetic intelligence.
 Interpersonal intelligence.
 Intrapersonal intelligence.

13. Advantages:
 Classroom- based testing.
 Self-directed testing on various aspects of the
o Computer- based testing:
language(vocabulary, grammar, discourse, etc.)
 Practicing for upcoming standardized tests.
Disadvantages:
 Lack of security and the possibility of cheating.
 Occasional “home-grown” quizzes.
 Open-ended responses are less likely to appear.
 Human interactive element (oral production) is absent.