Article : Testing and assessment in English Language instruction

Author Saragih

Language teachers face many difficulties as it comes to testing and evaluation. The two terms
are interchangeable but their meanings and functions are not always the same. The disctintion
between the two terms helps the teachers to know exactly what they intend to do and, by this
way help them to construct better tests. Testing is a method of measuring a person’s ability,
knowledge or performance in a given domain; it must be carried out through explicit and
structured methods like multiple-choice questions with prescribed correct answers, an oral
interview based on a question script and many others. They are many common types of tests
according to the purpose the writer of the test bear in his mind. They include: placement tests
(place students at the appropriate level within a program), diagnostic tests (identify students
strengths and weaknesses for remediation), progress or in-course tasks(provide information
about mastery or difficulty with course material), achievement tests(provide information about
students’ attainment of course outcomes at the end of course), standardised tests (provide
measure of students proficiency using international benchmarks).

Among the types of tests upwards, the progress test is the most appropriate to measure the
extend to which the students have fulfilled the course objectives. In general, the test’s role is to
show teachers how successful their teaching has been, it provides the washback for them to
adjust and change course content and teaching style where necessary; it tells the students how
well they are progressing; it helps identify areas for remedial and it helps evaluate the
effectiveness of the program course, material and methods.

Assessment includes a broad range of activities and tasks that teachers use to evaluate students
progress and growth on a daily basis. Its role is to identify the learners’ needs, document their
progress and determine how teachers are doing as teachers and planners. The difference
between language test and language assessment is that language tests are simply instruments or
procedures for gathering particular kinds of information having to do with student’s language
abilities. Language assessment meanwhile, refers to the process of using language test to
accomplish particular job in language classroom and programs. The ultimate goal of language
assessment is to use tests to better inform us on the decisins we make and the actions we take
in language education.
A test is a formal, systematic (usually paper-and-pencil) procedure used to garther information
about student behaviour.

Performance is assessed by documenting the successful completion of the task or by using a

rubric to assess various dimensions of carrying out the task ( eg. Listening comprehension and
language complexity in responses to question in oral interview.

Assessment is how to identify the learners’needs, document their progress and determine how
the teachers are doing as teachers and planners.

Traditionnaly, the most common way to measure achiievement and proficiency in language
learning has been the test.

It can be ssaid that testing and assessment are subsets of teaching

ARTICLE : Testing and Evaluation in English

Author:Sheeba

A teacher should know what his/her instructional task is. He should consider the objective or
the aim of his teachind and the best ways to measure their fulfilment it by testing. The teacher
must be aware of the different testing technics but no matter the technic, tests are used in
language classes for two purposes: to test the linguistic skills of the leraners ( testing their
listening, reading, speaking and writing skills); to test the linguistic component (find out what
the students have learnt eg. Testing their spelling, grammar, vocabulary and pronunctiation).

Skill is the ability to do something efficiently, In other words, a skill is a performance of

a specific task
author Mao, A. (2022).

Literature Review of Language Testing Theories and Approaches”, Open

No matter the approach we are dealing with, Language testing is inseparable from language
learning and teaching. Spolky (1978) distinguishes three historical period of modern language
testing that he calls the pre-scientific period , the psychometric-structuralist period and the
intergrative-sociolinguistic period.

- Pre-scientific testing
This period occurs before the early 1950s. it can be considered as a preleminary step towards
the current scientific tests because language was not scientificaly defined over that period but
xas simply taught as “knowledge”. Testing was mainly based on specific language points
selected by the teacher from the textbook. Also, the prior content was grammatical rules,
morphological change and the usage of words. Testing was basically subjective because there
was no standard specification for test making and scoring. As for the items types, most of them
were subjective items dealing with the knowledge of literature and culture.
- Psychometric-structuralist testing

From the early 1950s to the late 1960s, this approach was influenced by Structural Linguistics
which defines language as a structure of signs. Hence, language was defined as a system of
symbols made up of independent components (grammar, vocabulary and pronunctiation) and
independent skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing). Structural linguistics introduced
a new teaching method referred as the Audio-lingual Method. A new testing approach knoxn
as discrete point testing also came in, which separeted the testing of grammar from the other
clanguage components and also, prevailed the testing of only one point in each item. Multiple-
choice was the main item type for testing besides other objective items like sentence
completion, blank-filling and error correction.

- Psycholinguistic-sociolinguistic Testing

This approach appeared from the late 1960s and lasted till the present time. It provided two
similar approaches to testing language namely the intergrative test and the communicative test.
The intergative test lays an emphasis on communication, authenticity and context. Gradually,
tests tended to intergrate different components of language like pronunciation, vocabulary ,
grammar within specific context. Close test and dictation are the prime item type for intergrative
tests. Now concerning the communicative language test, it tests the significance of language
(use of language) instead of the form and structure of the language (usage of language). It
attaches more importance to the use of all kinds of language skills. Communicative language
test prescribed two features: it offers performance tests requirering the candidate to be engaged
in a specific communication context and it considered the social roles that candidates were
likely to be in real-world settings and offered specified demands of such roles. In the early
1880s Michael Canal and Merril Swain introduced the concept of communicative competence
as the grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, strategic competence and
discourse competence but in the 1990s, a new model of communicative competence appeared.
Proposed by Bachman, this model know as the interactional approach to language testing
consisted of two parts including the communicative languga ability (CLA) and the test method
facets (TMF). The Bachman approach served as the milestone in the history of language testing
and the foundation of what is called nowadays communicative approach. However, the next
section which focus on the four main approaches to language testing will give further details
about the communicative approach.

Rahmawati, language testing

Citation: test must provide accurate information as possible to enable testers to make fair
decisions

(Moi) testing is a delicate responsibility beacause test are used to make decisions in people’s
life. If must be a purposed-built task which provide accurate information as possible to enable
the tester to make fair decisions. Testing is rooted in many scientific disciplines such as
linguitsics, psychology and sociology, each of which has its own intricate and unresolved
issues.

Sangkala approaches in language testing

1. Discrete-point Testing Approach

Discrete Point tests are constructed on the assumption that language can be divided into its
components parts, and those parts can be tested successfully. The components are the skills of
listening, speaking, reading, writing, and various unit of language of phonology, morphology,
lexicon, and syntax. Discrete point tests aim to achieve a high reliability factor by testing a large
number of discrete items, but each question tests only one linguistic point.
Strengths of the Discrete-point Testing Approach
- The test of this approach can cover a wide range of scope of materials to be put in the
tests.
- The test allows quantification on the students’ responses.
- In the term of scoring, the test is also reliable because of its objectivity; the scoring is
efficient, even it can be performed by machine

Weaknesses of the Discrete-point Testing Approach

- Constructing discrete point test items is potentially energy and time consuming.
- The test does not include social context where verbal communication normally take
place.
- Success in doing the test is not readily inferable to the ability of the test taker to
communicate in real life circumstances

2. Integrative Testing Approach

This approach involves the testing of language in context and is thus concerned primarily with
meaning and the total communicative effect of discourse. This approach stated that
communicative competence is so global that it requires the integration of all linguistic abilities.
integrative tests put languages skills back together; whereas discrete items attempt to test
knowledge of language a bit at a time, integrative tests attempt to assess a learner’s capacity to
use many bits all at the same time.
The fact that discrete point and integrative testing only provided a measure of the candidate’s
competence rather than measuring the candidate’s performance brought about the need for
communicative language testing. By the mid-1980s, the language-testing field had abandoned
arguments about the unitary competence and had begun to focus on designing communicative
language testing.

Strength of the integrative approach

- The approach to meaning and the total communicative effect of discourse will be very useful
for pupils in testing
- This approach can view pupils’ proficiency with a global view.
- The strength of the test such as dictation, writing, and cloze test is that relatively cheap and
easy to make

Weaknesses
- Even if measuring integrated skills are better but sometimes teacher should consider the
importance of measuring skills based on particular need, such as writing only, speaking only
- The scoring is not efficient and not reliable

3. Communicative Testing Approach

Communicative testing approach lays more emphasis on the notion and function, like agreeing,
persuading, or inviting, that language means in communication. Communicative language
testing approach is used to measure language learners’ ability to use the target language in
authentic situations. The approach beliefs that someone/ a student is considered successful in
learning the target language if she/he can communicate or use knowledge and skills by way of
authentic listening, speaking , reading and writing . Communicative language tests have to be
as accurate a reflection of that situation as possible. The example of communicative language
test is role-play. The teacher asks students to do a role-play such as pretending that the students
come to the doctor, pretending that the students are in the market.
the principles of testing in the communicative language testing can be describe as the following
(Anon, 1990):
Tasks in the test should resemble as far as possible to the ones as would be found in real life
in terms of communicative use of language
There is a call for test items contextualization.
There is a need to make test items that address a definite audience for a purposeful
communicative intent (goal) to be envisioned (might happen).
Test instructions and scoring plans should touch on effective, communication of meaning
rather than on grammatical accuracy

3. Communicative Testing Approach

Strength
The tests are more realistic to evaluate the students’ language use, as the students in
a role as though they were to communicate in the real world / daily lives.
It increases students’ motivation since they can see the use of language they learnt in
class in the real world.

Weaknesses
Not efficient (time and energy consuming)
Problem of extrapolation (Weir, 1990) (we cannot guarantee that the students who
successfully accomplish the task in class will also be successfull in the communication in
real life)

4. Performance Testing Approach

Strenth