in the book and provides a summary of the main points raised in the earlier chapters.
Each chapter engages the reader through the use of Classroom Snapshots, Activities, and Spotlight Studies. Classroom Snapshots take you through authentic classroom situations and illustrate interactions between teachers and students or between students and their peers, as they engage in learning and assessment activities. Each chapter also contains a number of Activities to facilitate your inquiry-based reflection and discussion about specific issues arising from assessing language learners. Spotlight Studies will further inform your critical reflection and discussion, offering not only empirical evidence which will help answer questions but also an introduction to the different inquiry approaches taken, to seek evidence in particular assessment contexts.
The book concludes with Suggestions for Further Reading, along with brief annotations. This annotated list will introduce you to some excellent sources that will help continue your professional development and learning about language assessment. A Glossary at the end of the book provides brief definitions of some terms with which some readers may be unfamiliar. The terms included in the Glossary will appear in bold print the first time they are used in the text.
Throughout the book, the terms ‘test’ and ‘assessment’ are used interchangeably. In some cases, I use the term ‘assessment’ to refer to general assessment practice, not to a specific method. Assessment tasks refer to activities used in performance assessments. The test item refers to an individual question used for a selected-response test. The contexts of assessment which I consider in this book are ones in which English is learned as well as other languages. Students learning any additional language will be referred to as ‘language learners.’ Students learning English as a foreign (EFL) or a second language (ESL) will be referred to as English language learners (ELLs).
1 Uses of Language Assessment
Preview
Language assessment is a purposeful activity that gathers information about students’ language development. It is a means to a wide range of educational ends and is fundamental to all educational pursuits. It is a practice that involves multiple people in specific socio-cultural contexts. Assessment is not a tool whose value is judged technically nor is it a panacea that can solve all educational and social problems. It is an activity whose primary purpose is pedagogical, that is, to help teachers plan instruction and guide student learning. If assessment results are not used to inform instruction and improve student learning, they are of little use. This disconnect between assessment and instruction happens in some contexts where educational reforms are driven by mass testing and where testing becomes the end in itself. If assessment is purposefully used, it has effects on people and their surroundings, even though not all effects will be positive, intended, or clear.
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