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Testing

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Teaching is an important part of every teaching and learning experience. Well-made tests of English can help students to create positive attitude toward mastering the language. Tests of appropriate difficulty also contribute to a positive tone of both teaching and learning.

Tests can foster learning by their diagnostic characteristics: they show what each student has mastered and point up those language items that need further attention. Thus students become aware of their personal language needs and, besides, tests help them adjust their personal goals. As for the teachers, tests show them if they were effective in their teaching, and which skills were mastered by the students and which of them need reviewing. Tests are mainly concerned with evaluating real communication, so the best tests are those that combine various skills and show how well a person can function in his second language. For example, a close test (from a story words are removed at regular intervals) checks grammar vocabulary and overall meaning simultaneously.

As the main idea of teaching English as the second language is communication, we can state that language components involved in communications are: vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation and all of them are parts of listening, speaking, reading and writing, therefore testing vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation can be called testing language sub skills.

Testing language sub skills doesn't show exactly how well a person knows English, but shows pupils' strengths and weaknesses in oral or written communication. Now let's pay some attention to vocabulary tests. We teach our students new words and feel a strong need to measure the comprehension and production of words in speaking or writing.

The purpose of vocabulary tests is to measure the comprehension and production of words used in speaking or writing. There are four general kinds of vocabulary tests. The first, limited response is for beginners. These test items require a simple physical action like pointing at something or a very simple verbal answer such as "yes" or "no". The second, multiple-choice completion is a test in which a sentence with a missing word is presented; students choose one of four vocabulary items given to complete the sentence. A third type, multiple-choice paraphrase, is a test in which a sentence with one word underlined is given. Students choose which of four words is the closest in meaning to the underlined item. A fourth kind of test, simple completion when the students write in the missing part of words that appear in sentence. Deciding how to test vocabulary is related to how we teach it. Today we do not recommend students memorize lists of words. Instead we teach our students to find the meaning of words through the context of the sentence that is much more efficient, we can check vocabulary both orally and in writing. So in testing vocabulary, we need to avoid presenting words in isolation. One of the ways of testing vocabulary is limited response, which is divided into individual testing and group testing. In testing children we often use directed physical responses and visuals. We do this to avoid language skills that have not been mastered yet.

Grammar tests are designed to measure student proficiency in matters ranging from inflections (open-opened, book-books) to syntax. Syntax involves the relationship of words in a sentence, including matters such as word order, use of the negative, question forms, and connectives. Limited response is especially useful for students at the beginning level, then go multiple-choice completion, simple completion, and cloze tests.

Grammar tests are one of the most popular, much teaching is based on grammar; and unlike various measures of communicative skills, there is general agreement on what to test. Grammar items, such as auxiliary verbs, are easy to identify, and mistakes in grammar can be quickly spotted and counted, and both passive and active skills can be checked. In testing grammar, we don't pretend to measure actual communication, we can do a good job of measuring progress in a grammar class, and we can diagnose student needs in this area.

Limited response is a very popular kind of testing. The grammar of students with very little ability in English can be checked without having them speak or write anything. This can be done by means of directed physical responses and visuals. You can test them one at a time, and in groups.

While individual testing you can test students individually by using oral requests. These requests can ask for easy spoken replies or simply for nonverbal actions. When teaching students who know almost no English, you can even permit answers in their native language.

Choosing grammar points to test is usually rather easy: Just determine what structures you have taught since the last test. The results on quizzes or homework assignments can show those things that students have learned well and those things that need reviewing. The points they know well can be largely ignored. A few of these, however, could be included at the beginning of the test to encourage students.

A related matter is how to give different "weight" to various grammar points. Let's say you spent three times longer on modal auxiliaries than on two-word verbs. You could prepare two or three times as many questions on the modals. This is part of the planning that is necessary. Before starting to write the questions, you need to decide how many of each grammar type to include.

At last you have decided what points to test, what multiple-choice type to use, and how many questions to prepare. You are now ready to start writing the items. First, choose a structure and then use it correctly in a sentence. Remember, a good context is very important! Sometimes only a few words are enough, such as "I don't want to go" (in testing "to plus verb"). But notice how much context is needed for other grammar points. In the following sentence, must is used to express a conclusion or deduction: "Jimmy hasn't eaten anything, and he won't talk or play. He must be ill." When many of your test items require a lot of context like this, you will want to use a two-sentence approach.

Detractor preparation is a very important part of test preparation too.

 

 

Test 1




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