Approaches to language Assessment, The Islamic University, English department, presented by Dr. Ali Al-zurfi

1. APPROACHES TO
LANGUAGE
ASSESSMENT
PRESENTED BY ALI AL-ZURFI

2. INTRODUCTION
Linguistic theory Language learning Teaching Testing
theory methods methods

3. The main purpose of classifying the theories and approaches here is to
clarify the degree of emphasis given to certain skills or linguistic
components by various theories and more importantly the testing
techniques preferred by each.

4. The major approaches to language testing are roughly classified into
four main ones:
Approaches = theoretical Method = a set of procedures, developed based on
the theories.
1- The essay Translation approach
2- The structuralist approach
3- The integrative approach
4- The communicative approach

5. ESSAY TRANSLATION APPROACH
•
* Is commonly referred to as the pre-scientific stage of language testing.
* No special skills or expertise in testing required.
* Test usually consist of essay writing, translation and grammatical analysis.
* Language is a thing learned through reading and writing.

6. STRENGTHS OF ESSAY TRANSLATION
APPROACH
1- This approach is easy to follow because teachers will simply use their subjective
judgment.
2- It may be used for testing any level of examinees.
3- The model of the tester can easily be modified based on the essentials of the test.

7. WEAKNESSES OF ESSAY TRANSLATION
APPROACH
1- Subjective judgment of teachers tends to be biased.
2- The test have a heavy literary and cultural bias.

8. STRUCTURALIST APPROACH
* Views that language learning is chiefly concerned with a systematic acquisition of a set of
habits.
* Involves structural linguistics.
* Testing the skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing is separate from one another
as much as possible.
* Language is speech not writing.
* Testing is characterized by the view that ‘testing can be objective, precise, reliable and
scientific’ (Spolsky, 1975).

9. STRENGTHS OF STRUCTURALIST
APPROACH
1- In testing students capability, this approach may objectively and surely be
used by testers.
2- Many forms of tests can be covered in the test in a short time.
3- Using this approach in testing will help students to find their strengths and
weaknesses in every skill they study.

10. WEAKNESSES OF STRUCTURALIST
APPROACH
1- It tends to be complicated job for teachers to prepare questionnaires using this approach.
2- Considers measuring non-integrated skills than integrated skills.

11. INTEGRATIVE APPROACH
* This approach involves the testing of language in context and is thus
concerned primarily with meaning and total communicative effect of
discourse.
* Integrative approach is concerned with the global view of proficiency.
* Integrative testing involves functional language.
* The use of cloze test, oral interview and dictation which involves testing
listening comprehension, spelling, and require knowledge of grammar and
vocabulary.

13. STRENGTHS OF INTEGRATIVE
APPROACH
1- The approach to meaning and the total communicative effect of the discourse will be very
useful for students in testing.
2- Can view student’s proficiency with a global view.
3- A model cloze test used in this approach measures the readers ability to decode
interrupted or mutilated messages by making the most acceptable substitutions from all
the contextual clues available.

14. WEAKNESSES OF INTEGRATIVE
APPROACH
1- Even if many think that measuring integrated skills is better,
sometimes there is a need to consider the importance of
measuring skills based students need such as writing only,
speaking only, etc.
2- Neither cloze nor dictation offers the opportunity for
spontaneous production by the testees.

15. COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH
* This approach is sometimes linked to the Integrative Approach as they both
emphasize the importance of the meaning of utterance.
* Concerned primarily on how language is used in communication.
* Authenticity of texts and situations.
* Language use is often emphasized to the exclusion of language usage.
* Communicative testing introduces the concept of qualitative modes of
assessment in preference to quantitative modes of assessment.

16. STRENGTHS OF COMMUNICATIVE
APPROACH
•
Integrated Skills focuses on the four main English skills - reading,
writing, speaking and listening - through a “Communicative Language
Teaching”
1- Communicative tests are able to measure all integrated skills of students.
2- The tests using this approach face students in real life so it will be very useful
for them.
3- Detailed statement of each performance level serve to increase the reliability of
the scoring by enabling the examiner to make decisions according to carefully
drawn-up and well-establish criteria.

17. WEAKNESSES OF COMMUNICATIVE
APPROACH
1- Unlike the structuralist Approach, this approach does not emphasize
learning structural grammar, yet it may be difficult to achieve
communicative competence without considerable mastery of the grammar
of a language.
2- It is possible for cultural bias to affect the reliability of the test being
administered.

18. LANGUAGE USE AND USAGE
Language use is often emphasized to the exclusion of language
usage. Use is concerned with how people use the language for a
multitude of different purposes while Usage concerns with the
formal patterns of language.

19. WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
THE
1- CLOZE TEST
2- T-TEST
3- C-TEST ?