This document discusses assessing receptive skills, specifically reading and listening. It begins with definitions of assessing reading and listening, then describes major models and skills involved - top-down vs bottom-up processing for reading, and micro vs macro skills for listening. Various types of reading and listening are outlined. The document provides guidance on task types for assessing both skills, such as multiple choice, cloze, ordering and summarizing tasks. It concludes with guidelines for developing effective assessment tasks.

1. Assessing Receptive Skills
(Reading & Listening)
 Teacher Trainees:
Hasna Bouhmad
Lahcen Biznoukad
 Trainer:
Ayad Charaa
Departm
ent of
English

2. Outline
Introduction:Definition
Historical Background
Models of reading
Assessing Grammar and
vocabulary
Types of reading
Assessment Tasks
Assessing Reading Assessing Listening
Introduction: Definition
Models of
Listening:Micro and
macro skills
Types of listening
Types of Listening
Assessment Tasks

3. Language teachers understand that reading is an
essential skill and employ numerous strategies to help
learners become better readers. However, as a
receptive skill, the process of reading cannot be
directly observed, nor is there a “ product” from
reading that can be objectively assessed as there is in
writing and speaking. Therefore the assessment of
reading focuses on a variety of subskills that contribute
to the total process of making meaning from printed
material.
Introduction

4. Definition
Assessing reading involves systematically evaluating
individuals' reading proficiency and comprehension
skills. It utilizes tools like tests and authentic tasks
to measure their ability to understand complex
texts, analyze information, and synthesize
knowledge.

5. Major Vs Minor Reading Skills
Major reading skills include:
– Reading quickly to skim for
gist, scan for specific details,
and establish overall
organization of the passage
– Reading carefully for main
ideas, supporting details,
author’s argument and purpose,
relationship of paragraphs, fact
vs. opinion
– Information transfer from
nonlinear texts
Minor reading skills include:
– understanding at the sentence
level syntax, vocabulary, cohesive
markers
– understanding at inter-sentence
level reference, discourse
markers
– understanding components of
nonlinear texts the meaning of
graph or chart labels, keys, and
the ability to find and interpret
intersection points.

6. Historical Background
Early 1900s
Reading assessment focused
on accurate translation of
text passages, reflecting the
prevailing GTM in language
instruction.
1930s
Structural linguists emphasized the
importance of semantics and syntax,
leading to a bottom-up approach in
reading assessment that focused on
microskills like grammar and
vocabulary.
Mid-20th century
Reading instruction shifted to a top-down
approach, where readers actively created
meaning from longer passages using background
knowledge and predictions. Reading exams
started to assess main ideas, supporting details,
and contextual word understanding.
1980s
It was recognized that a combination of
top-down and bottom-up processing was
preferable, leading to an interactive
model of reading assessment that
incorporated both global and local
levels of text comprehension.
Ongoing
-Reading assessment continue to
follow the interactive approach
-Emergence of communicative
approaches with oral
performance-focused
assessment.

7. Reading processes

8. TYPES OF READING
1.Perceptive: Attend to components of discourse (letters, words,
punctuation). Bottom-up processing.
2.Selective: Assess recognition of language features in short
stretches (e.g., matching, true/false). Bottom-up and top-down
processing.
3.Interactive: Interact with longer texts, negotiate meaning,
identify relevant features. Top-down processing with some
bottom-up.

9. Types of reading by length, focus,
and process

10. Types of reading Assessment Tasks
Information Transfer Gap filling
Open ended Questions
Multiple-Choice
True/ False
Matching

11. Reading Aloud
Written Response
Picture-Cued Items
Cloze Tasks
Short-Answer Tasks
Ordering Tasks
Skimming Tasks
Summarizing and Responding
Sequencing Tasks
Editing (Longer Texts)
Scanning
Wh questions
Types of reading Assessment Tasks

12. Assessing Grammar and vocabulary
 Grammar and vocabulary are increasingly assessed within the
context of reading passages, integrated with other language
skills.
 The TOEFL iBT exam, for example, no longer has a separate
grammar editing section but evaluates grammar and vocabulary
through integrated tasks.
 Assessing grammar and vocabulary within context allows for a
more comprehensive evaluation of students' language skills as
they produce written and spoken responses.
 Research suggests that explicit instruction and incidental
learning both benefit language learners in acquiring vocabulary.

13. Text readability
Flesch Reading Ease score
Flesch Kincaid Grade
Webfx.com/tools/read-able
Datayze.com/readbility
Rewordify.com

14. Guidelines for preparing tasks
 Align with Purpose: Ensure that the reading
assessment aligns with the specific purpose
and objectives of the evaluation.
 Authenticity: Use authentic texts and tasks
that reflect real-world reading situations.
Select texts that are relevant to the context
and interests of the test-takers.
 Text Selection: Choose texts that are
appropriate in terms of difficulty level, length,
and content. Consider the test-takers'
proficiency level and ensure that the texts
provide enough opportunities for
comprehension and analysis.
 Task Variety: Incorporate a variety of task
types to assess different reading skills. Include
multiple-choice questions, summarizing,
analyzing information, matching, and other
relevant tasks that measure comprehension,
inference, and critical thinking.
 Clear Instructions
 Time Management: Allow sufficient time for
test-takers to complete the reading
assessment without feeling rushed.
 Scoring Criteria: Develop clear and objective
scoring criteria for each task.

15. Definition:
Assessing listening is the process of
assessing the spoken text through the
auditory insight. It requires the
ability to recognize the spoken input
with the auditory capacity and the
knowledge of spoken language.

16. Brown states that listening
comprehension assessment involves two
main aspects: language aspects (micro
skill) and content understanding (macro
skill).
Micro and macro skills of listening:

17. Micro skills include:
• Discriminating among the distinctive
sounds of English;
• Recognizing reduced forms of words;
• Processing speech at different rates of
delivery Recognizing grammatical
word classes, systems, and pattern
rules;
• Recognizing meanings by different
grammatical forms;
• Recognizing cohesive devices in
spoken discourse
Macro skills include:
• Recognizing the communicative
functions of utterances according to
situations;
• Inferring situations, goals, and
participants using real-world
knowledge;
• Predicting outcomes, inferring links and
connections between events;
• Using facial, kinesics, and body
language to decipher meaning;
• Developing and using a battery of
listening strategies.

18. Types of listening
Intensive:
It focuses on
components(Ph
onemes, words,
intonation,
discourse
markers)
Responsive:
A significant
proportion of
classroom listening
activity consists of
short stretches of
teacher language
designed to elicit
immediate
responses.
Selective:
Its purpose is not to
look for the global
or general
meanings, but to be
able to find
important
information in a
field of potentially
distracting
information.
Extensive:
Its purpose is
to develop a
top-down,
global
understanding
of spoken
language.

19. Types of Listening Assessment Tasks
1.Comprehension Listening
It involves comprehending the speaker’s message based on
different features such as vocabulary, language skills,
perception.

20. 2.Intensive Listening Tasks:
- Intensive listening assessments test the student’s ability to
recognize phonemes, morphemes, words and different
derivatives thereof, as well as discourse markers and intonation.
- This form of listening assessment assesses students’ ability to
correctly identify different phonemes and morphemes commonly
found in the English language.
Types of Listening Assessment Tasks

21. 3.Responsive listening tasks:
Responsive listening is another task used in listening
assessments. It can be assessed in more than one
manner. It allows the students to actively participate and
produce the language through speaking or writing in
response to spoken stimulus.
Types of Listening Assessment Tasks

22. 4- Selective Listening Tasks
It is when a student listens to a piece of information and must
discern specific information.
There are several activities for this task, such as:
• Listening cloze (students fill in the blanks);
• Chart completion (students feel in a grid);
• Sentence repetition (students repeat stimulus sentence).
Types of Listening Assessment Tasks

23. 5- Extensive listening tasks
Extensive listening tasks focus on macro-skills of listening,
such as inferring situations, goals, and participants based
on real-world knowledge, distinguishing between implied
and literal meanings, and using a variety of listening
strategies such as detecting keywords and using context
to guess the meaning of a word.
Types of Listening Assessment Tasks

24. Types of Listening Assessment Tasks
There are several activities for this task, such as:
Dictation
Dialogue
Lecture (students take notes, summarize, and list main points);
Interpretive tasks (students hear a poem – interpret meaning);
Stories, narrative (students retell a story).

25. Process of listening

26. QUIZ:
Extensive listening
Intensive listening Responsive listening
Selective listening
The test-taker listens to a limited quantity of aural input and
must discern within it some specific information. What the
type of this designing assessment task?

27. QUIZ:
What techniques are needed by selective listening?
Dictation, authentic
listening tasks, and
communicative stimulus-
response
Listening cloze,
information transfer, and
sentence repetition
Recognizing phonological
and paraphrase
recognition
Note taking, editing,
interpretive tasks, and
retelling

28. Understanding
sentence-level
vocabulary and syntax
Recognizing discourse
markers and
references
Identifying the
meaning of graph or
chart labels
Scanning for specific
details in a passage
QUIZ:
Which of the following is considered a major reading
skill in language assessment?

29. In a cloze exercise, which principle is typically
used to determine the missing words?
QUIZ:
Deletion based on
grammar and meaning
Random selection of
words
Removal of function
words only
Omission of content
words only

30. References:
• MacMillan, Fabiana M. "8. Assessing reading." Handbook of second language
assessment. De Gruyter Mouton, 2016. 113-130.
• Coombe, Christine Anne, Keith S. Folse, and Nancy J. Hubley. A practical guide to
assessing English language learners. University of Michigan Press, 2007.
• Spinelli, Cathleen G. Classroom Assessment for Students in Special and General
Education, 3/e. Pearson Education India, 2010.
• Alderson, Charles J., and J. Charles Alderson. Assessing reading. Cambridge
University Press, 2000.
• Hubley, Nancy J. "Reading Assessment." The TESOL Encyclopedia of English
Language Teaching (2018): 1-7.
• https://tenrycolle.com/skills/lisening/assessment-of-listening-skill/
• https://englishpost.org/how-to-assess-listening/
• https://www.coursesidekick.com/communications/study-guides/atd-fscj-
publicspeaking/types-of-listening