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Stream 1 & group 2


Abguel da Silva
Dezembro Pedro Faustino
Dinércia Jonasse Francisco
Domingos Fernando
Edgar Joaquim
Irene Francisco

TESTING PRODUCTIVE SKILLS


(Licenciatura degree in English course)

Universidade Rovuma
Nampula
2020
1

Abguel da Silva

Dezembro Pedro Faustino

Dinércia Jonasse Francisco

Domingos Fernando

Edgar Joaquim

Irene Francisco

TESTING PRODUCTIVE SKILLS

Essay to be presented the faculty of


Letters and Social Sciences, English
course in fulfillment of the subject: DI
III

Lecturer: MBA. Samuel Canda

Universidade Rovuma

Nampula

2020
2

CONTENTS PAGE
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................iii

1. TESTING PRODUCTIVE SKILLS...................................................................................4

1.1. DEFINITION OF TEST...................................................................................................4

1.2. CHARACTERISTICS OF GOOD TESTS......................................................................4

2. TESTING WRITING..........................................................................................................5

2.1 FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES IN TESTING WRITING............................................6

2.1.1. Coherence......................................................................................................................6

2.1.2 Cohesion.........................................................................................................................7

2.2. TESTING WRITING APPLYING THE CRITERIA......................................................7

2.3. TECHNIQUES TO TEST WRITING..............................................................................9

2.4. TECHNIQUES TO RESPOND STUDENTS WRITING.............................................11

3. TESTING SPEAKING.....................................................................................................12

3.1. ORGANISING SPEAKING TESTS.............................................................................12

3.2. WHY AND HOW TO TEST SPEAKING....................................................................13

3.3 TECHNIQUES TO TEST SPEAKING..........................................................................13

CONCLUSION.....................................................................................................................16

BIBLIOGRAPHY.................................................................................................................17
iii3

INTRODUCTION

Nowadays, English language teachers tend to give less priority to productive skills and
students need to learn and be tested in these skills to enrich their speech and handwriting. This
study is extremely important as it deals with Productive skills also known as active skills, are
those which allow students to produce language, they are writing and speaking.

The aim of this paper is to present the different activities that are used when you are testing
your students speaking and writing. Therefore, the structure of this paper is as follows: (i)
definition of test, (ii) characteristics of good tests, (iii) testing writing, (iv) fundamental
principles in teaching writing, (v) techniques to test writing, (vi) techniques to respond
students writing, (vii) teaching speaking, (viii) organizing speaking tests, (ix) why and how to
test speaking, (x) techniques to test speaking, (xi) conclusion and (xii) bibliography.
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1. TESTING PRODUCTIVE SKILLS

1.1. DEFINITION OF TEST

BROWN (2004) believes that test is “a measurement method to gauge someone’s skills,
knowledge or performance in a certain area in a controlled environment”.

UR (1996) defines test as “an activity whose main purpose is to communicate to show the
tester how well learners can do something”.

In a few words, test is an activity or measurement method designed to see how well students
are performing and if the teachers achieved the goals or not.

The test gives a score which is achieved to define the level of learning. Therefore, test maybe
used as means to:

 Give the learners information about their performance and decide what to teach next
class;
 Give the students information about what they know, so that they also have an
awareness of what they need to learn or reinforce;
 Promote students to learn or review specific material.

Testing can be understood as any formal or informal task set in a given moment for one or
several purposes. It may be more structural or more communicative, longer and shorter, but
always given as a precise means to provide assessments. As a teacher you may need to know
how your students are progressing and how your teaching has been. The students, for their
part, need to be reassured that they progress and they will want to be shown how best they can
improve their performance. So you need to use tests either published ones, or test that you
have devised yourself.

1.2. CHARACTERISTICS OF GOOD TESTS

According to HARMER (2007:381) good tests are those that do the job they are designed to
do and good tests also have a positive effect on both students and teachers. The test is good
when it is:

 Validity: good test is valid when it measures for example, student’s reading ability.
There is another kind of validity, too, in that when students and teachers see the test,
they should think it looks like the real thing. It is called face validity.
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 Reliability: good test should have marking reliability.

2. TESTING WRITING

Writing is a productive and active language skill. It is the act of using symbols like letters,
punctuation, spaces, to convey a message. This skill requires a certain degree of mastery in
the other skills of language, in other words: speaking, listening and reading, and thus is often
referred as the consolidation of the four skills.

UR (1996) defines writing as the “means to express a thought or idea, to transmit a message
to a reader, so the structures and lexis used in it are important”. Moreover, other aspects of
formal writing should be taken into consideration, such as handwriting and correct
punctuation, as well as the appropriate vocabulary.

Testing this skill is an essential part of learning a language. It is an activity that involves
reflection and requires sufficient time to choose a topic, organize the ideas and background
information. For this task, learners are required to possess an appropriate level of English,
with a fair understanding of structures, as well as a good notion of coherence and cohesion.

HUGES (2003:75) states that “the best way of testing people’s writing ability is to get them to
write”. So when you decide to test writing ability directly, you are in a position to state the
testing problem, in a general form for writing, therefore this is divided into three parts,
namely:

 You have to set writing tests that are properly representative of the population of tasks
that you should expect the students to be able to perform
 The tasks should elicit samples of writing which truly represent the students’ ability.
 It is essential that the samples of writing can and will be scored reliably.

BAKER (2000:103) defends that the way you test will depend on the writing approach
you have been using with your students. If you have used controlled and guided activities
you may write some tests similar to those given below.

Complete the blank spaces with the following words: we, our, lots, to, have.

1. I ----------------- two sisters and ----------------


like going ---------------- school, because
we have -------------- of friends and we like
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------------ teacher.

If you use a process- writing approach, the way you give marks may be different. Decide
what marks you give for accurate, writing, correct content, creativity or appropriate style
and tell the students this on the exam paper. Always state the number of words required.
For instance:

Activity 1

Write a composition about your daily routine in 250 words maximum

2.1. FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES IN TESTING WRITING

Coherence and cohesion

PRASAD (2016) believes that “a good academic writing requires a good combination of
cohesive ties and coherent features in the text”. In communication process, cohesion gives
insights into how the writer structures what he wants to convey. A text is formed not only
with the structured string of words, but also with the contextual occurrence of the sentences.
Coherence is the contextual appearance of the utterances in the text that contributes in
understanding the meaning or message.

2.1.1. Coherence

Coherence is referred as the appropriate linkage of a group of ideas at sentence level. In other
words, coherence is related to the rhetorical aspect of one’s writing, which consists of
developing an argument, as well as supporting and synthesizing it, organizing and clarifying
the ideas one wants to present.

There are several tools that can help a learner improve the coherence of their writing and
among those one of the most practical is to use a concept map, also known as a reverse
outline. To properly use a concept map, one should do it after having finished the main ideas
of the paper, by writing down the main idea of each paragraph and this way check whether the
arguments are connected to the main idea of the text or have strayed from it. By repeating this
process, a solid argument can be achieved.
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2.1.2. Cohesion

Cohesion is also regarded as a key aspect of academic writing, due to the fact that it
immediately affects the tone of one’s writing. While it is often said that making grammatical
mistakes in a paper will not result in any point loss, if the tone of the writing is inappropriate,
it may affect one’s overall score. Cohesive writing is then referred as the connection of ideas
at sentence and paragraph levels, which is above plain grammatical correctness. (HEATON
1990)

2.2. TESTING WRITING APPLYING THE CRITERIA

According to PEHA (2003) when testing writing you should focus your attention in these
criteria: organization, ideas, voice, word choice, sentence fluency and conventions.

2.2.1. Organization

It refers to the internal structure of a piece, the thread of central meaning, the logical
pattern of ideas.

 Chooses organizational structure based on structure of own ideas;


 Creates effective beginnings that catch the audience's attention and make them want to
read more;
 Creates effective endings that feel finished and give the audience something to think
about;
 Determines sequencing based on the logical progression of ideas and the needs of the
audience.
 Paces writing effectively, spends the right amount of time on each part,
 Produces writing that is easy to follow from section to section.
2.2.2. Ideas
 Defines and develops a central idea. Supports the central idea and secondary ideas
with interesting and relevant details;
 Produces a text that showcases a clear and consistent sense of purpose;
 Sometimes includes something peculiar or unanticipated that is appropriate and
effective;
 Produces a text that shows insight, knowledge, experience, and deep thinking;
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 Produces writing that makes sense and prioritizes the conveying of ideas over
structural and grammatical accuracy.
2.2.3. Voice
 Shows a level of caring about their writing;
 Writes expressing honest statements and strong feelings;
 Takes risks with writing that lead to new learning;
 Shows a level of comprehension of the link between voice and choice;
 Consistently asserts personal preferences to make their writing more effective;
 Produces original and unique texts;
 Attempts to create and develop a personal writing style.
2.2.4. Word choice
 Uses language that is appropriate to content, purpose, audience and form;
 Uses strong verbs and intensifiers effectively;
 Writes with appropriate and precise adverbs and adjectives;
 Produces writing that includes striking words and phrases;
 Uses appropriate grammatical structures;
 Shows a clear understanding of formal and informal lexis;
 Engages in word play.
2.2.5. Sentence fluency
 Reads own writing with expression;
 Shows a wide range of sentence beginnings;
 Displays a variety in the length of their sentences;
 Produces writing that is easy to read expressively;
 Uses rhythm, rhyme, alliteration and other "sound" effects appropriately;
 Makes sentences that are of easy understanding by the reader.
2.2.6. Conventions
 Adapts their writing style appropriately according to content, purpose, audience and
form;
 Shows awareness of the vocabulary of writing conventions and uses terms in an
appropriate way;
 Knows that conventions are not rules set in stone but agreements within communities
and that these agreements can change over time;
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 Knows that specific rules are determined by publishers who follow a particular "style"
which may, in certain ways, be unique to their particular publishing houses;
 Uses capital letters to indicate where new ideas begin; Uses the word “I” in
uppercases, as well as names, places, and things that are one of a kind.
 Uses full stops, question marks, and exclamation marks to show when a statement,
question, or exclamatory remark ends.

2.3. TECHNIQUES TO TEST WRITING

RAIMES (1938) suggested the technique called free writing, the purpose of this is to evaluate
the effectiveness of the total composition including sentence, level and accuracy, larger
rhetorical matters such as unity, coherence and organization as well as effectiveness in
conveying ideas to the intended audience, including socially appropriate language and
appropriate selection of supporting details.

This technique has a good effect because students will be more motivated to write in and out
of class, knowing that their test will be an actual writing task.

WEIR (1998) proposed the following techniques to test writing: brainstorming, parallel
writing and note-taking.

2.3.1. Brainstorming

It is defined as generating words, phrases, ideas and concepts, as quick as possible, as soon as
their come to our minds, without any regard to organization, order or even accuracy. Through
brainstorming, students can work on their own in small groups, and after deciding on a topic
start producing vocabulary and making short lists of ideas relevant to the topic, as well as
making connections between the presented ideas and concepts, and asking questions when
necessary, all this in a short time frame. Following this step, students can move onto writing
their ideas, concepts and phrases on paper, with minimum regard to grammar, spelling and
organization, or even the quality of the ideas that came to their minds.

Brainstorming can also be useful for broad writing activities, for instance when students are
asked to write about childhood memories, they can, before writing their paper, write down a
list of childhood events and memories, discuss in small groups, and then select those they
consider other might find more interesting or those they remember more vividly from among
their list of ideas. (WEIR 1998)
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2.3.2. Parallel writing

Among controlled writing activities, parallel writing is considered as the freest of all rather
than simply making changes to model texts or writing in accordance to an outline, students
read and study a text and using it as a basis and model, begin their own writing on a similar
theme. Readings, dictation, tapes, and textbook dialogs can also be used to provide the initial
model.

The students listen to a series or short descriptions of people. In front of them they have a
table with some information missing, which they have to fill in from the information given in
the description. Then they write a description of each person, using the given and the
collected information. For example:

Table 1

Name Age Hair Height Clothes


Carlos Curly hair
Mariel 19 Medium-height A brown skirt and blue
blouse
(RAIMES 1938)

2.3.3. Note-taking

In this kind of activity, the teacher reads aloud a passage that is related to a school matter or
something that has been shown in the news, while the learners take notes of the information
that is being provided by the teacher. Afterwards, students compare each other’s notes in
small groups. Then, the teacher distributes a reproduction of the original text or copies it on
the board. At this point, each group debates on which member wrote the most accurate notes
and what is it that makes them particularly good.

Using these individual notes, each student writes an account of what they have seen and
finally, they read their write-ups to the whole class and finally discuss all the differences in
their annotations. WEIR (1998)
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3. TECHNIQUES TO RESPOND STUDENTS WRITING

Students need to know what is the mistake in their writing but using others alternatives and
how they can identify them. There are some common symbols for classroom strategies in
applying these basic principles that students can have in their papers.

RAIMES (1983) suggests that writing down student sentences that contain errors. Then, after
duplicating those sentences, assign a number of them, about three, to each small group. The
group’s task is to make the necessary corrections and improvements in those sentences. Once
they have finished correcting and improving them, each group shares with the class how they
have fixed those sentences. While all this happens, the original authors of those wrong
sentences are in the classroom, hearing the suggestions. It is important to establish some sort
of code, like a set of symbols, to clearly indicate errors in a sentence or paragraph. These
symbols are to be used once the students have become familiar with the different grammatical
rules and can now apply this knowledge to correct erroneous sentences. Thus, a teacher can
circle or underline the mistakes within the text and write the symbol that corresponds to that
kind of error next to the word or phrase. Similarly, the teacher can write the symbol in the line
that contains an error, so students try to figure out by themselves where the error is located.

Here are some commonly used symbols

Sp Spelling error
Cap Error in capitalization
P Error in punctuation
V Error in verb from or tense
Vocab Wrong choice of word
Form Wrong word form
Gr Grammar error
Ss Error in sentence structure

RAIMES (1983) points out that while teachers must make sure errors are treated with
seriousness, the concern for errors cannot dominate the writing lesson. Rather, teachers should
focus on the intended message is and whether it is being conveyed through the sentences. The
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aim of teacher’s language teaching and language learning should be the expression of
meaning. For this reason, teachers should allow students to help, identify and correct their
errors at a later time, and refrain ourselves from correcting on the spot without taking into
consideration the ideas the learner has tried to convey. On the other hand, it is recommended
to use another type of colour to correct errors, like black or blue, because red is often seen as
an "angry" colour, which students may find demoralizing, and so it should be avoided.

3. 1. TESTING SPEAKING

This productive skill refers to putting together ideas and transmitting them as words so others
can understand the message that is conveyed, and it is very important to make sure the level
of input is higher than the level of language production. The mastery of this skill is more
complex than it seems at first glance, as it also involves the use of paralinguistic attributes,
that is, voice quality, voice modulation, pronunciation, intonation and tone.

Speaking is almost always connected to listening, so it is often presented in pair work or


group activities, and as a skill it can be enhanced by taking part in discussions and debates.

BAKER (2000:104) highlights that when testing speaking make pay attention to these points:

 When you construct the test, be clear what you are giving marks for. You can give
marks for grammatical accuracy, using vocabulary you have taught them, using
appropriate functional language, pronunciation.
 Make record sheet like the one below so that you can record all things you want to
test and how well a student will perform.

According to WEIR (1998:73) the criteria for communicative testing, namely that tasks within
this paradigm should be purposive, interesting and motivating, with a positive washback
effect on teaching that precedes the test; interaction should be a key feature; there should be a
degree of intersubjectivity among participants; the output should be to a certain extent
unpredictable: realistic context should be provided and processing should be done in real
time.

3.2. ORGANISING SPEAKING TESTS

If you have a large class, you need to plan very carefully the way you test speaking. Here are
some ideas to help you when testing speaking, namely:
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 Do the testing over many lessons


 Test students in pairs.
 Decide if you are going to give group mark or individual mark
 Give all students a writing activity or test and call out individuals
 Always mark speaking as it happens or very soon afterwards. Otherwise you will
forget what level a student actually achieved.
 Use cards marked with topics for discussion, pictures, maps, diagrams or objects to
give students something to talk about. These will also make them feel more relaxed.
 If you record speaking tests, don’t forget to ask students to say their names.

3.3. WHY AND HOW TO TEST SPEAKING

It is important to know how and why teachers should test students’ abilities to communicate
orally. It should be said that wherever a teaching- learning process is carried out, some
instruments must exist that are able to value and measure what the individual learner has
learnt or is able to do with language. Any form of formal test to check the abilities learners
have in speaking skills should be administered, but its content and testing techniques must be
planned keeping in mind the syllabus content or what they have been taught according to the
study of needs. Therefore, test construction must be a flexible, formative and integral
procedure in which the most reliable, valid, practical, comprehensive and confidential
guidelines are set to test the different language components involved in speaking.

TORRES (2010) defends that when testing speaking, it is extremely important to bear in mind
two main features of language:

 Accuracy: is a linguistic competence language form. ( pronunciation, vocabulary,


grammar and comprehension
 Fluency: communicative competence language function (mechanical skills, language
use and judgment.

4. TECHNIQUES TO TEST SPEAKING

WEIR (1998) proposed some techniques to test speaking such as: group planning tasks,
answering and advertising, role play, live monologues, pictures different tasks, half minutes
topics and interview.
14

4.1. Group planning task

One good example of group planning task could be that of holiday planning. In this activity,
the teacher must prepare some advertisements or leaflets that advertise vacation trips. Then
teachers have to make small groups and instruct learners that they must reach an agreement on
where to go for a holiday. After that, each group is given some brochures and each group has
to plan a holiday that is within a certain budget. Give students time to read the materials and
prepare a short presentation. In this short presentation, each group will have to persuade their
classmates to choose the holiday they have selected. Once every group has made their
presentations, the whole class debates and picks a holiday from among the presented topics.

4.2. Answering and advertising

The teacher gives pupils a worksheet. In which there is a student A and B. Student A needs
another person to share a house and has put an advertisement in the newspaper. Student B
phones up about it. Both students have to ask question in order to find the corresponding
information on the worksheet.

4.3. Role play

In this kind of activity, students have to act out a certain role. They are given a fair amount of
time and have to decide how their character would act in different situations or scenes, using
information given by the teacher through role cards or by coming up with their own ideas. To
fully take advantage of this activity, the roles should be selected with the idea in mind to
create natural conflicts due to the different personalities and mind-sets. This way, when the
discussions and debates are done, the participants will not have hard feelings with each other
because at the end it was just them playing a role.

4.4. Live monologue

The learners prepare and present a short talk on pre-selected topic. This eliminates the
interviewer effect and provides evidence of the candidate’s ability to handle an extended turn,
which is a not always possible interview. If other students take the role of the audience, a
questions- and- answer stage can be included, which will provide some evidence of the
speaker´s ability to speak interactively and spontaneously. But giving a talk or presentation is
15

only really a valid test if these are skills that learner are likely to need, for example, if their
purpose for learning English is Business, law, or education.

4.5. Picture difference tasks

In groups of two, each learner is assigned a picture, which is different from the one given to
their partner. Students have to find as many differences as possible without peeking at each
other’s pictures, only using their words to describe them.

4.6. Half minute topics

The teacher gives each group a handout and four countries. Students place these in the starting
point. They throw the dice by turns and move the corresponding number of squares, each time
one of them lands on a square, and he/she has a half minute to talk about the topic of the
square.

4.7. The free interview

In this type of interview the conversation unfolds in an unstructured fashion and no set of
procedures is laid down in advance. Free interview is like extended conversations and the
direction is allowed to unfold as the interview takes place. The discourse might see to
approximate more closely to the normal social interaction in real life where no carefully
formulated agenda is apparent.
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CONCLUSION

During the production of the present paper, it was strongly concluded that productive skills
are also known as active skills, productive skills those which allows students to produce
language, they are: writing and speaking. These skills need to be tested in each lesson to see if
your students are progressing or not.

When testing writing there are two elements that must be taken into consideration, namely:
coherence and cohesion. Coherence is the contextual appearance of the utterances in the text
that contributes in understanding the meaning or message while cohesion gives insights into
how the writer structures what he wants to convey. In relation to the kind of activities which
can be used to test writing, the suggested are: free writing, parallel writing, brainstorming and
note-taking.

On the other hand, testing speaking refers to putting together ideas and transmitting them as
words so others can understand the message that is conveyed, and it is very important to make
sure the level of input is higher than the level of language production. In addition, when
testing speaking you must pay attention to the fluency and accuracy. Some activities
suggested to test this productive skill are: group planning tasks, answering and advertising,
role play, live monologues, pictures different tasks, half minutes topics and interview.
17

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BAKER, J & WESTRUP, H. (2000) How to teach large classes with few resources. The
English Language Teacher Handbook. London: VSO.

BROWN, H. (2004) Language assessment. Retrieved from:

https://www.academia.edu/19979805/H._DOUGLAS_BROWN

HARMER, J. (2007). The practice of English Language Teaching. 4th edition, Cambridge:
PEARSON Longman.

HEATON, J (1990). Writing English Language. Retrieved from:

https://www.amazon.com/WritingLanguage-handbooks-language-teachers/dp/
0582002370Teachers

HUGHES, A. (2003) Testing for Language. United Kingdom: CUP

PRASAD, A. (2016). Academic writing: Coherence and Cohesion in Paragraph. Retrieved


from:https://www.academia.edu/35687243/Academic_writing_Coherence_and_Cohesion_in_
Paragraph.

PEHA, S. (2003). Assessing writers, assessing writing. Retrieved from:

https://www.ttms.org/PDFs/09%20Writing%20Assessment%20v001%20(Full).pdf

RAIMES, A. (1983). Techniques in teaching writing. New York: Oxford.

UR, P. (1996). A course in language teaching. Practice and theory. United Kingdom: CUP.
18

WEIR, C. (1998). Communicative language testing. New York: Oxford.

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