UNIT 4

Testing Receptive
and Productive Skills
Shenee Kate J. Balcia, LPT
Cyndie Mae R. Corpuz, LPT
Benmar B. Torres, LPT
 Testing

WRITING
 BACKGROUND

In the English language classroom,

especially at the high school and university
levels, teachers are always challenged by
how to reliably and validly evaluate
students’ writing skills, so that the
students will be better prepared for internal
and external proficiency and achievement
exams.
 BACKGROUND

Indeed, writing in the academic

community is paramount;
a student can’t be successful
without a certain level of
academic writing proficiency.
 BACKGROUND

Another question that many ELT

programs are addressing is how do
students perceive the process used to
evaluate their work?
Do they know how they are being
tested and what is acceptable by the
standards of the institution and their
teachers?
 BACKGROUND

The writing ESL students poses two major

problems:
• making decisions about the matter of
control, objectivity of the evaluation, and
naturalness in the writing test.
• test is done in a way that cannot be graded
objectively, it is necessary to develop a scale
that makes grading as objective as possible.
 Assessing and Evaluating Writing

Two main goals of testing:

• provide feedback during the process
of acquiring writing proficiency
(assessing)
• assign a grade or score that will
indicate the level of the written
product (evaluating)
 Assessing and Evaluating Writing

For testing writing, reliability

and validity, as well as choice of
topics and rater training, are
important and must be addressed
whatever the purpose of the
testing situation may be.
Reliability vs. Validity
Reliability Validity

• degree to which the scores • the degree to which a test

assigned to students’ work or assignment actually
accurately and consistently measures what it is
indicate their levels of
intended to measure.
performance or proficiency
• gender, backgound, and
• There are five important
training of the reader can aspects of validity: face,
affect the reliability of scores content, concurrent,
construct, and validity
 Five Important Aspects of Validity
(Hamp-Lyons 1991; Jacobs et al. 1981)

1. Face validity
• Does the test appear to measure
what it purports to measure?
 Five Important Aspects of Validity
(Hamp-Lyons 1991; Jacobs et al. 1981)

2. Content validity
• Does the test require writers to
perform tasks similar to what
they are normally required to do
in the classroom?
• Does it sample these tasks
representatively?
 Five Important Aspects of Validity
(Hamp-Lyons 1991; Jacobs et al. 1981)

3. Concurrent validity
• Does the test require the same
skill or sub-skills that other
similar tests require?
 Five Important Aspects of Validity
(Hamp-Lyons 1991; Jacobs et al. 1981)

4. Construct validity
• Do the test results provide
significant information about a
learner’s ability to communicate
effectively in English?
 Five Important Aspects of Validity
(Hamp-Lyons 1991; Jacobs et al. 1981)

5. Predictive validity
• Does the test predict learners’
performance at some future time?
• To what extent should we
teachers communicate these
reliability and validity concerns to
our students?
 Although we teachers try hard
to help students acquire
acceptable writing proficiency
levels, are we aware that
perhaps our students do not
know what is expected of them
and do not have a realistic
concept of their own writing
abilities?
Developing test procedures for
more valid and reliable evaluation is
necessary and important; however,
it does very little to motivate
students to continue learning if
their perceived levels of
performance are not compatible
with those of their teachers.
In addition to the need to
develop valid and reliable testing
procedures, we must not
overlook the need to raise
students’ awareness of their
abilities. It is perhaps only
through this understanding that
genuine learning occurs.
 WRITING EXERCISES

1. Copying – Young learners in

particular, or students who use a
different alphabet from the Roman
one used for English, often need to
copy characters or words in order
to learn how to formulate them.
 WRITING EXERCISES

2. Controlled exercises – Learners

write single words or phrases in
response to questions. There is little
room for error as the task is so
focused.
 WRITING EXERCISES

3. Guided writing – Using

samples or models of longer
texts to demonstrate to
students appropriate language
and structures for the task
 WRITING EXERCISES

4. Process writing – Students

choose what they want to write
but you guide them through
the process
 WRITING EXERCISES

5. Unguided writing –
Students write without
too much assistance
 TESTING WRITING

Common tasks for writing tests include:

(1) gap filling;
(2) form completion;
(3) making corrections;
(4) letter writing; and
(5) essay writing.
• Any chosen task should be evaluated for its
relevance to the student's eventual use of the
language.
 WRITING TASKS

• When assessing students at

intermediate and advanced levels, test
makers must consider:
Ø the instructions
Ø the choice of topics
Ø the choice of tasks
Ø the level of difficulty
Ø time allowed.
 1. Gap Filling

• One of the most controlled

way of testing writing
• Testees are presented with
a passage with blanks, and
they fill in the blanks.
 1. Gap Filling

• In this exercise, the learners will use

the verb base to form the correct
tense.
a) Thomas …… swimming in the
clear, blue sea every morning.
(enjoy)
b) Maria …… in the shop today.
(work)
 2. Form Completion

• Another controlled way of testing writing is

to have the test acts like filling out a form, for
example, an application.
• Advantage: at least somewhat
communicative
• Disadvantage: does not require any
connected discourse or any use of
language greater than lexical knowledge
and a small amount of grammar
 3. Making Corrections

• In some situations, testees are

presented with a short piece of
writing which has deliberate
grammar, punctuation and
spelling errors, and they are
asked to correct the errors.
 4. Letter Writing

• The stimulus for the letter may be:

Ø a situation that is explained in the
instructions
Ø a letter to which the testees are instructed to
respond
Ø information given in chart or graph form that
is to be summarized in the testees' letter
Ø pictures or drawings that give information
about a situation the testees are expected to
write a letter about, etc.
 4. Letter Writing

• In all of these possibilities, the tester must

keep in mind that the situation must be as
clear as possible for the testee, unless there
is an intention to test reading and writing
together.
• If the testee does not understand, for
example, a letter that he/she is expected to
respond to, it will be impossible to get a
sample of writing to evaluate.
 5. Essay Writing

• Essay writing is probably one of the

more common writing tasks, but it
should be used carefully.
• If the future situation of the students
will not include writing essays, the
tester should carefully consider
whether it is the best test of the
students' writing ability.
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Here are some solid, tried and tested, practical

suggestions:

• Copying text • Sentence

• Grouping completion
• Substitution tables • Transformations
• Matching tables • Dictation
• Tables and charts • Short essays based
• Reordering on pictures
words/sentences and • Dialogues
re-writing them • Writing predictions
correctly
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Copying text (for beginners)

• Grouping:
• For example, learners are given three
headings, say classroom, my kitchen,
a fruit shop, and a separate list of
words, containing, say, teacher, fridge,
tap, banana etc.
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Substitution tables:

old black coat.

man carrying
The poor is a brown hat.
woman buying
tall blue walking stick.
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Matching tables

boy her children day.

visits elderly
The girl his grandparents every week.
visit young
children their friend month.
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Tables and charts

• Reordering
words/sentences and re-
writing them correctly
• Sentence completion
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Transformations
• Dictations
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Short essays based on pictures

• For example:
Picture 1: Schoolboy misses bus to school
Picture 2: Arrives late-school clock shows the time
Picture 3: Teacher appears to be giving him a row
Picture 4: Back home, parent holds up newspaper
with the title page saying: Buses late today.
Picture 5: Boy takes newspaper into school and
shows it to the teacher
Picture 6: Teacher looks apologetic
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Dialogues
A: What’s your favourite food?
B:
A: I don’t like them. I like pears.
B.
A. I’ve never liked apples because
they’re sometimes sour.
B.
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Letters
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Letters
• Writing Predictions
 OTHER WRITING ACTIVITIES

• Letters
• Writing Predictions
• Projects
• In groups, they could perhaps collate and write
down information from short interviews and
surveys in the school
• They could design a holiday leaflet/mini-
brochure.
Issues Related to Intermediate
and Advanced Writing Tests

• For beginners: often necessary to

test writing indirectly, for example,
by giving them very limited tasks
• Intermediate and advanced stages:
writing proficiency should be tested
in direct ways; connected discourse
is necessary
INSTRUCTIONS

• The instructions should use as few words

as possible, consistent with making the
writing task and situation clear, so that
the testee does not spend too much time
on the instructions.
• Definitions should be provided in the
instructions, if any are necessary.
TIME AND LENGTH

• The instructions should also indicate the time

allowed for the task and any instructions
related to length in number of words.
• It may be useful to give the students a range
of the number of words, so they have an idea
of what is expected, though they should be
encouraged not to spend too much time
counting words.
Establishing a context and communicative
purpose

• The test should establish a clear purpose of

communicating, especially by indicating the intended
reader and giving a realistic context for the reader.
• In making the context realistic, the teacher should keep in
mind, for example, that the testee would probably not use
English in writing to someone who shares his/her native
language, so instructions to write a letter to a family
member would not be an appropriate use of context.
• Establishing the context should be done in as few words
as possible, while still making the situation clear.
Choice of Topic(s)

• Choosing the topic is a very important part of

the writing task. If the testees fmd that the topic
is something that they cannot respond to, they
will not be able to show their writing ability.
• There are various approaches to choosing a topic
and various issues to consider. There are not
always clear answers about what type of topic is
best, but the teacher should be aware of the
issues involved.
Doability

• The topic should be one that the

testees are able to respond to.
• To determine this, it is necessary to
pre-test the topic. A topic that
sounds very reasonable in context
may not work well in reality.
Knowledge

• The tester must consider the background

knowledge that the students have about the
topic.
• The topic should be one that the students have
an approximately equal familiarity with.
• If students have different levels of knowledge
about a topic, the ones with greater
knowledge about it will have a clear
advantage in writing about the topic.
Knowledge

• One approach is to choose a topic about which

the testees are equally ignorant. However, this
requires giving them enough information that
they can write, which may result in the testing of
the reading skill as well as writing, unless the
information can be presented visually.
Otherwise, a topic must be chosen that the
students are about equally knowledgeable
about.
Motivation

• Will the topic motivate students of the age, sex, field of

study, background, etc., of the testees to write?
• It is often difficult to find a topic that will motivate all
students equally. Some testers choose the strategy of
choosing a subject that none of the students are likely
to be motivated by. If none of the students are
motivated, they will at least be on equal footing.
• The problem with this approach is that it may be
difficult for students to do their best at showing their
writing skill if they are not motivated by the topic.
Breadth

• The topic needs to be broad enough

that every testee can approach it from
some angle.
• If the topic is too narrow, the testees
have little flexibility in their approach
to it and may not have an opportunity
to show their writing proficiency.
Level of Difficulty

• Like any other test, if a writing test presents a

task that is too easy or too difficult, if the
instructions are difficult to understand, etc.,
the responses that testees give will not
reflect their true ability, either because the
task is not challenging enough for their ability
or because it is so difficult that they do not
know how to respond.
Time Allowed

• If insufficient time is allowed, the

students do not have a chance
to show what they can do, and
particularly in the case of
assessing the organization of a
piece of writing.
Time Allowed

• There may be cases, such as writing an

essays for an examination, where the task
that the student needs to be able to do
in the real world will have restrictions
on time, so in some cases, it is
appropriate to allow enough writing
time for a reasonable performance.
Marking Tests of Writing

• The marking of writing tests will always be at

least somewhat subjective, but the use of
descriptors for each level of the marking scheme
can at least help make the marking consistent.
• One possibility is to make a marking scheme
for the overall quality of the writing, but the
problem is that, for example, the grammar can
be good but the organization poor.
Marking Tests of Writing

• It is perhaps more useful to have

different sets of descriptors for each
aspect of writing that you want to
consider.
• You might want to have descriptors for
grammatical correctness, use of
vocabulary, content, organization, and
mechanics.
Allowing students to choose topics

• In some cases, students are allowed

to choose from a list of topics.
• This raises difficulties in the reliability
of the grading, so unless skill in
choosing a topic is an ability being
tested, this is not recommended.
 Choice

OF TASKS
Connected discourse

• The task should

require testees to
write a piece of
connected discourse.
Realistic Task

• The task that is chosen

should reflect the type of
writing that the testee is
required to do in the real
world.
Clarity

• The testees should be presented

with a clearly defined task that
cannot easily be misinterpreted.
• Pre-testing helps insure that the
instructions are clear and that the
testees can carry out the task based
on them.
Modes of Discourse

• The test tasks should involve a

mode or modes of discourse
that are appropriate to the
actual writing needs of the
students.
The Number of Tasks

• The test should involve

more than one task, which
will give an adequate
sample of the testees'
writing for evaluation.
 Testing of

GRAMMARING
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• The notion of grammar has been

redefined as the system of rules that
every native speaker of a language has
acquired.
• It is in this sense that grammar has
moved from being a set of mechanical
structures to being psychological, or
rather, cognitive constructs.
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• Grammar has come to be described

as a competence.
• Grammatical competence
constituting only one aspect of our
overall communicative competence
in addition to sociolinguistic, strategic,
and discourse competences.
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• More recent view: Grammar as a skill

• “Grammar is to be seen as a skill not as

a competence.”
Ø When we speak or write, we are
always involved in “doing” grammar,
whether consciously or unconsciously.
Hence, this process of doing
grammar is termed “grammaring.”
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• Grammaring can be seen as a “fifth

skill.” Larsen-Freeman’s definition of
the word:

Ø “the ability to use grammar

structures accurately,
meaningfully, and appropriately”
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• Richards and Schmidt (2002):

Ø Grammaring is sometimes used to
refer to the process by which
language learners use grammar to
create messages through
grammaticalizing or adding
grammar to a sequence of words to
create finer meaning distinctions.
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• Diane Larsen-Freeman:

Ø Grammaring is an important
process in second language
acquisition. It emphasizes
grammar as a dynamic process
rather than a system of rules.
 WHAT IS GRAMMARING?

• The purpose behind teaching grammar

is no longer the transmission of
knowledge. Rather, teaching grammar
is now performed to enable students to
use grammatical structures accurately,
meaningfully, and appropriately.
• Grammar teaching is not so much
knowledge transmission as it is skill
development.
Practical
Activities for
Grammaring
 THREE CATEGORIES

• Accurately - FORM
• Meaningfully - MEANING
• Appropriately - USE
 FOCUS ON FORM

• For Larsen-Freeman, both language

form and language use are equally
important.
• In this vein, she states:
Ø Teachers who focus students’ attention on
linguistic form during communicative
interactions are more effective than those
who never focus on form or who only do so
in de-contextulized grammar lessons
 FOCUS ON FORM

• Three important activities:

• Games
• Use of rods
• Sentence unscrambling
activities
Cuisenaire Rods
Cuisenaire Rods
 FOCUS ON MEANING

• meaning should call for

some sort of associative
learning
Ø associating the form with the
meaning of a particular target
structure
 FOCUS ON MEANING

• Meaning can also be made clear by

using realia and pictures
• Mimicry of the appropriate action
is another way of making the
meaning of linguistic “signs” more
clear
 FOCUS ON USE

• The right form with the right meaning

should be selected for the right context to
ensure successful communication.
• Role playing can be considered one of the
most effective activities for developing the
appropriateness of the linguistic behavior
of students due to its simulation of real-
life contexts.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

The testing of grammar is one of

the mainstays of language testing,
since it can be argued that a basic
knowledge of grammar underlies
the ability to use language to
express meaning.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

• The most common way of testing

grammatical knowledge is the multiple-
choice test, and the most common
multiple-choice item is one in which the
student selects a word to complete the
sentence correctly.
• Students can also be asked to select the
correct response to an utterance or to
choose the most equivalent statement.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

• Error correction items are also useful in

testing grammar.
• A traditional way to test knowledge of
word order is to present alternative word
orders and ask the student to select the
best.
• Understanding of appropriate sentence
order can be tested in the same way.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

• Still another type of grammar test

item uses transformations in which
the test taker constructs new
sentences that have the same
meaning as the original sentence.
• Sentence combining exercises also
play a part in grammar testing.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

• While the testing of grammar is

limited in that it does not
guarantee that the test taker
can use the grammatical
knowledge in real
communication, it is sometimes
necessary and useful.
 TESTING OF GRAMMAR

• In constructing a grammar
test, the teacher must
consider:
Ø the ease of marking
Ø the degree of control
Ø the degree of realism.
Types of
GRAMMAR
TESTS
 Multiple Choice Tests

• These tests have the advantage of being

easy to grade and being able to cover a
lot of grammatical points quickly.
• Because my mother was sick, I ____ to go
home last week
a) had
b) have
c) has
d) hadn't
 Multiple Choice Tests

• This type of question sometimes makes use

of a short dialogue, with one person saying
something and the other person responding.
• A way of testing short answers and responses
is to give the testees an utterance, and have
them decide which of four or five utterances
is an appropriate response. This can be
either a test of comprehension or a test of
grammar.
 Multiple Choice Tests

• For example:

• "I think that tuition is much too high here."

a) I do so.
b) Do I so.
c) I so do.
d) So do I.
 Multiple Choice Tests

• Another way to test grammatical knowledge using

multiple choice items is to give testees a sentence and
ask them to choose which of four or five alternatives has
the same meaning.

• "The school should have expelled him."

a) The school didn't expel him, which was wrong.
b) The school expelled him, because it was necessary.
c) The school might have expelled him, if it had
known.
d) The school will probably expel him in the near
future.
 Multiple Choice Tests

• The test maker must find a

balance between giving
enough context and giving too
much.
• A variation on this idea is to use a
piece of prose written by a non-
native English speaker.
 Error Correction

• An error correction item is one in which the

testee is given a sentence with an error.
• Four words or phrases in the sentence
marked with letters, and the testee needs to
decide which of the words or phrases has the
error. FOR EXAMPLE:
 Knowledge of Word/Sentence Order

• The traditional way is to

present the testee with
four alternative word
orders.
 Knowledge of Word/Sentence Order

• Another possibility is to give testees the four

words and ask them to put the words in
order.
• FOR EXAMPLE:
 Knowledge of Word/Sentence Order

• This can also be done in a way

that actually requires the writer
to do some writing.
• For example:
 Completion Items

• Completion items are items in

which the testees are asked to fill
in blanks in sentences.
• FOR EXAMPLE:
 Completion Items

• For the purpose of a grammar test, the words

which fit in the blanks should be function
words, such as articles and prepositions.
• The advantage: they test production, not just
recognition.
• The disadvantage: they need to be marked
by hand and there will be some cases where
the marker needs to make judgements
about whether a response is correct.
 Completion Items

• It is possible to require a phrase

instead of a word in each blank.
• However, while this method
presents a more realistic
situation, it does become more
difficult to mark.
 Transformation Items

• In this type of item, testees are given a

sentence and the first few words of another
sentence to change the original sentence
without changing the meaning.
 Transformation Items

• The word which starts the transformed

sentence is underlined, or the testee is
given one word to use in the new sentence.
For example,
 Word Changing Items

• The testees are given a sentence and a

word which they need to fit into the
sentence by changing the form of the
word.
• For example,
 Sentence Combining Exercises

• Sentence combining exercises can play a part

in testing grammar as well as its more
traditional use as part of composition testing
and training.
 SUMMARY

• While the testing of grammatical knowledge

is limited, it does not necessarily indicate
whether the testee can use the grammatical
knowledge in a communicative situation--it is
sometimes necessary and useful.
• When considering the testing of grammar,
the teacher has to make decisions about such
factors as ease of marking, the degree of
control, and the degree of realism.