Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

SUBJECT ASSIGNMENT:
ASSESSMENT AND TESTING IN THE CLASSROOM

GENERAL INFORMATION:

This assignment has to fulfil the following conditions:

- Length: between 4 and 6 pages (without including cover, index or appendices –if
there are any-).
- Type of font: Arial or Times New Roman.
- Size: 11.
- Line height: 1.5.
- Alignment: Justified.

The assignment has to be done in this Word document and has to fulfil the rules of
presentation and edition, as for quotes and bibliographical references which are
detailed in the Study Guide.

Also, it has to be submitted following the procedure specified in the Study Guide.
Sending it to the teacher’s e-mail is not permitted.

In addition to this, it is very important to read the assessment criteria, which can be
found in the Study Guide.

The assignment mark is 80% of the final mark and the participation in the activities
performed during the tutorials constitutes the remaining 20%.

1
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Assignment:

You should devise a formal “progress” or “achievement” test for assessing

language learning outcomes of:
 Specified objectives in either listening or reading.
 Specified objectives in either speaking or writing (you must specify the
objectives).

The instrument should be justified in relation to its theoretical basis. The test
should aim to test the communicative use of language and will therefore include
integrative techniques, although these might be objectively or subjectively
marked as you feel appropriate. Items which test knowledge of discrete items of
grammar and lexis may also be included if you think it is appropriate. The
rationale should minimally include discussion of the following:
 The type of test according to purpose (see unit 2).
 Whether the test could be considered second, or third generation.
 Discussion of the principles of language testing as outlined in Unit 3, in relation
to the test you design.
 Discussion of relevant scales and instructions for marking the test.
 Discussion of why you have chosen the test formats elected for the particular
skill.

Note: You are expected to devise a (i.e. write your own) test. Do not use an
already written test from other sources, and please note that plagiarised tests
will be given a fail grade.

Important: you have to write your personal details and the subject name on the
cover (see the next page). The assignment that does not fulfil these conditions
will not be corrected. You have to include the assignment index below the cover.

2
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Name and surname(s): Rebecca Fitzell

Login: ESFPMLAEILE1823552
Master Edition: 2014-2015
Date: May 15, 2015

3
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Index
Page

1. Introduction 5
2. Institutional and Student Background 5
3. Objectives of Test 6
4. Evaluation Rationale 7
5. Conclusion 10
6. Bibliography 11
7. Webography 11
8. Appendix 12

4
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

1. Introduction
The demand for English is increasing every day and with it comes the demand for
language proficiency examinations which determine the level of a student. Universities,
enterprises and businesses are all beginning or have already begun to stipulate a
particular level of English as a requirement for a better opportunity in education or
employment. Every student deserves the best chance at sitting an exam which
analyses their capabilities and to do this, we must start with basic assessment in the
classroom environment.
But why do we need to carry out language tests? Bachman (1990) claims that
there are two primary uses of them, namely as sources of information for making
further decisions about educational courses and also as indices of the abilities of
language learning which are of interest to research in various areas of language
acquisition. Personally, I believe that the evaluation of students’ abilities in the English
language classroom is vital as we need to check their day-to-day progress with the
language and as discrepancies show, if any, we can address the issues.
This assignment describes a progress test that will be administered to a group
of young learners which is advocated by its theoretical basis. First, I will highlight the
students who will take the test, then highlight the goals of it, after that the evaluation
will be described using the fundamental principles of learning before finally drawing my
conclusion on the subject of assessment and testing in the classroom.

2. Institutional and Student Background

The institution where the students attend class is a relatively small, family-owned
‘academy’ in a central area of Jaen surrounded by many other businesses and public
schools. In this sense, it has an advantage of being ideally located with many
prospective students coming from the neighbouring enterprises, public primary and
secondary schools and also, the university, as it is also located in one of the principal
zones where tertiary education students prefer to live. In general, the students who
attend the private English language school range from as young as 6 years old to
adults of 40+. The majority of students are preparing for official English examinations,
namely those carried out by Cambridge University, London and Trinity College,
London, at various different levels, altering from A1-A2 with the younger learners and
B1-C1 with teenagers and adults. These levels are recommended by the CEFR
(Common European Framework of References for Languages).

5
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

In this particular assignment, I will focus on the students who are aged between
10-11 years old. All attend public primary school in the morning, some of whom are
taking part in the bilingual programme, others who are not and their families have
decided to send them to the academy to give them extra support with the English
language. This age-group are considered as having a low elementary level and ideally
will undertake a Cambridge Young Learners Movers exam at the end of the course. In
these exams, there are separate papers which examine all the four skills of Reading,
Writing, Listening and Speaking along with integrated Grammar and Vocabulary.
The students have a course book called Super Minds (Level 4) published by
Cambridge University Press which contains examples of the Movers exam along with
aspects of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL). As we are following a
course book, after every unit is completed, we are required to carry out a progress test
to evaluate the students’ knowledge of the chapter. Normally we aim to complete three
units per trimester, and in addition two practice Cambridge listening exams and one
practice Cambridge speaking exam, whose results we can include in the students’
school reports which are administered at the end of every trimester. Taking all of this
into account, each test carried out is considered as formal assessment.

3. Objectives of Test
At the moment, I am midway through a particular unit and have already starting
thinking about and planning the exam. The unit in their book is Unit 6 which is called
Mythical Beasts (p. 70-81) which, as the titles suggests, covers fictional creatures
characteristics but also highlights vocabulary and language which can be used to
develop their knowledge of animals which I have always referred to in class to give
more examples and extra reinforcement.
The objective of this test is to examine their abilities to retain a certain amount
of knowledge which was learnt throughout this unit over the course of three and a half
weeks. Thus it is a progress test which provides the teacher, the student and the
student’s parents feedback on how the student is performing. Progress tests are
beneficial because of many reasons. Research has demonstrated that when teachers
use student progress monitoring, students learn more, teacher decision making
improves, and students become more aware of their own performance (Safer &
Fleischman 2005)

6
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

It aims to cover particular parts of the English language with a precise focus on
their abilities with vocabulary related to animal features, grammatical structures of
comparative and superlative language, the receptive skill of reading a text in relation to
animals, the productive skill of writing in two tasks and also a combined listening and
speaking communicative task.
I chose this format of test because it has been used in previous tests and the
students are quite familiar with its process, thus it has not caused problems in the past.
It is clearly laid-out and reader-friendly so children generally do not have a problem
completing it.

4. Evaluation Rationale
Firstly, I would like to highlight that the progress test has evidence of first and second
generation tasks as it includes a variety of different activities from different aspects. I
believe that giving a range of tasks makes the test more challenging for the students,
and also makes it less boring and monotonous. In order to consider the different
aspects of this exams, I will take the Fundamental Principles of Language Testing
summarised by West (1990) into account.

Competence vs. performance

I believe that this test gives the learners the chance to demonstrate both their
competence and their performance. The activities which cover their knowledge of
vocabulary, grammar, reading and writing determine what the students have learnt in
this particular unit and if they are capable of using these aspects. Taking that into
account, the final speaking activity, in which the student will be asked some questions
about the subject, proves the student’s ability to speak about the topic fluently.

Usage vs. use

As we learnt from the content of this subject, the term ‘usage’ attributes to the method
of what makes a language, for example, the structures which are used, which in this
case, are the grammatical aspects of comparatives and superlatives. From the
grammar activities in this exam, the students are tested on their competence in this
language usage. On the other hand, the speaking activity can demonstrate how
effectively they can be used orally and within a certain context.

7
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Direct / indirect assessment

This progress test has many examples of indirect assessment as a lot of the activities
present the language to be chosen and used. An example of this is clearly highlighted
in Vocabulary Exercise 1, where there are the pictures of three animals and a box of
eight words, the new words which were taught in the unit. The students are presented
the vocabulary and must label the parts on the pictures. The Speaking and Listening
activity can be considered direct assessment as it will demonstrate a language task but
in a communicative way by showing if they can hold a conversation about animals.

Discrete point vs. integrative assessment

As most of the assessment is considered indirect, they can also be seen as discrete
points as they are only testing one particular item of English. Examples of these
discrete points can be seen in the activities which include Reading I (true or false
activity), Grammar I (comparative sentence formation) and Grammar II (superlative
alternatives / fill in the gap). To say this in a different manner, these activities are
focusing on form in order to evaluate the learner’s competence with certain element of
the English language.
However in this progress test, there are also examples of integrative
assessments, for instance in Reading II and Writing I & II as they are not restricting the
student to only one element. In these activities, the student is being tested on their
much wider range of comprehension and knowledge of English. Also, a large
percentage of points are awarded in the Speaking and Listening Part as I consider
these integrative testing parts the most important when it comes to communication.

Objective vs. subjective assessment

The vast majority of this progress test can be considered objective as a large quantity
of the activities only have a correct or incorrect answer. These activities are namely:
Vocabulary, Reading I & II and Grammar I & II. In my opinion, the other activities are
subjective as I have to take some criteria into account before marking it. Something I
may have to consider is how the children view some animal descriptions, as they may
alter from child to child depending on their experience.

8
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Receptive vs. productive skills

I believe that there is quite a nice balance between the receptive and productive skills
in my progress test. Receptive skills are evident in Reading I & II, while productive
skills are in Writing I & II and the Speaking/Listening activity. In the writing skills the
students are given clear instructions on how to deal with the task and the language
involved is quite basic and adheres to that of which has been learnt in the unit.
Although I tried to be as objective as possible in the speaking activity, at times it was
difficult when asking for students’ opinions about the topic. I consider the test as being
communicative because it focuses on the communicative use of the grammar and
vocabulary assimilated through these various types of skills tasks.

Backward -and forward-looking assessment

In general, a competence test like this looks backwards at the usage which was
covered in the unit studied. From this test, the teacher can evaluate to what extent it
has be comprehended by the student. A high amount of the activities undertaken in this
test are backward-looking as they are examining a specific piece of lexical or
grammatical structure which has been previously learnt. We can consider that the
vocabulary and language learnt and examined will be used daily in different real-life
situations in the future, therefore in general, it could be slightly forward-looking, but this
is not the aim of the test.

Contextualised vs. disembodied language

This test uses contextualised language which specifically outlines words and grammar
which the learners must use in order to complete the activities related to the topic of the
physical description of animals along with comparing them.

Criterion referenced and norm-referenced assessment

As highlighted in the content of this subject, criterion-referenced assessment examines
an individual learner’s success in performing a task, which is how this test is evaluated.
The students are not compared against each other, nor with an average passing mark.
The reason we undergo this type of assessment in our school is because at the end of
each trimester, every student receives a school report highlighting their performance
and progress from one exam to the next and they highlight their abilities to their
parents.

9
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

Reliability vs. validity

By maximising the reliability and validity of the information provided by test, we are
reducing the probability of errors in the decisions we make, and hence the potential
costs associated with those errors. (Lord 1983)
With regard to thinking about this test’s reliability and validity, we have to ask
ourselves again about the objectives of this test. When making a test for a group of
learners, it is vital to note down what your objectives are before planning the
evaluation, along with how, when and why is it going to happen.

When we consider its validity, we can think about the following:

Content validity - The test reflects the language of comparatives and superlatives which
were highlights in the syllabus and which is vital in the learners’ language needs.
Construct validity - It does inspect all the aspects which were highlighted in the
objectives, namely receptive and productive skills.
Predictive validity - I believe that this progress test assesses future language
performance of students and can be an indicator of their future achievements.
Concurrent validity - I agree that my progress test results would be comparable to
those taken from an established test.

5. Conclusion
In conclusion, when designing a test for our learners, I believe that the most important
fact to take into consideration is its relevance. In my opinion, this is the key factor we
have to take into account as we ask ourselves: Why are our students learning English
and why do they need to do this test? If we cannot answer this question with the
aspiration of our students having the ability to use target language from the test in the
future, then our evaluation will be fruitless. We must always try our best by thinking
carefully about the planning involved in assessment and how our students can benefit
from it. If at first, our tests are not successful, we must learn from our previous errors
and continue to develop and improve our testing methods according to our students’
needs. When we take the time to reflect on this, we can design better evaluative or
summative tests which can help our students’ language learning process in the future.

10
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

6. References

 Bachman, L. (1990): “Uses of Language Tests” in Fundamental Considerations

in Language Testing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 54-79

 Common European Framework of References for the Languages (2001). British

Council.

 Lord, F.M. (1983): Unbiased estimators of ability parameters, of their variance,

and of their parallel-forms reliability. Psychometrika 48: pp. 233-245. Taken
from: Bachman, L. (1990): “Uses of Language Tests” in Fundamental
Considerations in Language Testing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 54-
79

 Puchta, H., Gerngross, G., Lewis-Jones, P. (2014): Superminds 4. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press.

 West, R. (1990): Introduction and Principles of Language Testing. University of

Manchester SEDE.

7. Webography

 Safer, N & Fleischman S. (2005): “Research Matters / How Student Progress

Monitoring Improves Instruction” in How Schools Improve. Educational
Leadership, February 2005, Vol 62, Number 5, pp. 81-83. Article accessed via
webpage
<http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/feb05/vol62/
num05/How-Student-Progress-Monitoring-Improves-Instruction.aspx>
09/05/2015 13:00

11
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

8. Appendix
Appendix 1 - Progress Test
Name: _______________________

Progress Test - Unit 6 ‘Mythical Beasts’

1. VOCABULARY (8 points)*
Draw a line and label the different parts of the animal using the words in the box.
Tail Horn Back Scales
Neck Wing feather tongue

2. READING I (8 points)
Read the sentences about animals and write ‘T’ for true and ‘F’ for false.

1. Dogs have got a tail. __________

2. Elephants have got horns. __________
3. Pigs have got wings. __________
4. Snakes have got long tongues. __________
5. Parrots have got different coloured feathers. __________
6. Horses have got scales. __________
7. Giraffes have got long necks. __________
8. Snakes have got bones in their back. __________

3. READING II (6 points)**
Read the text and answer the questions about the animals.

The lion and the mouse

A lion was asleep in the sun one day. A little mouse came out to play. The little mouse ran up
the lion’s neck and slid down his back. The lion caught him with a great big smack! “I’m going
to eat you!” the lion roared, his mouth open wide. “No, no, please don’t!” the little mouse cried.
“Be kind to me, and one day I’ll help you.” “I’m a lion! You’re a mouse! What can you do?” The
lion laughed, very hard, and the mouse ran away. But the mouse was out walking the very
next day. He heard a big roar, and squeaked when he saw the king of the jungle tied to a tree.
But the mouse had a plan to set him free. The mouse worked quickly, and chewed through the
rope. The lion said, “Oh little mouse, I had no hope. You were right, little mouse – thank you,
I’m free. You’re the best friend there ever could be!”

12
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

a. What animal does the lion catch?

_____________________________________________________________
b. What does the lion want to do with the mouse?
_____________________________________________________________
c. What does the mouse promise the lion?
_____________________________________________________________
d. Does the lion think the mouse can help him?
_____________________________________________________________
e. What happens to the lion the next day?
_____________________________________________________________
f. How does the mouse help the lion?
_____________________________________________________________

4. WRITING I (6 points)
What do these animals look like? Please write three sentences for each.

 What does a mouse look like?

__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
 What does a fish look like?
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________

5. GRAMMAR I (8 points)
Use the words in the box to compare the animals. You can repeat the animals.
Small Big Fast Slow
Strong Peak Beautiful Ugly

Cat Dog Snake Elephant

Zebra Lion Mouse kangaroo

1. ____________________________________________________
2. ____________________________________________________
3. ____________________________________________________
4. ____________________________________________________
5. ____________________________________________________
6. ____________________________________________________
7. ____________________________________________________
8. ____________________________________________________

6. GRAMMAR II (5 points)
Read the sentences and choose the correct alternative and complete the space.
1. The blue whale is the smallest / the biggest animal in the world.

13
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

2. Cheetahs are the fastest / the slowest animals in the world.

3. Giraffes are the tallest / the shortest animals in the world.
4. Dinosaurs are the youngest / the oldest animals in the world.
5. Hippos are the fattest / the thinnest animals in the world.

7. WRITING II (4 points)
Describe your favourite animal. Please write four sentences.
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________

8. SPEAKING AND LISTENING (30 points)

When you are finished your exam, please raise your hand and tell the teacher, so she can
speak to you about this unit.

Total: ___/ 75

*Pictures taken from: www.classroomclipart.com

**Reading taken from: http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/sites/kids/files/attachment/
storytime-the-lion-and-the-mouse-transcript.pdf

Appendix 2 - Speaking Test (30 points) - Instructions and Rubric

Instructions Testing Points
1 Teacher greets student and asks for their name, - listening to
surname and how to spell them. instructions
- ability to produce
name and surname in
full sentences 2 points in
- correct spelling total
2 The teacher presents a selection of SIX flashcards* - listening to 1 point for
with animals depicted on each. The student must instructions each
identify the animals. - ability to name
animals correctly 6 points in
- “it’s a ….” total
3 The student must choose two animals to describe in - listening to 5 points for
detail and compare and contrast with the other instructions each correct
flashcards. - vocabulary of animal animal
features description
- adjectives
- comparatives 10 points in
-superlatives total
4 The student is presented with a picture** of animals - listening to 2 points for
participating in sporting activities. He / she must listen instructions each correct
to the teacher’s sentences and answer true / false. - listening and sentence
1. The cheetah is riding a bike. comprehending
2. The ostrich is slower than the boy. sentences in order to
3. The lion is the winner. answer

14
Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ATC

4. The elephant is the strongest animal in the - comprehending

picture. sentences, identifying
5. The octopus is a better tennis player than the characters in picture
girl. - answering true or 12 points in
6. The giraffe is taller than the basketball net. false total
5 The teacher thanks the student for participating in the
test.

**Animal poster taken from:

http://www.zazzle.es/poster_de_los_campeones_del_parque_zoologico-228834126734150467

*Animal flashcards taken from:

http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/worksheets/animal-flashcards

15