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Unit 4 Testing Writing

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Unit 4 Testing Writing

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dungbaothuan
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© © All Rights Reserved
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UNIT 4: TESTING WRITING

What does it mean to test writing ability?

“The best way to test people’s writing ability is to get them to write”

(Huges, 1989, p.75)


Writing ability
Key questions before designing tasks

• What are we trying to test?


• Why do we want to test writing ability?
• Who are our test takers?
• Who will score the tests, and what criteria or standards will be used?
• What are the constraints that limit the amount and kind of
information we can collect about test takers’ writing ability?
• What do we need to know about testing to make our test valid and
reliable?
Test purpose

Bachman and Palmer (1996) discuss two main purposes for language
tests:
- The primary purpose is to make inferences about language ability
- The secondary purpose is to make decisions based on those
inferences
Eg: Inferences about achievement of a student is used to make
decisions about grading on the individual level, and about
modification of instruction on the classroom level.
Language use and language test
performance

- Grammatical knowledge

- Textual knowledge

- Functional knowledge

- Sociolinguistic knowledge
Test usefulness

- Reliability
- Construct validity
- Authenticity
- Interactiveness
- Impact
- Practicality
Considerations in task design

- Subject matter: what topic test takers should write about, and what
topics should be avoided
- Stimulus material: a writing prompt can include source materials
(reading passage, a brief quotation, drawing…)
- Genre: can be defined both in terms of the intended form and the
intended function of the writing.
- Time allotment: decide how much time test takers will be given to
complete each task
- Instructions: simple/ short/ detailed
- Choice of tasks:
Scoring procedures for writing assessment

- Rating scales

- Designing the scoring rubric

- The scoring process


Types of rating scales

• Holistic scales: assign a single score based on the


overall impression of the script.

• Analytic scales: rate on several aspects of writing or


criteria.
Designing the scoring rubric

• It is critical, represents as explicitly as possible the


definition of the skill(s) that the test is intended to
measure.

• It must be clear, explicit, useable and interpretable by


raters, test takers and decision makers.
The scoring process

• Assuring reliability

• Rater training
Practice scoring

• https://
assets.cambridgeenglish.org/
schools/
CER_6647_V1d_JUL20_Teacher-
Guide-for-Writing-
C1_Advanced.pdf
Practice scoring

Dear Allan,
I am a second year VNUA student in room 201. I am writing to express my
annoyance with my roommate who studied in the same department as me.
I am very unhappy with her presence because she listens to music without using
her headphones and this leads to disturbance during my study time. Also, she
lets in her senior friends and they stay almost all day long in the room which
interrupts my privacy. My roommate also leaves the room open during my
absence, because of which I cannot ensure safety of my personal belongings.
So I implore my roommate can change her personality and lifestyle. If not, I am
forced to move to a single room so as not to affect my privacy.
I really hope my roommate will change, so that we don't have to fight, and live
happily together.
Thank you very much for your consideration.
Yours faithfully,
Nguyen

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