Two issues in assessment of high school students performance in english

THANH HOA Department of Education and Training TRAN PHU High School  EXPERIENCE INITIATIVE THEME: Two Issues in Assessment of High School Student Performance in English Researcher: Dau Thi Diep Foreign Language Group Tran Phu High School THANH HOA MAY 2016 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction A) Problem Area in Assessment B) A Review of Relevant Literature B1) Assessing Grammar Knowledge B2) Assessing Oral Skills C) Recommendations for The Current Case Conclusion References Introduction The issues of teaching English have widely discussed and researched since English now becomes an international tool for communicating among people around the world, even among people in the same community Individuals with a variety of professionals, age, ethnics and purposes try hard not only to achieve a certain level of but also to get a required certificate of English In other words, “language tests play a powerful role in many people’s lives, acting as gateways at important transitional moments in education, in employment, and in moving from one country to another” (McNamara, 2000, p.4) Hence, the issues of testing one’s ability of English have attracted great attention of language experts From the point of view of an English educator, the author of this paper aims to discuss two issues in assessment of high school student performance in English, specifically which of the twelfth grade students Then, in an attempt to find best solutions to the involving case, the author reviews relevant literature, comparing various possible answers The last part of this paper is devoted to identifying the most suitable solution to the two mentioned problems, detailing specific recommendations A) Problem Area in Assessment As you can find a typical test attached with this paper, tests during the twelfth school year, even in other school years, are mainly aimed to measure students’ ability of grammar However, the required level of grammar is quite high It is obviously that exceptions of grammar rules are tested for often One can claim that such a high level is unnecessary and causes many problems for students and relevant educators as well Learners and teachers spend a lot of valuable time practicing all that grammar stuff even though it is clear to them that what they are struggling for is hardly ever applied in communication Making students pay much attention to grammar also affects their later process of learning English They certainly become less fluent, even less confident once they are too conscious of grammar rules This negative effect is obviously shown in reality as at the end of a seven-year high school course students are rarely able to communicate in ordinary conversations in English The lack of balance of measurement among four macro skills is another problem area in assessment that this paper aims to cover Oral and aural skills are completely neglected during the period of seven years of learning English at high school Therefore, no one can find even a single part which is devoted to testing speaking or listening skills in any out of twelve tests in the twelfth grade Meanwhile, speaking ability is a very key indicator of one’s English competence Also, listening skill receives very little attention Hence, one can claim that measuring listening and speaking skills is absent from the assessment of student performance Practicing all four skills in English is officially required in almost English courses in high school so it is necessary that aural and oral skills receive much more attention in language testing B) A Review of Relevant Literature B1) Assessing grammar knowledge Penny Ur (1996, p.75) over-simply defines grammar as “the way words are put together to make correct sentences” However, one can “apply the term ‘grammatical’ to units smaller than sentences” (Ur, 1996, p.75) as grammar is “the rules in a language for changing the form of the words and joining them into sentences” according to Oxford advanced learners’ dictionary, seventh edition Grammatical competence “will be understood to include knowledge of lexical items and of rules of morphology, syntax, sentence-grammar semantics and phonology” (McNamara, 2000, p.93) The question on the adequate level of grammar which should be achieved by high school students has been an issue of debate for many years Some argue that the superficial knowledge of grammar can make no significant contribution towards achieving the communicative aim Hence, there is no point in setting the target grammatical level for high school students unnecessarily high In contrast, one may fear that “a lack of grammatical knowledge can severely limit what is understood or produced in communication” (Purpura, 2004, p.4) In reality, each educational institution requires a certain grammatical level of their learners Thus, it is the teacher’s responsibility for guiding students to acquire the grammar necessary and to meet the grammatical requirement of that teaching situation High school students in this case demonstrate their grammar ability only through language tests designed by their own teachers Arthur Hughes (2003) has stated that all we would be looking for is some general indication of the adequacy of the student’s grammar knowledge so “the test should be guide do-able; not too difficult” (Ur, 1996, p.42) Moreover, the grammar part of the test must provide more context than only single sentences Unfortunately, the achievement test discussed here uses a list of single sentences to check the grammar knowledge Besides traditional tests, there are a variety of alternative assessments like class observation, portfolio or class activities which can be applied for the author’s teaching situation These alternative ones require students to be able to produce grammatical responses and apply grammar to some communicative purpose (Purpura, 2004, p.2) In other words, assessments of grammar should require students to demonstrate not only their memory capacity of grammar forms but also their language ability of understanding and applying them B2) Assessing oral skills Hughes (2003) believes that language abilities are not easy to measure and it has been widely recognized that speaking is the most difficult skill to assess It is absolutely true to the author’s teaching situation In reviewing earlier work, this paper concludes that testing speaking skill consists of the testing of pronunciation, spoken grammar, spoken vocabulary, and even sociolinguistic applications of speech Hughes (2003) claims that the most common format for assessing speaking ability is the interview Besides, interaction with fellow candidates and responses to audio- or video-recordings are also widely applied for testing oral skills However, “a frequent problem for teachers is when there are so many learners in one class that it seems to make it unrealistic to assess speaking” (Scrivener) The teachers who designed the discussed test are also in that situation Their class size generally ranges from thirty to fifty and each class lasts forty-five minutes per time so it is unlikely possible to assess all students’ performance at a time In this case, this assessment should be done through classroom activities, group presentations during class periods of the school year An underlying problem in testing speaking in this educational case is its scorer reliability As Mead and Rubin (1985) confirm that “a major aspect of any rating system is rater objectivity: Is the rater applying the scoring criteria accurately and consistently to all students across time? The reliability of raters should be established during their training and checked during administration or scoring of the assessment” In some cases, it would be more reliable if students’ performance is double rated Not only marking learners’ performance but the teacher should provide them with a grid containing a list of specific criteria with comments As Hughes (2003) concludes that the accurate measurement of oral ability is not easy and it takes considerable time and effort, including training, to obtain valid and reliable results C) Recommendations for the current case It cannot be denied that grammar contributes an essential part to one’s linguistic competence However, the too much emphasis on the mastery of grammatical structures may decreases students’ fluency Thus, under the discussed circumstance, the test designers should aim to a lower level of grammar which is widely considered an adequate level for high school students Specifically, exceptions of grammar rules need to be tested with care and are used only to distinguish outstanding individuals rather than to check ordinary students’ grammar ability One more thing to make this test authentic is that texts for checking grammar ability should not be in isolated sentences but in a specific context The teachers in charge of designing tests should be in an emphasis on grammar meaning rather than on accuracy of form Therefore, the answer to the question whether grammar tests that focus only on sentence level accuracy can be justified (Rea-Dickins, 2001) is absolutely no Moreover, the format for measuring students’ control of grammar should be varied It can be separately tested with multiple-choice questions, matching or sentence transformation, etc at a time and through writing tasks at other time, for example In short, more effort and investment should be put into designing tests, especially into the grammar part In regard to speaking and listening skills, it is strongly advisable to include their measurement sessions among tests, at least in one test, during the school year because “the motivating power of tests appears clear: learners who know they are going to be tested on specific material next week will normally be more motivated to study it carefully than if they had simply been told to learn it” (Ur, 1996, p.279) Under the author’s educational situation, teachers may encounter difficulties in measuring these skills but it is worth great effort to manage them The author of this paper is in favor of covering the measurement of the oral skill through class activities and observation such as pair work, group work or group discussion In terms of the aural skills, they can be included in a fifteen-minute test At the early stage of the semester, students should be noticed that their speaking and listening skills will be assessed during the class time and the criteria that the teacher would focus on Moreover, the teachers should give their learners comments on their oral performance in parallel with a specific score after the testing progress comes to end In short, although speaking ability is the most difficult one to measure, “where there’s a will, there’s a way” Conclusion In this paper, the author has identified two issues in assessment relevant to her own teaching situation, reviewing related literature and finally detailing specific recommendations It should be repeatedly noticed that grammar tests should be guide do-able; not too difficult and testing speaking and listening skills at least once during the school year is essentially done Also, various alternative assessment ways which are more effective than the traditional tests are already presented in the paper It would be ideal if teachers could combine those assessing methods The testing issue obviously plays a vital part in test-takers’ learning process, especially in which of high school students Thus it is vital that test designers are aware of making assessing student performance more valid and reliable References: Harmer, J (2007) The Practice of English Language Teaching England: Pearson Education Limited Hughes, A (2003) Testing for Language Teachers Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Mead, Nancy A & Rubin, Donald L (1985) Assessing Listening and Speaking Skills Eric Digest Retrieved 26 May 2011, from http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-923/speaking.htm McNamara, T (2000) Language Testing Oxford: Oxford University Press Purpura, J E (2004) Assessing Grammar In Anderson, J C & Bachman, L F (Eds.), Cambridge Language Assessment series Cambridge University Press Rea-Dickins, P (2001) Fossilization or evolution: The Case of Grammar Testing In Elder, C., Brown, A., Grove, E., Hill, K … O’Loughlin, K (Eds.), Studies in Language Testing 11: Experimenting with Uncertainty: Essays in Honour of Alan Davies (pp 22-32) Great Britain: Cambridge University Press Scrivener, J One Stop English: Skills: Assessing Speaking Skills Retrieved 26 May 2011, from http://www.onestopenglish.com/support/teaching-tips/skillswork/skills-assessing-speaking-skills/146607.article Ur, P (1996) A Course in Language Teaching: Practice and Theory Cambridge: Cambridge University Press SỞ GD & ĐT THANH HOA THPT TRAN PHU 2016 KIỂM TRA HỌC KỲ II LỚP 12, NĂM HỌC 2015Môn: ANH VĂN Thời gian làm bài: 90 phút, không kể thời gian giao đề (Đề thi có 06 trang) Mã đề thi AV102 Họ, tên thí sinh: …………………………………… Số báo danh: ……………………………………… PHẦN TRẮC NGHIỆM: TỪ QUESTION ĐẾN QUESTION 64 ( điểm ) Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions from to 25 Question 1: A: “ Do you have copy of The Last Leaf ?” B: “ You are …… luck I have just one copy left.” A by B in C of D at Question 2: Since the flood the number of homeless people………… dramatically A are increasing B had increased C increase D has increased Question 3: Can you make yourself……… In French ? A understood B understand C to understand D understanding Question 4: Today many species of plant and animal are in……… of extinction A danger B endangered C endanger D dangerous Question 5: If your current rate of deforestation continues, the world’s rainforests……… within 100 years A would vanish B vanish C will vanish D would have vanished Question 6: At first she was trained to be……….scriptwriter, but later she worked as…… secretary A the/a B a/a C the/the D a/the Question 7: “ Don’t look so worried! You should take the leader’s comment with………” A a teaspoon of salt B a cup of salt C a dose of salt D a pinch of salt Question 8: If I…………an astronaut traveling in a cabin, I’d not be annoyed by the weightlessness A am B be C will be D were Question 9: Our project was successful……… its practicality A in terms of B with a view to C regardless D on behalf of Question 10: Of the two new students, one is friendly and………… A the others are not B the other is not C another is un friendly D.other lacks friendliness Question 11: There is one person to…………T owe more than I can say A whom B who C that D whose Question 12: After a good night’s sleep I woke up feeling as fresh as……… and eager to start a new day A a fruit B a daisy C a flower D a maiden Question 13: Mary is sixteen years old She is……… young to get married 10 A too B so C such D enough Question 14: ………… is the existence of a large number of different kinds of animals and plants which make a balanced environment A Extinction B Biodiversity C Habitat D Conservation Question 15: Since we………….to working so hard, can we rest for a while? A don’t used B aren’t used C don’t use D not use Question 16: - Kate: “ How lovely your cats are!” - David: “…………………….” A Really? They are B Thank you, it is nice of you to say so C Can you say it again? D I love them, too Question 17: Peter was ejected after committing five personal………… In water sport game yesterday A mistakes B faults C fouls D errors Question 18: Toxic chemicals in the air and land have driven many species to the……… of extinction A tip B edge C verge D border Question 19: She ran…………an interesting article about fashion while she was reading the newspaper A after B cross C away D out Question 20: It’s essential that every student………… All the lectures A attends B attend C has attended D attended Question 21: It’s secret You…………let anyone know about it A mustn’t B needn’t C mightn’t D may not Question 22: When Tet holiday comes, Vietnamese people often feel inclined to……… Their houses A up B in C through D over Question 23: - Anne: “ Make youself at home” - John: “ ………………… ” A Thanks! Same to you B That’s very kind Thank you C Not at all Don’t mention it D Yes, can I help you? Question 24: He managed to keep his job………….the manager had threatened to sack him A therefore B although C unless D despite Question 25: It was announced that neither the passengers nor the driver…………in the crash A are injured B was injured C were injured D have been injured Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word that differs from pronunciation in each of the following questions from 26 to 27 Question 26: A leaves B brings C looks D plays Question 27: A watched B promoted C invited D decided Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word that differs from the rest in the position of the main stress in each of the following questions from 28 to 30 Question 28: A require B consist C achieve D system Question 29: A intervention B necessary C intellectual D productivity Question 30: A intensity B accurate C erosion D miraculous 11 Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word or phrase that is CLOSEST in meaning to the underlined part in each of the following questions from 31 to 32 Question 31: We went away on holiday last week, but it rained day in day out A every single day B every other day C every second day D every two days Question 32: We can use either verbal or non-verbal forms of communication A using gesture B using speech C using verbs D using facial expressions Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word or phrase that is OPPOSITE in meaning to the underlined part in each of the following questions from 33 to 34 Question 33: Thousands are going starving because of the failure of this year’s harvest A hungry B rich C poor D full Question 34: There is growing concern about the way man has destroyed the environment A ease B attraction C consideration D speculation Mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to show the underlined part that needs correction from 35 to 39 Question 35: Men and women in the Pea Corps work with people in the developing A countries to help them improving their living conditions B C D Question 36: Although not widely sold, that book is considered to be best book on the A B C D subject Question 37: Because his sickness, he didn’t take part in the English competition held A B C D last Sunday Question 38: I found my new contact lenses strangely at first, but I got used to them A B C in the end D Question 39: Dreaming, like all other mental processes, it is a product of the brain A B C and its activity D Read the following passage and mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions from 40 to 49 Acid rain will not be an easy problem (36) ………… As more and more countries become (37) ………… , there will be more and more competition for 12 petroleum for cars, home heating, and indusrty, while (38) ……………… petroleum contributes greatly (39)…………… acid rain, it is less polluted than coal Unfortunately petroleum is more (40) …………… than coal and no one knows exactly (41) ………… petroleum is left Therefore, there will be a pressure to burn coal for energy Coal is a (42) …………… dirtier energy source than petroleum Since we already know how (43) ………… acid rain is, it is important (44) …………… we increase our efforts to find a (45) ……………… source of energy as quickly as possible, so that we can advoid further environmental damage Question 40: A solve B to solve C solved D solving Question 41: A industry B industrial C industrialize D industrialized Question 42: A firing B shooting C burning D cooking Question 43: A to B for C at D with Question 44: A expensive B cheap C clean D dirty Question 45: A how many B how much C how far D how long Question 46: A so B many C lot D much Question 47: A destroy B destroyed C destruction D destructive Question 48: A that B if C whether D which Question 49: A polluted B polluting C non- polluting D unpolluting Read the following passage and mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions from 50 to 54 Walt Whitman, born in New York in 1819, was one of America’s unusual literary figures An individualist, he rambled through the country seeing people and places, and making them his own His experiences in earning a living were varied: at times he was a printer, a teacher, a carpenter, a nurse and a newspaper editor He was a big-hearted man, open and accepting He spent a lot of his time caring for the wounded during the Civil War Though he lived in the city, he often spent time in the country, developing his strong sense of nature, which carried through his poems In 1855, he collected the verses he had written, and published them in one thin volume, “Leaves of Grass”, a book which he revised and was generally ignored by other poets, probably because his verse forms were not traditional He had felt that it was necessary to achieve a new poetic form in order to communicate his views His reputation didn’t grow until after his death, and it reached a high point in the 1920s Since then, Whitman’s style has greatly influenced modern poets Question 50: The best title for this passage is …… A Leaves of Grass B A Country Man C Walt Whitman D A New Form of Poetry Question 51: Whitman’s big-heartedness is shown by his ……… A visiting the country B being an individualist C rewriting “Leaves of Grass” D caring for the wounded Question 52: It can be understood from the passage that during Whitman’s lifetime, probably other poets …… A accepted him B praised him C laughed at him D communicated with him Question 53: Probably, Whitman was ignored because he ……… A wrote a new form B walked through the countryside C published his poems D rewrote his book 13 Question 54: The word “rambled” in line is most similar to the meaning of ……… A stopped briefly B walked slowly C traveled quicklyD marched excitedly Read the following passage and mark the letter A,B,C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions from 55 to 64 A pilot cannot fly by sight alone In many conditions, such as flying at night and landing in dense fog, a pilot must use radar, an alternative way of navigating Since human eyes are not very good at determining speeds of approaching objects, radar can show a pilot how fast nearby planes are moving The basic principle of radar is exemplified by what happens when one shouts in a cave The echo of the sounds against the walls helps a person determine the size of the cave With radar, however, the waves are radio waves instead of sound waves Radio waves travel at the speed of light, about 300,000 kilometers in one second A radar set sends out a short burst of radio waves Then it receives the echoes produced when the waves bounce off objects By determining the time it takes for the echoes to return to the radar set, a trained technician can determine the distance between the radar set and other objects The word “radar”, in fact, gets its name from the term “radio detection and ranging” “Ranging” is the term for detection of the distance between an object and the radar set Besides being of critical importance to pilots, radar is essential for air traffic control, tracking ships at sea, and for tracking weather systems and storms Question 55: What is the main topic of this passage? A The nature of radar B History of radar C Alternatives to radar D Types of ranging Question 56: According to the passage, what can radar detect besides location of objects? A Shape B Size C Speed D Weight Question 57: The word “exemplified” in the passage can be replaced by _ A “specified” B “resembled” C “illustrated” D “justified” Question 58: The word “shouts” in the passage most closely means _ A “exclaims” B “yells” C “shoots” D “whispers” Question 59: Which of the following words best describes the tone of this passage? A argumentative B explanatory C humorous D imaginative Question 60: According to the passage, the distance between a radar set and an object can be determined by _ A the time it takes for a burst of radio waves to produce echoes when the waves bounce off the object B the term “ranging” used for detection of the distance between an object and the radar set C the time it takes for the radio waves to produce echoes and bounce off the object D the time it takes for the echoes produced by the radio waves to return to the radar set Question 61: Which type of waves does radar use? A tidal B sound C heat D radio Question 62: The word “tracking” in the passage most closely means _ A sending B searching for C ranging D repairing 14 Question 63: Which of the following would most likely be the topic of the next paragraph? A A history of flying B Other uses of radar C The technology used by pilots D Uses of some technology Question 64: What might be inferred about radar? A It takes the place of a radio B It has improved navigational safety C It was developed from a study of sound waves D It gave birth to the invention of the airplane II PHẦN TỰ LUẬN ( điểm ) A Finish each of the following sentences in such a way that it means exactly the same as the sentence before it Question She started working in this school years ago - I’ve Question Tom sai: “ let’s go out for a walk” - Tom suggested Question Tom said that he hadn’t stolen the money - Tom denied Question We don’t study hard, so we don’t get good grades - If Question People say that he was a businessman years ago - He is……………………………………………………………………………… B Write a paragraph about the ideal world in which you would like to live in the year 2050 You should write at least 100 words Nga Son, May 2016 Xác nhận thủ trưởng đơn vị Tôi xin cam đoan SKKN tự viết Đậu Thị Diệp 15  ... discuss two issues in assessment of high school student performance in English, specifically which of the twelfth grade students Then, in an attempt to find best solutions to the involving case, the... neglected during the period of seven years of learning English at high school Therefore, no one can find even a single part which is devoted to testing speaking or listening skills in any out of twelve... measuring listening and speaking skills is absent from the assessment of student performance Practicing all four skills in English is officially required in almost English courses in high school so