Job Discussion Forums

[travellingtefler]

Hi

Just thinking about this and wondered if any of the more experienced posters could give me their thoughts/suggestions.

In every institute I've worked, the placement test has comprised a number of grammar questions (chose the correct answer out of four to complete the sentence), a piece of writing and (sometimes) an oral interview.

I think the grammar section works quite well if the students are at a high level - I personally find the writing and the oral assessments better indicators.

What other methods have you found effective and accurate? I have thought that a cloze assessment that gets progressively higher would be useful. However, I would like to know of methods of assessment that are accurate at lower levels and don't leave the students sitting at a desk for hours. Suggestions for children and adults would be helpful.

I'm looking forward to your replies - thanks

[dmb]

I agree with written and oral sections of a placement test being better indicators. The problem with placement tests are that they are fairly subjective. I'm lucky in that I know all the students at my place of work(it's quite small) Because of this I can use other students as a yard stick.

Placement testing can be quite stressful for the teacher. For example, last month I had to go to a multi national company and level test about 80 students. The tests weren't given to place a student in a class. The company wanted only the advanced students to be accepted onto the fast track management program. Basically little old me was contributing to a decision about their careers. When you get a student who is Upper int/adv. It's extra pressure on the teacher. Congratulations you are advanced. You are going to have a wonderful career travelling the world.OR. Sorry you are only upper int. so you are going to be stuck in a boring 9-5 office job. It's the part of teaching I dislike the most

[travellingtefler]

Over the years, I've been put in that situation many times when I've been testing to stream applicants down to the final group for interview and that's one of the reasons I was asking for input from the more experienced testers.

I worked with a company with a testing department and they used a tape where the students listened to sentences and ticked what they thought was being said (I can't remember what company produced this test). Unfortunately, my involvement was administering the test - I don't know how the results were evaluated.

I was quite intrigued with this because it was fairly quick and the students weren't left in a corner to plough through a multiple-choice followed by writing.

And I agree - one of things I would like to do is take the subjectivity out of the testing process.

Anyone help?

[Stephen Jones]

Oxford UP produce a placement test which has about 100 listening multi-choice questions and 100 written multi-choice.

It is very accurate for students from lower-intermediate through Proficiency.

Where you have to grade at a much lower level, as you often have to do in the Middle East or Asia, then multi-choice becomes less useful.

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[travellingtefler]

Stephen

You've identified the main problem as I see it - how do you accurately assess lower levels?

Ben Round de Bloc

Does this combo accurately place lower levels- especially if you have limited time to spend with each stiudent?

Thanks both of you for responding.

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[Teacher in Rome]

In Italy we get a lot of "mixed level" students - typically those who score high on grammar awareness, but low on speaking or listening tests. Although we have both tests in our initial placements, we end up having to find a "happy" medium for these students who aren't consistent in their linguistic competence. Because of time constraints, we don't have production exercises. (And if we did, I imagine that students would score much lower on grammar use.) In many cases, I tend to place more emphasis on students' speaking ability, rather than on their grammar awareness.

We use the Council of Europe's guidelines in assessing language levels. These guidelines are pretty comprehensive and help to take out the subjectivity of speaking tests.

One frustration of my job is that having tested and placed students neatly into different levels, the client turns round and insists that we lump students together... It kind of makes a mockery of testing in the first place.

[Signor]

I've been reading this thread with great interest as it's a problem I have too. I work in the ME where the speaking level is generally much higher than the written language and finding the happy medium can be difficult.

I tried to get the Council of Europe's guidelines in assessing language levels on the net - but have had limited success - can you give me a link please?

I want to look at this and perhaps change my approach to testing - I am (hopefully) about to commence work at a new institute and may have some input to the selection tests.

So - let me investigate - but keep posting - you are confirming a great deal of my own conclusions and many minds work better than one (especially if it's mine)

Quick question - how do you assess the speaking? Do you use a tape, have a conversation with the student (unstructured), do you ask set questions, or do you use scenarios such as those described in the Pitman SESOL?

I'm looking forward to your replies.

[dmb]

grading an oral test can be/is very difficult. Very often I am asked 'to give a mark out of 20', for example. I try to break it down into smaller components. So if it were a mark out of 20 I would break it down like...
Fluency
Accuracy
pronunciation
Use of vocab
Communitative competence.

Give each of the above categories a mark out of 4 then add them up. Very simplistic I know. but giving a mark out of X is very difficult.( and, as I mentioned earlier, subjective)

[SueH]

Aha,

At the moment a subject after my own heart. I teach part time ESOL here in the UK where, in my college, traditionally the numeracy guy did the initial interviews and then proceeded to shove students willy-nilly into any available class. (I wonder if he teaches basic addition, calculus and fluid dynamics in the same class...). Yesterday I started doing the interviews - I wonder if I will be paid as promised......

There are some new assessment tests available here produced by a national body (Skills for Life) which are under assessment and with which I still have some technical reservations, although still useful.

No test deals with the student who has a spiky profile and makes the ESOL class such a challenge. What do you do with a student with reasonable oral skills and also completely illiterate (in L1 as well)?

I shall go and pour another glass of Temperanillo to consider the matter..

Sue

[travellingtefler]

This thread is very informative and interesting. I'm enjoying it.

dmb

When you are grading - do you grade within level? I'm interested in this since I'm about to do a group of tests to identify levels for a company recruiting non-native speakers for training that will be conducted in English.

All the other tests are easy to administer (reduced to a tick format) but I'm thinking about how to grade the written English - if you take the range from beginner to intermediate (the highest I think it would go) - I would have to have a marking system that would identify the level and then the range within the level.

I'm not having to worry about the spoken element and this will be tested separately.

However, as this will be funded by a givernment body - it will have to be auditable.

Any help appreciated.

SueH

This was one of my problems in the UK. It's also one I've encountered abroad.

With beginners, I've often utilised a bi-lingual picture dictionary to help at the beginning. This is okay when the student can read.

I had a group of five last year - three different first languages and none had ever been to school. They didn't use English outside class (despite their colleagues being willing to help) . In six months, I managed to get a few vocabulary words in their heads plus greetings and that was all.

It was very disheartening because I had another beginners group who had been to school and this class progressed quickly. I tried to integrate this group with the other class but it didn't work since the other students spent their time explaining things and translating for them.

If anyone knows what to do - I'd love to hear too.

Good luck SueH

Anyone reading

Any ideas for assessing children?

[dmb]

TT, at the moment I am testing students for one to one classes. So the placement isn't that much of a problem The teacher after a few weeks knows the students better than I do after a placement test. The teacher can give more suitable materials. However in the past I did work at a school that would have 8 levels within one level. Placement was difficult. After deciding what level the student was, say preintermediate. I would have to decide which unit in the book the student should start. Say the student needed a refresher course in present perfect i would place the student in the level which covered the unit with present perfect.

[Ben Round de Bloc]