Teacher Discussion Forums

I'd like to receive some advice from experienced teachers on the topic of evaluating or assessing students' progress. This is not such a big problem when it comes to grammar and reading/listening comprehesion. The real area of trouble for me is how to evaluate a student's productive abilities (writing and speaking). I've been looking for a book or a website or something to give me some direction.
My degree was in History, so I haven't had an formal training in teaching English to adults. The last four years have yielded a lot of improvement for my teaching technique in general, but I still struggle with this issue of evaluation. And, I feel like I'm often doing a disservice to the students who are serious about improving their skills when I can't offer them consistently objective praise and criticism. Thank you, dear colleagues, for giving my post some consideration.

Jerry White
Houston, TX

This is always hard to assess, or at least to assess fairly. What if the student is having a bad day, or gets nervous in tests?

I've given quarterly assessments in the past, which are based on the entire three months of lessons. You can jot down a few notes after each session, and then type these up for the assessment. This presents a more accurate picture of his/her abilities. But you can record a five minute conversation, and then assess the strengths and weaknesses, too. Or just take notes during any conversation with him/her, and talk about these points afterwards.

When you assess speaking ability, you want to gauge fluency and accuracy with the language, as well as pronunciation. Pay particular attention to the language covered during the past few months, which should be used correctly. Unfortunately, a lot of this assessment isn't objective like a test, which is either right or wrong. But in discussing fluency, accuracy, pronunciation, use of vocabulary, etc., you are guiding your student forward, and pointing out deficiencies in his/her skills.

I hope this helps, or gives you some ideas. Does anyone else have suggestions?

Chris Cotter
Heads Up English - Materials based on current events. Just print, and teach!
www.headsupenglish.com

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If you look at the Common European Framework, it has very specific definitions of what each fluency level entails in speaking, writing, listening and reading. So this might give you a detailed set of measurements, at least, to evaluate whether they are at, e.g., level C2 or level B1. The complete definitions are available for download in PDF from the EU web site.