DIMENSIONS OF LANGUAGE ASSESSMENT
A. TYPES OF TEST ACCORDING TO THE PURPOSES a. Diagnostic Test
The purpose of this test is to diagnose specific aspects of a language, offering a checklist of features for the teacher to use in discovering difficulties encountered by the students. A diagnostic test's goal is to identify areas of a language that a student should work on or that a course should cover.69 For example, a writing diagnostic pretest would elicit a written sample from students, allowing the teacher to identify which rhetorical and linguistic characteristics in the course require extra attention. If for instance, the students lack the cohesion of their writing, the teacher may set the lesson to spend more time on cohesive devices and how they are used in sentences and paragraphs.
b. Proficiency Test
The purpose of a proficiency test is to test global competence in a language. It tests overall ability regardless of any training they previously had in the language. This test does not focus on a single course, curriculum, or talent in the language; rather, it assesses total proficiency.70 Standardized multiple-choice items on grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension and aural comprehension have typically been used in proficiency assessments. Many commercially available proficiency tests are available.
69 Brown and Abeywickrama, Language Assessment Principles and Classroom Practices.
70 Ibid.
70 Language Learning Assessment: Linking Theory to Practice
c. Achievement Test
The purpose of achievement tests is to determine whether course objectives have been met with skills acquired by the end of a period of instruction. It analyzes the extent to which students have acquired language that has already been taught. As pointed out by Miller et al, the achievement test, also known as published test, is widely used in primary and secondary schools and underpinned by norm-referenced types of test, meaning that it measures the level of students’ achievement across a variety of knowledge and skills comparing their performance with other students’ performance within the same reference group (Nationwide with the same grade level).71 The specification of the achievement test should be determined on the basis of the following statements:
The objectives of the lesson, unit, or course being assessed
each objective's relative importance (or weight) is calculated
during the unit of time, tasks were employed in classroom lessons,
deadlines for both the test and the distribution of results to students, possibility of providing formative feedback72
Achievement test furthermore falls into two types, namely standardized and informal classroom test. The former is carefully designed with achievement domains that are clearly defined, specific guidelines for administering and scoring, as well as norms for representative groups for whom the test is designed. Millet et al list several main characteristics of standardized achievement tests as follows:73
The test items have a high technical quality.
The guidelines for administering and scoring are so precise that they can be used by different users.
To help interpret the result for assessment based on the test, norms based on national samples of students are provided.
71 Miller, Linn, and Gronlund, Measurement and Assessment in Teaching (Tenth Edit.).
72 Brown and Abeywickrama, Language Assessment Principles and Classroom Practices.
73 Miller, Linn, and Gronlund, Measurement and Assessment in Teaching (Tenth Edit.).
Kasyfur Rahman, M.Pd. 71
Information on comparable and equivalent forms of test is provided.
Accessory and complementary materials such as a manual is provided as a guide for administering and scoring the test, evaluating qualities, and interpreting the results.
Sources of samples for standardized achievement test74 The latter type of achievement test, the informal classroom one is usually designed by the teacher on a micro-scale. Although relatively similar to standardized achievement tests particularly in terms of clear directions to students, informal classroom achievement test to some extent differs from the standardized one when it comes to the nature of learning outcomes and measured content, the test reliability, quality of test items, the procedure of test administration and scoring as well as test result interpretation.
Here is a chart of comparison between the advantages of both types of achievement tests.
74 Ibid.
72 Language Learning Assessment: Linking Theory to Practice
Table 12: Advantages of Standardized and Informal Achievement Test.75
d. Aptitude Test
Aptitude test can provide information about individuals’
readiness for instruction, identification of different achievers (low and high), identifying learning problems, and help students to plan their learning. The purpose of a language aptitude test is to predict a person’s success in exposure to a foreign language. An aptitude test is used to assess the capacity or general ability to acquire a foreign language a priori (before enrolling in a course) and the likelihood of success. In other words, it indicates the present level of learner’s abilities which are useful to predict future performance.
However, it is worthy of our attention that aptitude test does not measure fixed ability.76
Generally speaking, compared to achievement tests aiming to measure what has been learned by students, aptitude test tends to measure the ability to learn new tasks. However, this distinction should be carefully examined since aptitude test actually measures
75 Ibid.
76 Ibid.
Kasyfur Rahman, M.Pd. 73 what students have previously learned from their past experiences, and achievement test results might be also used to predict performance in the future. Thus, the difference between both types lies in the types of learning measured and the types of prediction for which each test is most useful. In the context of language assessment, a common content-based language achievement test measures knowledge of subject matter and skills to use the language learned. On the other hand, a school-oriented attitude test is aimed to measure verbal and problem-solving abilities. Language aptitude assessments were apparently created to apply to any language learning in a classroom setting. For example, SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test), Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT), and Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery (PLAB).
e. Placement Test
The placement test goal is to assign a student to a specific level or area of a language program or school. This is usually administered before a program or course is run. For example, when one desires to take an English course, she would need to take the placement test to determine at which level of course (beginner, elementary, pre-intermediate, intermediate, and so forth) she should attend.
74 Language Learning Assessment: Linking Theory to Practice
Figure 9: Types of Test According to the Purposes
B. TYPES OF TESTS ACCORDING TO THE RESPONSE