Lesson 1: Principles in

Language Assessment
WHAT IS ASSESSMENT?
Assessment

Assessment has a variety of meanings in higher education. It includes “any activity designed to collect information on the success of a program, course, or University curriculum” in order to “improve institutional
practices” (Stassen et al., 2001, p.5).

Assessment “focuses on assessing student learning and experience to determine whether students have acquired the skills, knowledge, and competencies associated with their program of study” (Stassen et al., 2001,
p.7).
Why do teachers need to assess learning?

Assessment in education provides concrete evidences that a student has learned and experienced a certain process.

Student assessment enables instructors to measure the effectiveness of their teaching by linking student performance to specific learning
objectives. As a result, teachers are able to institutionalize effective teaching choices and revise ineffective ones in their pedagogy.
Principles of Language Assessment

1. Validity
2. Reliability
3. Authenticity
4. Prcaticality
5. Washback
Validity

Does the assessment accurately measure what we really want to measure?

Validity is the extent to which a test measures what it claims to measure.

Reliability

Is all work being consistently marked to the same standard?

Reliability is the degree of consistency of a measure. A test will be reliable when it gives the same repeated result under the same conditions.
Authenticity

Are students/task-takers asked to perform real world task?

Using creative learning experiences to test students' skills and knowledge in realistic situations.
Practicality

Is the process relatively easy to administer?

Practicality in assessment means that the test is

easy to design, easy to administer and easy to
score.
Washback

Does the assessment has positive effect on the learns and teachers?

Effect of assessment on teaching and learning process

Traditional and Non-traditional
Assessment
1. Assessing Concepts about Print

Developed the Concepts About Print Test to formally further assess young children’s understanding of written language concepts.(May Clay
1985)

Learners need to acquire and master basic concepts of print and literature to achieve mature reading and writing behaviors.
2. Assessing Alphabet Knowledge(Letter Sound and Letter Names)

Alphabetic Knowledge is learner’s understanding that letters represent sound so that words may be read by saying that
sounds represented by the letters and words maybe spelled by writing the letters that represent the sounds in a word.
3. Assessing Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic awareness is a subset of phonological awareness in which listeners are able to hear, identify,
and manipulate phonemes, the smallest units of sound that can differentiate meaning.
4.Assessing Decoding Skill

Decoding is the ability to read words by translating written symbols into the sounds of spoken language(Mother Tongue, Filipino, and English).

To test the learner’s decoding skills, they should be given a stimulus to pseudo words which represent the various orthographic rules of the
language to be tested.
5. Assessing Word Recognition

Word recognition is the ability of learner’s to read words by sight with

automaticity and not resort to blending.
6. Assessing comprehension of narrative text

A narration is retelling of a story, and in general a story is a sequence of events (which may be
historically true or false) presented in such a way that the reader’s imagination can comprehend
the action
7. Assessing Interest

Language learning must be contextualized not just in local settings where learners can see an immediate
application of the language skills they are acquiring from class. Teachers must also assess learners interest to be
able to get better contextualized learning activates that will entice students to pay more attention to the lesson.
8. Anecdotal Records

Anecdotal record are description of students action written as they occur or soon afterwards.
This help teachers analyze a student’s accomplishments and approach to learning over time.
9. Portfolio Assessment

Assessment from where students and teachers collaborate in collecting samples of student-
learning progress. This assessment forms helps the learning monitor their own learning.
10. Observation

Student observation are done informally while monitoring classroom work and participation. They can be recorded on checklists or
anecdotal records.

The purpose of observation young children is to carefully pay attention to the details of the child’s behavior, records these details in a
structured manner, and assess