TESTING: PRINCIPLES AND

TECHNIQUES

Testing: Principles and Techniques

Tests are “inappropriate, mysterious, unreal, subjective, and unstructured.”

Certain basic questions need to be answered before applying any tests What is my purpose in testing? How is the test related to the objectives of this course? What do I expect this test to show? What precisely is being tested by this method of testing? Am I really testing what my students have been learning? Am I actually finding out what students know?

Why You Are Testing Many aspects of language study may be tested. The selection of material for a test and the way this material is to be tested will

depend on the purposes and objective of the test and the course. What are the objectives of this course? What kinds of competencies do I want these students to be able to

demonstrate? Is the test being given with a special intent?

If the tests are to be effective in grouping or ranking candidates as required, decisions like these must be made before the test is designed.

The following tests can be administered:1. Prognostic or aptitude tests2. Proficiency Tests3. Achievement Tests, or diagnostic tests

Aptitude Tests Are designed to identify students who will have difficulties in learning another

language. They provide a chart of predicted strengths or weaknesses which may serve as a

guide in determining students’ levels. Useful for a teacher to help students with particular problems of the students. Data from these tests can also aid the teacher in identifying underachievers in

the foreign language class. Some researchers has clearly been unsuccessful with many students exposed to

it. Therefore, they intended to develop tests that could predict probable success or failure.

Traditionally, Success = general intelligence + achievement in studying the native language.

Paul Pimsleur discovered that these were less important than other measures. He developed a test system called Language Aptitude Battery.

Research into aptitude has been conducted with an aim to determine ability factors in active oral use of communication in a foreign language.

Aptitude Tests - MLAT John Carrol and Stanley Sapon designed a Modern Language Aptitude Test(MLAT)

in 1960s based on most important factors in learning a language such as phonetic coding, ability to handle grammar, rote memorization ability: and ability to infer linguistic forms, rules, and patterns from a new content.

These abilities has been test under 5 subtests. Number Learning

– learner to write the appropriate numbers for the numbers dictated. Phonetic Script

– learns the phonetic symbols of the English sounds looking at the script after hearing the word.

Spelling clues – learns had to recognize the word. For example, mblm for emblem, knfrns for conferences

Words in sentences – learner is expected to detect the function of the words in a sentence and identify the words with same function in other sentences.

Paired Associates- students select the English equivalents of the words in their language.