The evaluation of student performance and knowledge is a critical element of an educator’s job as well as an essential step in the learning process for students. The quality and effectiveness of the evaluations given by educators are impacted by their ability to create and use reliable and valuable evaluations to facilitate and communicate student learning. The Handbook of Research on Assessment Literacy and Teacher-Made Testing in the Language Classroom is an essential reference source that discusses effective language assessment and educator roles in evaluation design. Featuring research on topics such as course learning outcomes, learning analytics, and teacher collaboration, this book is ideally designed for educators, administrative officials, linguists, academicians, researchers, and education students seeking coverage on an educator’s role in evaluation design and analyses of evaluation methods and outcomes.

Language Testing Reconsidered provides a critical update on major issues that have engaged the field of language testing since its inception. Anyone who is working in, studying or teaching language testing should have a copy of this book. The information, discussions, and reflections offered within the volume address major developments within the field over the past decades, enlivened by current "takes" on these issues. The real value of this collection, however, lies in its consideration of the past as a means of defining the future agenda of language testing.

This book examines the relationship between Chinese college-level test takers' strategy use and reading test performance using a Structural Equation Modelling Approach. With a large sample of Chinese college-level test takers, the book investigates the underlying structure of the EFL reading test. It suggests implications for classroom teachers and testing researchers about the relationship between metacognitive and cognitive strategy use in testing contexts.

Second language assessment is ubiquitous. It has found its way from education into questions about access to professions and migration. This volume focuses on the main debates and research advances in second language assessment in the last fifty years or so, showing the influence of linguistics, politics, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and psychometrics. There are four parts which, when taken together, address the principles and practices of second language assessment while considering its impact on society. Read separately, each part addresses a different aspect of the field. Part I deals with the conceptual foundations of second language assessment with chapters on the purposes of assessment, and standards and frameworks, as well as matters of scoring, quality assurance, and test validation. Part II addresses the theory and practice of assessing different second language skills including aspects like intercultural competence and fluency. Part III examines the challenges and opportunities of second language assessment in a range of contexts. In addition to chapters on second language assessment on a national scale, there are chapters on learning-oriented assessment, as well as the uses of second language assessment in the workplace and for migration. Part IV examines a selection of important issues in the field that deserve attention. These include the alignment of language examinations to external frameworks, the increasing use of technology to both deliver and score second language tests, the responsibilities associated with assessing test takers with special needs, the concept of 'voice' in second language assessment, and assessment literacy for teachers and other test and score users.

Despite prodigious developments in the field of language assessment in the Middle East and the Pacific Rim, research and practice in these areas have been underrepresented in mainstream literature. This volume takes a fresh look at language assessment in these regions, and provides a unique overview of contemporary language assessment research. In compiling this book, the editors have tapped into the knowledge of language and educational assessment experts whose diversity of perspectives and experience has enriched the focus and scope of language and educational assessment in general, and the present volume in particular. The six ‘trends’ addressed in the 26 chapters that comprise this title consider such contemporary topics as data mining, in-class assessment, and washback. The contributors explore new approaches and techniques in language assessment including advances resulting from multidisciplinary collaboration with researchers in computer science, genetics, and neuroscience. The current trends and promising new directions identified in this volume and the research reported here suggest that researchers across the Middle East and the Pacific Rim are playing—and will continue to play—an important role in advancing the quality, utility, and fairness of language testing and assessment practices.

This book examines the simultaneous contribution of learner vocabulary size and speed to second language performance differences across learner levels and settings. Harrington considers vocabulary size and speed, as reflected in retrieval speed and consistency, as a three-dimensional measurement construct termed lexical facility. While size and retrieval speed are generally known, this is the first attempt to incorporate consistency, as measured by the coefficient of variation, as an index of vocabulary skill. Part 1 describes the three dimensions and the roles they play on lower level text processing and thus on second language performance more generally. Part 2 reports on seven studies and related research that investigate the sensitivity of the three dimensions, both individually and in combination, to proficiency differences in common domains of academic English performance. Harrington’s framework and the theoretical and methodological issues that arise are presented in a manner accessible to a wide readership, including second language acquisition vocabulary researchers, testing and assessment practitioners, and those interested in second language research methodology.

Strategies in Learning and Using a Second Language examines what it takes to achieve long-term success in languages beyond the first language. Distinguishing language learning from language-use strategies, Andrew D. Cohen disentangles a morass of terminology to help the reader see what language strategies are and how they can enhance performance. Particular areas of research examined in the book include: - links between the use of task-specific strategies and language performance - how multilinguals verbalise their thoughts during language learning and use strategies that learners use in test-taking contexts In this fully revised and substantially rewritten second edition, every chapter has been reworked, with material either updated or replaced. Entirely new material has also been developed based on examples of specific strategies supplied by actual learners, mostly drawn from a website featuring these strategies in the learning of Spanish grammar.Strategies in Learning and Using a Second language will be an invaluable resource for language teachers and researchers, as well as for administrators of second language programmes and for students of applied linguistics.

This second edition of The Routledge Handbook of Language Testing provides an updated and comprehensive account of the area of language testing and assessment. The volume brings together 35 authoritative articles, divided into ten sections, written by 51 leading specialists from around the world. There are five entirely new chapters covering the four skills: reading, writing, listening, and speaking, as well as a new entry on corpus linguistics and language testing. The remaining 30 chapters have been revised, often extensively, or entirely rewritten with new authorship teams at the helm, reflecting new generations of expertise in the field. With a dedicated section on technology in language testing, reflecting current trends in the field, the Handbook also includes an extended epilogue written by Harding and Fulcher, contemplating what has changed between the first and second editions and charting a trajectory for the field of language testing and assessment. Providing a basis for discussion, project work, and the design of both language tests themselves and related validation research, this Handbook represents an invaluable resource for students, researchers, and practitioners working in language testing and assessment and the wider field of language education.

This book investigates the relationships between learner strategy use and performance.