Post on 03-Apr-2018
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
1/12
Prepared by Sabariah Md Rashid
TESTING WRITING
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
2/12
The Nature of Writing
- Writing skills: complex and difficult to master
- Includes mastery of grammatical skills,
rhetorical devices and conceptual /judgmental elements
- different types of writing task require differentskills
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
3/12
5 general components of what entails good
Language use ~ correct/appropriate sts.
Mechanical skills ~ correct conventions oflanguage
Treatment of content ~ think creatively/dev. thoughts
Stylistic skills ~ manipulate sets/paragraphs
Judgmental skills ~ appropriacy of
- audience/purpose
- correct registers
W
W
W
W
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
4/12
2 common approaches in testing writing
1. Indirect test of writing
2. Direct test of writing
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
5/12
Indirect writing test
~ testing the underlying skills of ability made
up of discrete levels, e.g., error recognition
~ using multiple-choice items
~ TOEFL incorporated these items before
the early 80s
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
6/12
~ getting students to write/perform task
~ e.g. TWE (Test of Written English),which is a supplement
to TOEFL
Direct test of writing
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
7/12
Problems in Testing Directly
Need to set tasks which are properlyrepresentative of pop and tasks thatstudents are expected to be able toperform
Tasks: to elicit samples of writing, whichtruly presents the writing ability of astudent
Scoring of writing samples reliably
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
8/12
What different types of writing task arestudents expected to be able to perform?
Examples:
- writing stories (narrative)
- summary
- reports
- letters (informal vs. formal)
- descriptions (descriptive)
- presenting opinions (expository)
- argumentative
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
9/12
In class ~ teachers need to teachstudents the specified writing tasks& the micro-skills
Micro-skills
- accuracy
- cohesion & coherence
- mechanics
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
10/12
i. Set as many tasks as are feasible:
~ validity: ideally, should include all the
relevant potential tasks
~ total score best estimate of a candidatesperformance of the test ability
~ all scores on different writing tasks =
ones performance on the same task some people are better at some tasks than
others
How to obtain samples which represent eachcandidates writing ability?
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
11/12
However, need to balance this against practicality
ii. Test only writing ability and nothing else
~ need to be aware of not testing wide
general knowledge reading composition, etc.
~ instructions: clear/not too long
iii. Restrict candidates
~ provide information that is required
of the writing task
7/28/2019 Testing AND Writing
12/12
How to enhance reliability?
Include as many tasks as possible
Restrict candidates
Do not give choice of tasks
Ensure samples which are sufficiently
long