Quality Language Assessment in University EFL Classroom

Abstract

In recent years, teachers have become increasingly interested in the methodology by which the attitudes, knowledge and skills of EFL learners can be constructively developed. In line with this strand, European language examinations focus upon assessing a learner’s ability to use the language, and do not concentrate on testing whether learners can recite the rules of the language, or how many words they have learned, or whether they sound like a perfect native speaker. Modern language assessments are not interested in whether students can transform isolated sentences into paraphrased versions, or whether they can give a definition of a word out – or even within – the context. They are also rarely interested in whether the learner can translate sentences in his/her first language into the target language, or whether (s)he can translate sentences from the target language into the mother tongue or, indeed, whether (s)he can give the mother tongue equivalent of an underlined word in an English passage.