Student-Centred Testing: Assessing Communication in Progress.

Assessment of communicative language learning means evaluating not only whether the language used is correct or incorrect, but also whether it is appropriate for the context. In structuring a communicative exchange for the purpose of testing, it must be determined that the problem used as the subject of an assessment interaction is suitable, and that it is at the appropriate level of language use, of interest to students, relevant to their language needs, and generalizable to other situations. The hypothetical problem should create an information gap and the incentive to bridge it. The linguistic, semi-linguistic, and non-linguistic means used to communicate in the exchange must be evaluated according to the alternatives available, the appropriateness of the language for the occasion, the degree to which error can be tolerated before it inhibits communication, the extent to which the essential elements of the exchange are present, and the degree to which it approaches native performance. The use of transcripts can be helpful in the analysis of spoken exchanges. Role-playing exchanges by fluent speakers can be used to establish the likely content and form of an interaction, for both evaluation and feedback to the student. (MSE)