Common problems in using and scoring the Developmental Sentence Scoring procedure to quantify young children's grammatic structure expressive language are reviewed. Scoring examples are provided to help clinicians learn the DDS procedure. (Author/CL)

Discusses the development of a language aptitude test designed to help select students to study German. Four areas of assessment are memory ability, ability to deal with stress and intonation patterns, inductive reasoning ability, and ability to recognize grammatical case. (EKN)

The limitations of objectives tests, the language skills needed for university work, and effective ways of appraising and communicating these skills to the university are discussed. The goals of university English as a second language (ESL) programs is to train international students in the linguistic and academic skills they will need in American…

Testing English listening skills involves a variety of skills. Sounds are sometimes difficult to discriminate in a language that is not one's native tongue, so testing phoneme discrimination, the ability to tell the difference between sounds, is important. Picture choice items are a good way to select among alternatives to demonstrate…

The paper examines aspects involved in providing an accurate evaluation of speech and language of culturally different preschool children. Dialectical differences of Spanish and Black English speakers are detailed. Culturally based nonverbal behaviors and situational factors, including touching behavior and eye contact, are considered. Cultural…

In an effort to comply with bilingual instruction requirements, school districts throughout California will soon be involved in testing vast numbers of children to determine language proficiency and language dominance. Many language tests will require a child to repeat a sentence or a phrase in exactly the same manner that is stated by an examiner…

Of the four language skills, reading is probably tested most often, and it may seem to be the easiest to test. However, testing reading proficiency has its difficulties, and the test constructor must be aware of several issues. Reading involves a number of skills, and the number and complexity of these must be recognized. Choosing the text to test…

The Nonbiased Assessment module contains seven sections that provide information on various issues relevant to the construction of programs for assessing minority group children. Each section, in addition to the discussion of the topic, contains a list of objectives for the workshop participant or reader, a pretest, simulations, and an annotated…

This text on foreign language testing provides an overview of testing principles, problems, and practices, and examines the multiple roles of the classroom teacher, as well as the construction and scoring of more formal language tests. The following types or foreign language tests are distinguished: achievement or attainment tests, proficiency…