This article provides a detailed review of the Computer-based English Listening Speaking Test (CELST) used in Guangdong, China, as part of the National Matriculation English Test (NMET) to assess students' English proficiency. The CELST measures listening and speaking skills as outlined in the "English Curriculum for Senior Middle…

As our understanding of the construct of oral communication (OC) has evolved, so have the possibilities of computer technology undertaking the delivery of tests that measure this ability. It is paramount to understand to what extent such developments lead to accurate, comprehensive, and useful assessment of OC. In this paper, we discuss five…

The computer-based College English Test-Spoken English Test (CET-SET) in China incorporates interactional competence in its construct by using a non-face-to-face paired discussion task. To build validity arguments for this unique computer-mediated interactive task, the present study investigated the impact of delivery mode on test performance in…

Fluency in terms of speed of speech and (lack of) hesitations such as silent and filled pauses ('uhm's) is part of oral proficiency. Language assessment rubrics therefore include aspects of fluency. Measuring fluency, however, is highly time-consuming because of the manual labour involved. The current paper aims to automatically measure aspects of…

Severity and centrality are two main kinds of rater effects posing threats to the validity and fairness of performance assessments. Adopting Jin and Wang's (2018) extended facets modeling approach, we separately estimated the magnitude of rater severity and centrality effects in the web-based TestDaF (Test of German as a Foreign Language) writing…

Despite an emphasis on oral communication in most foreign language classrooms, the resource-intensive nature (i.e. time and manpower) of speaking tests hinder regular oral assessments. A possible solution is the development of a (semi-) automated scoring system. When it is used in conjunction with human raters, the consistency of computers can…

The literature on task planning abounds with studies in laboratory or classroom contexts; however, the contribution of task planning to the testing context has remained a largely uncharted area of enquiry. The current study is primarily focused on exploring the impacts of pressured vs. unpressured on-line task planning conditions on EFL students'…

This article provides an overview and evaluation of the uses--actual and potential--of automatic speech recognition (ASR) and spoken dialogue systems (SDS), related technologies that can be applied to second language speaking assessment, given particular definitions of the construct. Both technologies have only gradually moved in the direction of…

Assessing speaking is one of the most difficult tasks in computer based language testing. Many countries all over the world face the need to implement standardized language tests where speaking tasks are commonly included. However, a number of problems make them rather impractical such as the costs, the personnel involved, the length of time for…

This report describes the initial automated scoring results that were obtained using the constructed responses from the Writing and Speaking sections of the pilot forms of the "TOEFL Junior"® Comprehensive test administered in late 2011. For all of the items except one (the edit item in the Writing section), existing automated scoring…