Since its introduction in 2017, NFER has been contracted by Ofqual to develop, deliver and analyse the results of the National Reference Test (NRT) in English and maths. The NRT is administered annually and shows if student performance in English and maths at GCSE level has changed from year to year. The NRT results are based on analysis of data…

This study aimed to investigate the effect of written cues on the second- language (L2) language perception, processing, and word learning, especially when the person's first language (L1) belongs to a different rhythmic type of language than L2. The first objective was to examine whether late bilinguals as L2 learners can benefit more from…

The purpose of the study was to address the Adult TESOL leadership concern of insecure grant funding. It focused on two key performance indicators: Student retention and academic skill level gains. Students dropping out of the program and scoring poorly on assessments are an ongoing concern for leadership. The study used an intervention and…

Extending new verbs is important in becoming a productive speaker of a language. Prior results show children have difficulty extending verbs when they have seen events with varied agents. This study further examines the impact of variability on verb learning and asks whether variability interacts with event complexity or differs by language.…

Purpose: This study explored whether a monolingual-normed English language battery could identify children with English as an additional language (EAL) who have persistent English language learning difficulties that affect functional academic attainment. Method: Children with EAL (n = 43) and monolingual English-speaking children (n = 46)…

This study is an evaluation of the performance of automated speech scoring for speakers with documented or suspected speech impairments. Given that the use of automated scoring of open-ended spoken responses is relatively nascent and there is little research to date that includes test takers with disabilities, this small exploratory study focuses…

Reviewing the assessment literature, dynamic assessment is the most recently advocated type of assessment in that it not only argues for integration between assessment and instruction, but also takes into consideration the testees' past, present, and future potentials. However, as far as dynamic assessment is concerned, a key question is: How much…

The aim of this study was to develop, for the benefit of both test takers and test score users, enhanced "TOEFL ITP"® test score reports that go beyond the simple numerical scores that are currently reported. To do so, we applied traditional scale anchoring (proficiency scaling) to item difficulty data in order to develop performance…

Pragmatic competence may be disrupted due to psychological and neurological causes. For appropriate remedy and rehabilitation, a precise assessment of pragmatic skills is important. However, there is no test battery in the Bengali language, and consequently, there is no published data on pragmatic ability of Bengali speakers. Due to the vast…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of sentence combining (SC) and sentence decombining (SD) activities on fostering reading comprehension. As a widely used writing activity for enhancing syntactic fluency in English Language Arts (ELA) classes, SC requires learners to combine short sentences into longer and more complex…

Given that teaching Arabic, as a second language has become increasingly significant in the present context, it follows that there is an urgent and pressing need to develop efficient learning tools as well as adequate measuring tools for testing the learner's development. There are numerous problems associated with measuring a learner's…

This study aims to investigate the effect of an intensive language course at Majmaah University on improving students' linguistic repertoires. It also explores the perceptions of instructors at Majmaah University on students' performance after the intensive language course. The study also addressed the following questions: 1-To what extent did the…

The study aims to find out the impact of intensive reading strategy on English for specific purposes college students' in developing vocabulary. To achieve the aim of the study, 40 ESP College students were randomly chosen from the college of political sciences at A-Nahrain University in Iraq, the participants were in the second grade during the…

The purposes of this study were to investigate the levels of receptive and productive knowledge of English collocations of Thai EFL university students and identify the types of grammatical and lexical collocations reported as most and least known by the students. The participants were 286 third-year regular students affiliated with four academic…

This study examined whether direct communication with people from other countries using Skype or Line would affect students' English test scores in listening and reading as well as the development of their curiosity concerning foreign cultures by comparing the data of an experimental group with that of a control group. The former group conducted…