This issue of the 1971-72 series of "Language in American Indian Education" contains articles on bilingual education and the testing of language skills. The first, "The Language of the Sioux," is a bibliographic essay dealing with the studies that have been made to date of the Sioux language and its dialects. A Title 7…

This paper describes an experimental testing program in England which parallels a broader, 1967 study concerning second language acquisition in the United States. The earlier study, conducted by John Carroll, concentrated on determining proficiency of language majors in five foreign languages. This experiment limits the field of study to German…

This study both examines the relationship between oral dialect proficiency--Standard English and Black Nonstandard English--and auditory comprehension of stories presented in Standard or Black Nonstandard English and attempts to obtain information concerning the reactions of black dialect speakers to oral stories in Black Nonstandard English and…

To help assess the writing ability of college freshmen studying English as a second language (ESL), this study was undertaken to identify particular structures of subordination associated with writing maturity and to develop a diagnostic instrument to test student control of those structures. Following sentence-generating principles of…

This is a teacher's guide for "Poor Simpleton," a language test designed for students of English in bilingual programs. The guide explains the nature of the test, how to administer and score it, and how to analyze test results. The test is a modified version of the cloze procedure. Unlike most cloze tests, which are…

During the 1974-1975 school year eight itinerant French teachers travelled among 20 elementary schools teaching oral French to Grade 6 and Grade 7 students. Each teacher was responsible for two or three schools, The course was based on the book Le Francais Partout-Cours Preliminaire (1967) ed.). The study described in this report was initiated to…

During the last decade, bilingual programs have increased dramatically in number and scope; but there are still many problems to be resolved in implementing cultural pluralism. The definition of who is bilingual is an important issue. Bilingual programs currently in existence vary between the widely used transitional model (where instruction is…

A systematic and explicit approach to evaluation of pronunciation is proposed. Generalizability theory was applied in order to comprise all relevant factors in one psychomotor model. French and German pronunciation tests (in Appendix) were devised and evaluated. Common pronunciation problems for native Dutch speakers were incorporated. (Author/LMO)

Sketches some of the dilemmas in language assessment and presents exemplary practical approaches to assessment in the language arts areas of listening, oral language, reading, and writing. (SD)

Describes a study whose aim was to improve the quality of the structured oral interviews used in Denmark to test the English proficiency of high school students after five years of instruction. The study focused on construct validity and interscorer reliability. (SED)

Recent language testing research investigates factors other than language proficiency that may be responsible for systematic variance in language test performance. One such factor is the test takers' cognitive styles. The present study was carried out with the aim of finding the probable effects of Iranian EFL learners' cognitive styles on their…

In school year 2003-2004, state data showed that the percentage of students with limited English proficiency scoring proficient on a state's language arts and mathematics tests was lower than the state's annual progress goals in nearly two-thirds of the 48 states for which data was obtained. To help these students progress academically, state and…

This text on teaching language to students with hearing impairments stresses the use of multiple language learning pathways to meet the individual needs of students. The introductory chapter looks at language issues in the context of history, instruction, technology, culture, and the law. Chapter 2, on language acquisition, discusses the nature of…

This study tested the effectiveness of the cloze procedure, used aurally, to teach listening comprehension in English as a foreign language (EFL). Subjects were the classes of two teachers (n=74, n=75); one teacher taught using the aural cloze procedure, and the other taught using conventional listening instruction techniques. In aural cloze…

The annotated bibliography describes foreign language assessment instruments currently used in elementary and middle schools. The instruments are drawn from a wide variety of program models: Foreign Language in the Elementary School (FLES), middle school sequential instruction, and immersion (total, two-way, partial). The bibliography has six…