When preintermediate English-as-a-foreign-language students did a controlled dictation test and then amended their protocols during an unexpected second exposure to the passage, an analysis of the scores showed a modest improvement in performance, counterbalanced by a marked drop in dispersal and a loss of validity. (Author/CB)

Discusses the results of a workshop examining the application of American Council for the Teaching of Foreign Languages proficiency testing to African languages, focusing on the possibility of an alternative testing procedure for those languages for which certified testers are not available and the potentials and problems of a team assessment…

Problems in the use of foreign graduate students as teaching assistants include cumbersome language proficiency testing, limited English proficiency, internal struggles in training programs, and rapidly increasing foreign graduate student enrollments. (MSE)

Results indicated significant differences between scores of the 18 low vision children (ages 1.5-4.5 years) and normal seeing agemates on auditory comprehension and verbal ability components of the Preschool Language Scale. (Author/DB)

Three standardized language assessment measures (Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised, Test of Early Language Development, and the Preschool Language Scale) were individually administered to 25 nonreferred, White, middle-class preschoolers. Correlations among the three measures were statistically significant suggesting an interrelationship of…

Discusses the provisional proficiency guidelines of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages and explores their application to two important areas of foreign language education--testing and curriculum development. Reviews the features of proficiency and achievement tests and describes two proficiency-based curriculum projects.…

Reviews some trends in the measurement of oral fluency in a foreign language and offers an alternative to integrative and discrete point testing and to the oral interview. This alternative looks at two components of fluent speech--speech rate and consonant attraction--as they fit into the parameters of fluency. (SED)

Discusses the concept of reliability in language testing and considers several simple ANOVA (analysis of variance) models which can be used to define and estimate reliability coefficients. Summarizes the main statistical results associated with the commonly used measurements of reliability. Presents results likely to be of use to language testers.…

Describes the Sign Communication Proficiency Interview (SCPI) and discusses the SCPI rating scale, linguistic and cultural factors important for sign communicative competence, and skills in communicating simultaneously in signing and speaking. (EKN)

Discusses several tests designed to determine speaking ability which preceded the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages/Educational Testing Service test and describes the benefits of the American Institute of Musical Studies oral proficiency testing program. (SED)

Presents results from a case study of a bilingual reader who read both easy and hard texts in her first and second language. Rational cloze and introspection tasks were used to examine quantitative and qualitative differences in comprehension in the two languages. Discusses implications of the test for diagnostic testing. (SED)

Discusses the difficulties of testing listening comprehension in a second language and describes test procedures which try to overcome these difficulties used in a French course taught at the University College in Cardiff. The specific tests are note taking and summary writing, oral translation, and transcription. (SED)

Soldiers in each of the 3 countries answered questions relating to content and vocabulary of material in languages of the other 2 countries. Nonlinguistic factors (education, travel, etc.) were taken into account. Investigation indicated that the languages are so similar that comprehension could be improved with little difficulty. (RW)

This article is mainly concerned with a study of the relation between the content of a multiple choice test and its composition, from the point of view of those features in tests which enable the testee to derive the correct answer by studying the composition of the test itself. (Author/POP)

Task-based language assessment (TBLA) grows from the observation that mastering the grammar and lexicon of a language is not sufficient for using a language to achieve ends in social situations. In TBLA, language use is observed in settings that are more realistic and complex than in discrete skills assessment and that typically require the…