LANGUAGE TESTING AND ASSESSMENT

Student name Nguyễn Minh Thư

Trần Hữu Phước
Nguyễn Thị Mỹ Trang
Y Thị Quỳnh Như
Nguyễn Khánh Ngọc
Unit name Language Testing and Assessment

Name of course instructor Nguyen Thi Thanh Ha, PhD

Assignment name Assignment 1

Title of your paper Review the test qualities on the IELTS

test
Word count (excluding list of references, 2495
and appendix)

Due date Soft copy: July 8, 2019 11:59 p.m.

Hard copy: tba by your monitor.

You must keep a photocopy or electronic copy of your assignment.

 Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 2

REVIEW THE TEST QUALITIES ON THE IELTS TEST

I. INTRODUCTION:

In the context of globalizing world, English has become an international language

for people from all over the world to communicate to each other and a compulsory subject

at many schools. There are more and more people are learning English for many purposes,

such as getting jobs or communicating. One of the major reasons that people tend to learn

English more is achieving a certification of International English Language Testing System

(IELTS) to gain knowledge and satisfy their personal demands. Obviously, the IELTS is

the world’s most popular English language proficiency standardized test for higher

education, studying abroad and global migration, so most of learners are inclined to achieve

the certification of IELTS. In this paper, we would describe briefly about the IELTS test,

and make a specific evaluation, in the terms of validity, reliability, practicality and

washback effect, as well as demonstrate our personal viewpoint for each term.

II. A DESCRIPTION ON THE IELTS TEST:

1. Author(s) and publisher(s):

According to the Manhattan Review Organization (2019), the International English

Language Testing System (IELTS) was published and developed during the 1980s and first

administered to students in 1989. The creators and administrators of IELTS are three main

institutions: the University of Cambridge ESOL Examinations (Cambridge ESOL), British

Council, and the International Development Program of Australian Universities and

Colleges (IDP).
Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 3

2. Test purposes:

IELTS is designed to test the language ability of people who want to study or work

where English is used as the language of communication. Specifically, the IELTS

certification helps the test-takers satisfied the requirements of educational institutions,

employers, professional registration bodies and government immigration agencies often

require proof of English language skills as part of their recruitment or admission

procedures. In Vietnam, people tend to participate in IELTS examination mainly for jobs

recruitment, enrolling for higher education, immigrating and studying abroad. The test that

can be taken as either the Academic or the General Training modules. The Academic Test

is for people who wish to pursue studying abroad, such as at universities or language

schools, while the General Training Test is typically for employment purpose or migration

to another country for working or living.

3. Length and test format:

The IELTS test assesses candidates all four-skills, in both modules include listening,

reading, writing and speaking. The listening and speaking are general; however, the reading

and writing parts differ in tasks and topics between the Academic and General Training

modules. For example, in the Academic reading and writing, the topics would be more

academic such as science and technology, life science, and social science. The time allotted

for the test is in about 2 hours and 40 minutes for three skills listening, reading and writing,

and the speaking section would take about 10 to 15 minutes. The format of the test is

divided into separated part as follow:

Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 4

 Listening: including 4 sections with a total of 40 questions, and takes 30 minutes to

complete, plus 5 or 10 minutes for candidates to transfer their answers. Different

question types include multiple-choice, labeling, short answer, and completion of

forms, notes, charts, tables, sentences, and summaries.

 Reading: 3 sections with 40 questions, and take 60 minutes. Question types are

similar to listening types, as well as true/false, matching headings, and identifying

a writer’s views/claims.

 Writing: including 2 tasks, and takes 1 hour. The first task requirement must be

longer than 150 words, and the second task must be at least 250 words.

 Speaking: in form of a recorded face-to-face interview in three parts, and it takes

about 10 to 15 minutes. In the first part, candidates are asked general information.

In the second part, the candidates get a task card with a specific topic and prepare,

then they speak and answer a few questions on the topic. The last one is a two-way

conversation between the examiner and the candidate on the topic from part 2.

4. Administration and scoring:

In Vietnam, the IELTS test is mainly administrated by British Council and IDP. All

the centers must follow the same code of practice and procedure, and handbook instructions

are scripted to ensure that every candidate has the same testing experience. Candidates are

scored by trained examiners, on a 9 band system, from 1 indicating non-user and 9

indicating expert-user. A band score and criteria are given for each part of the test, marked
 Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 5

to the nearest whole or half-band, and one overall band score is calculated from those

averages, as follow:

 Listening and reading: each correct answer gets 1 point and a band score is

calculated from the total number correct out of 40 questions.

 Writing: examiners score the test based on 4 criteria, task response, coherence and

cohesion, vocabulary, grammar and accuracy.

 Speaking: candidates are assessed by their fluency and coherence, word choice,

grammatical range and accuracy, and pronunciation.

III. EVALUATION:

As a large-scale, standardized test, the IELTS does display the typical strengths as well as

point to the weaknesses of mass testing.

1. Validity (Anh Phuoc)

Validity is one of the most complicated criteria in language testing, which is closely

related to appropriated testing, it must be realistic and reliable (Brown & Abeywickrama,

2004). Three typical types of validity assessment should be described such as content,

criterion-related and construct validity.

In terms of content validity, the requirement for an ILEST test must be described

adequately, including its practicality in assessing four skills directly. The situation of the

content reflects real-life contexts related to social background. Test takers are not provided

information about the content in the IELTS test, they need to participate in some special
Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 6

courses or take carefully material by their -self to improve their knowledge because the

IELTS test types are not the same in each of the periods.

Regarding criterion-related validity, which involves two commonly types:

concurrent validity and predictive validity. Firstly, the test taker should perform the other

test to evaluate the relationship between the newly familiar test and the previous IELTS

test score based on concurrent validity. Secondly, predictive validity would be considered

to analyst the knowledge of the candidates in the future to evaluate the criterion validity.

Ferguson and White (1994) claimed that the predictive validity of the IELTS test should

be higher for students in case of a lower IELTS score. From figures establish on the IELTS

homepage (2009) with the list of results in 2007, reading and listening modules showed a

high correlation, standing at 0.89, and 0.88 respectively for reading. Such suitable figures

could be said the concurrent validity in students’ academic performance as evidence of

validity.

Besides, the other measures that can be used for the IELTS test are construct

validity, which determines how well a test measures its purpose to measure. The IELTS

test covers the four language skills such as: listening, speaking, reading, writing to assess

overall the candidate’s ability. For example, regarding the IELTS reading test, it is

necessary to offer specific content that distinguishes learners into the level of ability. At

the same time, learners can apply suitable techniques based on the ability to scan and skim

to focus on the information. (Moore, Morton, & Price, 2012).

2. Reliability (Chi Trang)

Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 7

In spite of the unachievable reliable tests, the attempt for designing the tests yielding

similar results in different administrations is in processing (Hughes , 1989). For example,

with the different groups of candidates take the IELTS test in a different period; the score

of a test result is uneven only around 0.5 marks (all candidates are at the same level). It

proved that this kind of test is reliable. Moreover, there are further concepts related to the

test reliability, including test method facets, random factors and personal attributes

(Bachman , 1990). Besides, the physical and psychological factors play an important role

in contributing to the test results. Illness, fatigue, anxiety or bad mood affect negatively

reliability. Consequently, those results cannot give appropriate feedback. For further

action, it can be seen that the exact estimation of test reliability is often a difficult task. As

the IELTS test is well-known all over the world to assess English proficiency, the uncertain

measurement of the test is insignificant and the rater of reliability is considerate.

3. Practicality (Như)

According to Bachman & Palmer (1996), the practicality of a test refers to money,

time-efficient, economy, and effort. On the other hand, it should be easy to conduct,

administer, design and easy to interpret the results. Furthermore, the practical test means

appropriate time constraints, financial limitations and easy to score (Brown &

Abeywickrama, 2004). IETLS is a test to measure the language proficiency of non-native

people who want to work in the English environment. The IELTS test is quite expensive

and its price is increasing from time to time affecting people who could not achieve the

required scores. Additionally, the fees of test-takers are offset for the cost of administering.
Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 8

The time for giving the test is standardized by test centers and it only takes two and a half

hours to complete three first sections, plus with fifteen minutes for the speaking part. In an

attempt to be practical, the limited time imposes for the test with each section, which can

increase the anxiety and affect negatively to a candidates' scores The questions in the

reading and listening parts are not multiple choice, they have only one acceptable answer

(with the exception of dialectical spelling differences sometimes being allowed), allowing

scoring to be more practical than open-end responses. Besides, the layout for each part is

easy to follow and understand. The short speaking test serves a large number of candidates

as it is over 900 test centers around the world. The examiners test the speaking ability of

the candidates and record it to ensure that the score is more practical. Moreover, the

examiners are allowed to focus on the conversation with the candidates. Considering all

the factors of IELTS seems to be practical because it does not take a lot of time and is easy

to administer. Moreover, it also reduces the fatigue factor on the candidate.

4. Washback (Ngọc)

As one of the characteristics of a good test, washback is an integral part as feedback

in language testing. In the words of Hughes (2003), washback (or backwash) is defined as

the harmful and beneficial influences of testing on teaching and learning. It means that a

test has the power of affecting the teaching practice, learning outcomes, and content of

language courses to help test-takers, as well as students, enhance their language

development. According to Bailey (1996), the washback effects of testing can be either

positive or negative. Based on the above theories, and the connection with teaching and
Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 9

learning in some international high-stakes language tests, it was proved that the academic

IELTS test has been considered as one of the most influential examinations to promote a

more positive washback due to the adequate inclusion of the speaking, listening, reading

and writing components as well as negative backwash because of the narrow scope and

contents of teaching and learning.

The IELTS test encourages positive washback effects by testing performance on

communicative tasks that simulate the target situation. Both teaching and learning of the

four macro skills are necessary for the test. Students have more opportunities to improve

their deep knowledge of different topics by practicing some tasks of integrated skills before

achieving the IELTS test certificate with the required scores. It means that it is intended to

have a positive washback effect aiming at progressing applicants’ language proficiency in

a way that assists their academic study through English (Hayes & Read, 2004). By

practicing, students can clarify their own immediate learning goals, which is to achieve a

given test score and at the same time, a long-term goal, which is to improve their language

proficiency. The long-term goal also serves as the ultimate product of beneficial washback

on learning (Hughes, 1993). Furthermore, teachers are one of the most influential on the

IELTS test as well. In the previous research of Hayes & Read (2004), they suggested that

different teachers respond to the IELTS test in different ways with a considerable amount

of knowledge according to the test, suggesting this as a factor influencing the washback of

the test on teaching. In the aspect of teaching or learning contents, the IELTS test exerted

positive washback on emphasizing comprehensive language ability since most participants

Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 10

acknowledged that it enriched their teaching and learning contents and firmly believed the

effectiveness of authentic materials. Moreover, (Yue, 1997) agrees that some of the

textbooks pay attention to practicing skills and sub-skills that are requested by IELTS,

providing adequate information about the exam and increase students testing abilities. In

this case, IELTS is improving positive washback on preparation materials. Besides, as for

teaching or learning assessment, the positive washback lied in that most test-takers

acknowledged the usefulness and necessity of the IELTS test as a language measurement

tool that could be employed to examine their capability and shortcomings in language

teaching and learning. Finally, both teachers and students made efforts to combine test-

oriented and ability-oriented teaching or learning methods driven by the positive washback

of the IELTS test. Therefore it makes their teaching and learning more scientific and valid.

However, the negative backwash clearly appears in the IELTS test. Generally

speaking, teachers may have some difficulties in keeping a balance between the

improvement of students’ ability and the training to help them get a higher score in the

IELTS test, especially some students with poor language foundation. Another negative

impact of the IELTS test on students is the conflict between their expectation of success

and their passive learning method. As the IELTS academic module assesses four macro-

skills through a variety of tasks that are designed to stimulate authentic study tasks, it just

allowed for students too much guessing when doing this test (Qian, 2007, p. 33). That

makes students pay specific attention to the practice of the test tasks rather than the

improvement in language proficiency. Besides, the format of the results is based on the
 Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 11

generalized bands that not given any specific feedback on how to improve. Consequently,

it does not seem to be the type of positive effects expected.

IV. CONCLUSION

After extensive analysis and evaluation, I realized how incredibly difficult it must

be to create a standardized exam in general. This is completely a complex process that

requires accounting for multiple factors to ensure a fair and accurate judgment of the test-

taker ability. Through our evaluation, it could be concluded that there were both positive

and negative qualities towards the IELTS test because of its stimulation in the learning

process. Since most of the researchers claimed that the IELTS test is kind of a fair and

reliable measurement to assess the English proficiency of each student and that its four-

skill test encouraged them to think critically, logically, and analytically. However, I also

realize that none of these exams is ever fully valid, reliable, authentic, and equitable. There

are also some official IELTS denied that this test results are not adequate to be the one and

only instrument for determining language proficiency. Unfortunately, test scores are one

of the most practical measures for institutions to use through examinations, so the IELTS

test should continue striving for validity, reliability, practicality, and washback.
Review the test qualities on the IELTS test 12

REFERENCES

Bachman , L. F. (1990). Fundamental considerations in language testing. Oxford:

Oxford University Press.

Bachman , L. F., & Palmer, A. S. (1996). Language testing in practice: Designing and

developing useful language test (Vol. 1). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Brown, H. D., & Abeywickrama, P. (2004). Language assessment: Principles and

Classroom Practices. White Plains, New York: Pearson Education.

Ferguson , G., & White, E. (1994). A Predictive Validity Study of IELTS. . Edinburgh:

University of Edinburgh, Institute for Applied Language Studies .

Hughes , A. (1989). Testing for language teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press.

Moore, T., Morton, J., & Price, S. (2012). Construct validity in the IELTS academic

reading test: A comparison of reading requirements in IELTS test items and in

university study. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Organization, M. R. (2019). Manhattan Review. Retrieved from Manhattan Review, Inc.

[US]: https://www.manhattanreview.com/ielts-history/