In response to calls for an assessment tool that provides a separate performance dimension from the linguistic quality-oriented measures of complexity, accuracy, and fluency (CAF) and guided by systemic functional linguistic (SFL) theories, this study introduces a set of fine-grained objective measures of communication/content/function…

This study uses a complexity-accuracy-lexis-fluency (CALF) framework to explore performance on 2 speaking tasks: a narrative picture-based task and an interactive decision-making task. A preliminary aim is to compare performance on the 2 tasks, using a wide range of CALF measures to explore where scores are similar and where they are different.…

This study investigated the effects of two types of classroom instructions on EFL learners' oral proficiency by implementing teachers' judgment. Two intact classes of EFL university students studied a compulsory subject of their department under two different types of classroom instruction. The first group of students was trained with explicit…

The current study set out to investigate the effect of dynamic assessment (DA) on the speaking accuracy and fluency of pre-intermediate English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. In contrast to static assessment, DA is conceptualized as an interactive approach towards assessment which combines teaching and testing in a unitary instructional…

This study reports the results of an action-based study conducted in an EFL class to examine whether digital video recordings would contribute to the enhancement of EFL learners' oral fluency skills. It also investigates the learners' perceptions of the use of digital video recordings in a speaking class. 10 Turkish EFL learners participated in…

This study compared various measures used to assess oral reading fluency skills in relation to reading comprehension. The participants were 54 first year students from the Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University. An English Oral Reading Fluency (EORF) test and a set of comprehension questions were devised. Then, the scores of rate,…

Describes techniques for measuring and developing the syntactic fluency of students learning French. (P M P)

This paper describes the development of materials to test English language skills and discusses some of the procedures and rationale which were employed in that development. The materials were designed for use in the New Canadian Study (1967-68), which was concerned primarily with the school success of students who learned English as a second…

A study was conducted that was designed to determine if experienced ESL (English as a second language) teachers, working in pairs, can reach the same judgments regarding the oral proficiency of non-native speakers of English and to determine the reliability of such judgments. In addition, the question of whether different sets of judges rate…

An alternative assessment instrument developed to assess oral language skills of students in Spanish immersion programs in the United States is described. Originally developed by the Center for Applied Linguistic to evaluate 6-year-old immersion students' speaking and listening skills in a school in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the Student Oral…