Gaining insights from domain experts into how they view communication in real world settings is recognized as an important authenticity consideration in the development of criteria to assess language proficiency for specific academic or occupational purposes. These "indigenous" criteria represent an articulation of the test construct and…

This article addresses the suitability of the CEFR as the basis for decisions about the readiness of individuals to engage in academic writing tasks in undergraduate university courses, and as a guide to progress. The CEFR offers potentially relevant general scales and subscales, but also more specific subscales for writing in the academic…

The suggested role for assessment in developing "Roadmaps for Learning" has potentially important implications for the learning of second or foreign languages in school, a major concern of applied linguistics. In this response, the authors consider how the findings of a detailed ethnographic study of classroom-based assessment in two…

This paper examines the uptake of Rasch measurement in language testing through a consideration of research published in language testing research journals in the period 1984 to 2009. Following the publication of the first papers on this topic, exploring the potential of the simple Rasch model for the analysis of dichotomous language test data, a…

This paper presents a comprehensive framework for researching classroom-based assessment (CBA) processes, and is based on a detailed empirical study of two Australian school classrooms where students aged 11 to 13 were studying Indonesian as a foreign language. The framework can be considered innovative in several respects. It goes beyond the…

This article proposes a distinction between "fairness" and "justice" in relation to language tests. Basing its discussion on the validity theory of Samuel Messick, it discusses the way in which these terms have been used in the existing literature, and their relationship to the concept of validity. Fairness, broadly speaking,…

In its late colonial history and early years as an independent nation, Australia practised a policy of ruthless exclusion of immigrants on the basis of race by means of a language test: the notorious Dictation Test. In the 50 years following World War II, Australia adopted policies encouraging immigration with bipartisan political support.…

The thought of Samuel Messick has influenced language testing in 2 main ways: in proposing a new understanding of how inferences made based on tests must be challenged, and in drawing attention to the consequences of test use. The former has had a powerful impact on language-testing research, most notably in Bachman's work on validity and the…

This report documents two coordinated exploratory studies into the nature of oral English-for-academic-purposes (EAP) proficiency. Study I used verbal-report methodology to examine field experts? rating orientations, and Study II investigated the quality of test-taker discourse on two different Test of English as a Foreign Language? (TOEFL®) task…