This study measures the perceptions of English language teachers at Japanese universities. It combines the results of online questionnaires on assessment practices and another one on teacher autonomy. Results suggest that according to teachers' self-reports of assessment practices, certain measures of assessment quality are being affected by the…

It is common practice for K-12 schools to assess multilingual students' language proficiency to determine language support program placement. Because such programs can provide essential scaffolding, the policies guiding these assessments merit careful consideration. It is well accepted that quality assessments must be valid (representative of the…

Understanding the sources of variance in speaking assessment is important in Japan where society's high demand for English speaking skills is growing. Three challenges threaten fair assessment of speaking. First, in Japanese university speaking courses, teachers are typically the only raters, but teachers' knowledge of their students may unfairly…

Although the importance of summary writing is well documented in prior studies, few have investigated the evaluation of written summaries. Due to the complex nature of L2 summary writing, which requires one to read the original material and summarize its content in the L2, raters often emphasize different features when judging the quality of L2…

This document is an English-language abstract (appropriately 1,500 words) of a thesis answering the arguments against adopting the tests from the national Educational Test Research Institute (ETRI). The author gives an account of the committees on selection methods in his own university and also analyzes responses to an opinion survey conducted on…

To find ways to improve rater reliability of a tape-mediated speaking test for Japanese university students of English as a Second Language, two studies gathered information on: how raters actually made their choices on rating sheets of students' speaking ability; determined what criteria teachers think they use and actually use in rating…

The IADIS CELDA 2012 Conference intention was to address the main issues concerned with evolving learning processes and supporting pedagogies and applications in the digital age. There had been advances in both cognitive psychology and computing that have affected the educational arena. The convergence of these two disciplines is increasing at a…