Language testing 98-599 Wennerstrom, Ann (U. of Washington). Language testing Intonation as cohesion in academic discourse. Studies in Second Language Acquisition (New York), 20, 1 (1998), 1-25. 98-601 Brindley, Geoff (Macquarie U., Sydney). This paper reports the results of a study of the intona- Assessing listening abilities. Annual Review of tion of 18 Mandarin Chinese speakers lecturing in Applied Linguistics (New York), 18, (1998), 171-91. English. As a basis for the study, it is proposed that into- Assessment of listening ability has received relatively lim- nation be considered a grammar of cohesion in English ited coverage in the language testing literature. This discourse: drawing from the intonational model of paper begins by presenting current views of second lan- Pierrehumbert and Hirschbery (1990), it is argued that guage listening. Whilst drawing attention to the inade- discrete morphemes of intonation correspond to the quacies of current models of listening comprehension, it categories of cohesion in Halliday and Hasan's (1976) identifies two common points of consensus in the litera- typology. The study investigated the hypothesis that the ture on the nature of listening processes: the assumption non-native speakers who were able to use the intona- by test developers that there are identifiable, hierarchical tion system of English most effectively would score listening skills; and the move towards a more interactive higher on a global language test. Using a Computerised model of the listening process. It then reviews various Speech Lab to measure pitch, four aspects of intonation issues and challenges in the assessment of listening: assess- were averaged for each speaker: (a) the pitch difference ing higher level skills and listening in oral interaction, the between newly introduced content words and function confounding of skills (which threatens the validity of lis- words; (b) the use of high pitch at phrase boundaries to tening tests), and dealing with authenticity (purpose, link related constituents; (c) the use of pitch to distin- task, text). Aspects of task construction for assessment guish contrasting items from given items; and (d) the include factors affecting test performance, practical issues pamtone or increase in pitch range at rhetorical junc- in listening test construction, and item formats. Some tures to signal topic shift. These four measures were consideration is given to potential applications of new chosen for their contribution to the cohesion of the technology (video and computers), and some avenues for lectures. Multiple regression analysis indicates that the further research are suggested.There is both an annotated fourth intonation variable, the pamtone, was a significant and extensive unannotated bibliography. predictor of these subjects' test scores. Examples are given of the other variables in context from both low- 98-602 Brindley, Geoff (Macquarie U., Sydney). and high-scoring speakers. It is emphasised that intona- Outcomes-based assessment and reporting in tion is not only a stylistic component of accent but also a meaning-bearing grammatical system. language learning programmes: a review of the issues. Language Testing (London), 15,1 (1998), 45-85. 98-600 Youngju, Han (Youngsan U. of International Affairs) and Ellis, Rod. Implicit In recent years educational authorities in many coun- knowledge, explicit knowledge and general tries have introduced outcomes-based assessment and language proficiency. Language Teaching Research reporting systems in the form of national standards, (London), 2,1 (1998), 1-23. frameworks and benchmarks of various kinds which are used both for purposes of system accountability and for This paper explores ways of measuring implicit and assessing individual progress and achievement in lan- explicit second language knowledge and examines the guage learning. However, in some cases the introduc- relationship between these measures and measures of tion of these systems has proved problematic, owing to general language proficiency. Scores were obtained a number of political, technical and practical factors. from a timed oral production test, a timed grammatical- These include the difficulty of combining formative ity judgement test (administered twice), a delayed assessment with summative reporting, the differing grammaticality judgement test and an interview information requirements of different audiences, con- designed to tap metalingual knowledge, all of which cerns about the validity and reliability of outcome focused on learners' knowledge of verb complementa- statements, and the lack of appropriate resources to tion in English. A factor analysis revealed a two-factor support implementation. This paper suggests that such solution, reflecting a clear distinction between those problems may be able to be alleviated by closer consul- measures that incorporated a time constraint (hypothe- tation between policy-makers, administrators and prac- sised to reflect implicit knowledge) and those that did titioners, by undertaking further research into the not (hypothesised to tap explicit knowledge). Both validity and consistency of outcome statements, and by factors were found to correlate with scores on the strengthening the links betwen assessment and report- Secondary Level English Proficiency Test. However, ing. A major investment in teacher professional devel- only one measure of explicit knowledge (the Delayed opment is deemed necessary if teachers are to be Grammaticality Judgement test) was found to be signif- responsible for carrying out their own assessments. icantly related to scores on the Test of English as a Ongoing research needs to be conducted into the Foreign Language. The significance of these results for effects of outcomes-based assessment and reporting on language teaching and testing is considered. student learning. 244 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.14, on 23 Sep 2021 at 19:16:26, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444800013409 Language testing 98-603 Egbert, Maria and Maxim, Hiram (U. of 98-605 Kuo, Jane and Jiang, Xixiang (American Texas at Austin). Incorporating critical thinking and Grad. School of Internat. Management). Assessing authenticity into Business German testing. The the assessments: the OPI and the SOPI. Foreign Modern Language Journal (Madison, Wl), 82,1 Language Annals (New York), 30, 4 (1997), 503-12. (1998), 19-32. This paper examines the two forms of oral proficiency For some time, foreign language proficiency theoreti- testing currendy in use in most language teaching pro- cians and practitioners as well as executives in interna- grammes across the United States: the Oral Proficiency tional business have identified critical thinking as an Interview (OPI) and the Simulated Oral Proficiency essential skill. Despite this demand, the leading world- Interview (SOPI). The authors, who have extensive wide examinations for assessing oral and written com- experience in conducting the OPI and in training municative competence in Business German, the SOPI raters, attempt to provide an objective assessment Priifung Wirtschaftendeutsch International [International of the two tests by comparatively examining the test Business German Examination] (PWD) and the administration, response elicitation, and rating proce- Zertificat Deutsch fur den Beruf [German Certificate for dures. The paper also provides a concise but general Professional Purposes] (ZD£B), test only students' infor- overview of the two test instruments regarding their mation retrieval skills and fail to test their critical think- theoretical underpinnings, administrative support from ing abilities. This article proposes to integrate critical their test developers, and the test structures and con- thinking and problem solving into the exams and to tents.While recognising that the two tests are both valid contextualise the tests' tasks in a more authentic busi- and reliable oral proficiency measurements, the authors ness setting without compromising the PWD's and the have examined the characteristics that distinguish them ZDfB's content. These proposals should then be as two different tests suitable for different purposes in researched using qualitative as well as statistical methods different situations. Teachers are encouraged initially to in order to develop a stronger test. For each component identify the specific testing needs of their own institu- of these exams, the article offers ways to include an tions, and then to align the features of the two tests assessment of the students' ability to reflect on, analyse, with these before deciding on a particular form of the and critically evaluate business information. Parallels test. are drawn with the ACTFL (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages) Proficiency 98-606 McNamara, Tim (U. of Melbourne). Guidelines. 'Interaction' in second language performance assessment: whose performance? Applied 98-604 Glisan, Eileen W. and Foltz, David A. Linguistics (Oxford), 18, 4 (1997), 446-66. (Indiana U. of Pennsylvania). Assessing students' oral proficiency in an outcome-based curriculum: This paper addresses the notion of interaction within student performance and teacher intuitions. The performance-based language assessment. Discussions of Modern Language Journal (Madison, Wl), 82,1 interaction in second language performance assessment have generally been loosely psychological in orienta-