（英语语言文学专业论文）交际式语言测试及其对阅读理解测试的启迪.pdf

3 acknowledgements the accomplishment of this thesis owes a great deal to many people. first of all, my hearty gratitude goes to professor xin-hua, cheng, my supervisor, who has directed me throughout the every stage of writing the paper. his profound insights, valuable suggestions and critical comments have guaranteed the reliability of the research. the current version depends to a large extent on his careful reading and correcting each part of the paper. his personality as a mentor showed through his constant encouragement and patient guidance, especially his rigorous scientific approach will benefit me all my life. secondly i appreciate the instructions and sincere help from my teachers and friends in shanghai normal university. thirdly i am indebted to all the authors whose books i have consulted in the preparation of this thesis. finally i am deeply thankful to my dear husband and beloved daughter and the other members of my family, who have offered me tender solicitude as well as sufficient encouragement. 4 摘要 语言测试是为语言教学服务的一种语言教学方法的流行往往会伴随产生 一种相应的测试方法 二十世纪六十年代中期以前语言学理论把语言作为独 立的符号系统加以研究注重研究语言的形式规则或结构排斥语言的社会 因素完全不考虑或很少考虑人们在社会中使用语言的规律和语言受人类社会 影响所产生的各种变异因素二十世纪六十年代中期 社会语言学兴起这一 学派一改以往语言学的研究重视语言形式轻视语言使用的倾向十分重视研 究语言的社会功能社会语言学家们认为语言的社会交际功能是语言最本质的 功能二十世纪七十年代以来随着交际法在外语教学中的兴起对交际性测 试的研究与推广应用方兴未艾随着我国改革开放扩大对外交流政策不断深 入发展培养具有外语交流能力的人才成了外语教学的最终目标之一交际教 学法正日益受到重视并逐渐推广因而交际式外语测试也势在必行 交际式外语测试的理论基础基本特点存在的问题在实际测试中的应 用等使我们了解了其实质阅读理解能力在英语学习及测试中具有举足轻重的 作用作者讨论了交际式测试理论对阅读测试的启迪并以我国大学英语四级 阅读测试为例进一步阐述了交际式测试对今后阅读测试的启迪以便设计出 既适应我国学生的实际需要以英语为工具获得信息又能培养提高学生的 英语交际能力 虽然交际测试已取得长足发展但仍有许多问题如阅读材料的真实性测试 的实用性等需要进一步研究交际测试的前景是广阔的随着语言学计算机 技术等相关领域的飞速发展不远的将来满足人们对交际能力测试不同层次 需要的交际测试法会应运而生 5 abstract language testing never takes place in isolation. it serves and is served by language teaching. it seems that there are as many teaching approaches as language testing methods. prior to the mid-1960s, linguists studied language as an independent system with an emphasis on its forms, structures and grammatical rules, and with an exclusion to its various social functions. the mid-1960s witnessed the sprung of sociolinguistics, which attached much importance to researching the social functions of language. sociolinguists have seen communication as the most essential feature of language. since the 1970s, communicative language teaching approach has gradually dominated foreign language teaching field throughout the western countries. accordingly, communicative language testing (clt) method arouses due consideration. nevertheless, it was not until the middle of the 1980s that it grew into maturity. in china, as early as the 1970s, communicative language teaching approach entered the scene, and has been highly recommended because of the continual adaptation of reform and opening-up policy and the further development of exchanges with foreign countries. training more and more students to be able to communicate in the english language proves to be the ultimate goal of college english teaching in china, therefore developing tests with a communicative bias has never been so valued than before. the theoretical basis, distinguishing features, and applications of communicative language testing theories help us further understand the nature of clt. given the great importance of reading proficiency and current insufficient consideration taken into the evaluation of reading proficiency in clt, this paper focuses on the far-reaching implications of communicative language testing principles for testing reading comprehension, with reading tests in college english test band 4 (cet-4) as an example. in conclusion, it should be confessed that remarkable progress has been achieved, although much research remains to be done in clt. with the quick development in linguistics, computer technology and other related areas, some new methods will be created so as to satisfy the various communicative needs of people. the future of the application of clt is rosy and encouraging, and its implications are profound. 6 introduction language testing came into birth a bit later than language teaching, but now it is generally accepted that language testing has fought back from the shadow of language teaching and has been viewed as an independent discipline with its own research field and method. language testing is a complex matter. it involves elements from linguistics, from psychometrics, and from language didactics (klein-braley, 1981). it provides not only a powerful and progressive force in language teaching but also a better understanding of the nature of language, language use, and language learning as well. over the past few decades there has been a marked shift in emphasis from the linguistic to the communicative dimension on language teaching and testing. the language teacher used to be in the business of helping the learner to master a system. that is, the goals of language instruction were described in purely linguistic terms. the language teachers task was seen as helping the learner to a gradual mastery of structural features. the purposes of the language study were given little importance. fortunately, however, the 1970s witnessed the gradual flourishing of communicative language teaching approach, in which the emphasis is no longer on linguistic accuracy, but on the ability to function effectively through language in particular contexts of situation. as a result of this approach, communicative language testing (clt) is called for and gradually becomes the mainstream in language testing field in the past two decades in america, britain and some other western countries. in china, though, this new approach has not dominated teaching or testing practice due to the shortage of qualified teachers and other facilities. on the other hand, english needs in present-day society have changed greatly during the past twenty or thirty years. nowadays much more importance is attached to the ability to communicate in the language because many more contacts with members of other linguistic communities take place through what is sometimes called the phonic and/or verbal (non-verbal) layer of language, i.e. listening and speaking (telephone, television, radio, staying abroad for business, on-line, internet and/or recreational purposes, etc.). changes in the english language need accordingly must be reflected in the language teaching and testing. as a matter of fact, recently more and more teachers, linguistics and administrators bear increasing interest in this new testing approach. this paper gives a rough description of communicative language testing, its theoretical basis and the implications for testing reading comprehension. the purpose is to give some nudge to constructing reading comprehension test with a communicative bias as much as possible in the future situation. chapter one presents the important relationship between language teaching and language testing. then it traces the history of language testing development with an aim to demonstrate that the communicative-pragmatic era has come. it thus behaves 7 to pay due attention to clt. in chapter two, the theoretical basis of clt, hymes, canale and swains language competence theories and bachmans frameworks of communicative language ability are described respectively. chapter three begins with various criteria available for clt, then, comes to its distinguishing features and focuses on the basic consideration in the construction of clt: test design, sampling, test method and scoring, which are examined briefly in turn. the discussion shows that clt has come to reach maturity and possess profound implications. in chapter four the nature of reading process is considered an important prerequisite for the discussion of testing of reading proficiency. taking the magnitude of reading proficiency and the present inadequate consideration of clt into account, assessing reading ability deserves greater attention. reading comprehension testing in cet-4 has been taken as an example to indicate the far-reaching implications of clt for constructing reading comprehension with a communicative preference so as to satisfy as much as possible the increasing need of communication in the english language. 8 chapter one modern language testing 1.1 language testing and language teaching testing has become an unavoidable part of the business of language instruction. the key reasons may be as follows: teachers, learners and administrators all need information, motivation and reassurance from time to time. for one thing, language testing can be used as useful feedback to language teaching and a criterion measure of language ability. for another, language testing can function as a valuable source of information about the effectiveness of a teaching approach. to some extent, language teaching is directed by the baton of testing. a good case in point is that standardized tests and public examinations, such as tofel (test of english as a foreign language, cet-4/6, tem (test for english majors), exert such a considerable influence on the average teacher, student, as well as administrator that they are often instrumental in determining the kind of teaching that takes place before the test. in consequence, language testing implicitly or explicitly becomes the master of language teaching. in addition, insights gained from language teaching practice can provide valuable information for constructing and developing more appropriate and useful tests. advances in language testing do not take place in a vacuum; they are served by progress in language teaching and other correlated areas, and that the proper relationship between teaching and testing is surely that of partnership. what should be demanded of it, however, is that it should be supportive of good teaching and, where necessary, exerts a corrective influence on bad teaching. if testing always had a beneficial backwash on teaching, it would have a much better reputation amongst teachers. the relationship between language teaching and testing is illustrated in figure 1.1: teaching aim teaching content teaching approach testing language testing and language teaching are so closely interrelated that it is almost impossible to work in one field without being constantly concerned with the other. language testing is a necessary tool for language teaching both theoretically and practically. it is generally realized that language testing has been developing in accordance with the development of linguistics, language teaching approaches, psychometrics as well as other fields. the following historical overview of language testing may help us further understand the close relationship between language teaching and language testing and the development of the latter. bernard spolsky (1975), j.b. heaton (1989) and weir (1990) identify four eras 9 in the history of language testing: the pre-scientific era, psychometric-stucturalingistic era, psycholinguistic-sociolinguistic era and communicative-pragmatic era. here, it should be noted that although the four eras appear to be in a linear arrangement and clearly separated, they are, in fact, not pure but interrelating, interacting and overlapping one another and different tests can usually be seen to be related to one or other of these eras. 1.2 pre-scientific era before world war ii there scarcely existed the idea of language testing as a distinct activity. a learners second language proficiency had to be assessed in much the same way that the language had been taught: composition, translation, grammatical analysis and so on. since the sole purpose of foreign language teaching was to help the students to read the literature works of famous writers, essayists and the like, the grammar-translation method dominated the classroom teaching and learning. the distinction between teaching and testing was not clearly drawn. it is believed that tests at that time suffered from shortage of linguistic and/or psychological theories, therefore no special skill or expertise interest was required and little attention was paid to the validity, reliability and efficiency of the tests. bernard spolsky describes this period language testing as pre-scientific, which implies that it is not scientific. at the pre-scientific stage of language testing, the essay-translation approach is commonly used. tests usually consist of essay writing, translation, grammatical analysis, open-ended questions, and sometimes with an aural or oral components at the upper intermediate and advanced levels. 1.3 psychometric- structuralinguistic era after world war ii, a large number of factors contributed to the development of interest in systematic scientific language testing. new importance and funds were given to foreign language teaching projects because of wartime language programs in the united states and elsewhere and the growth of international agencies. methods of evaluating the effectiveness of these projects were required and the work done in the united states during this period quickly became the prevailing orthodoxy in the field of language testing. current ideas about language testing have been greatly influenced by this approach structuralist approach. for this reason it is necessary for us to examine it carefully and see exactly what its legacy has been. the roots of the structuralist approach can be traced back to two academic traditions. 1.3.1 psychometric testing in the 1920s and 30s psychological testing gained great popularity. two characteristics of these tests are of paramount importance for language testers. firstly the questions are of the closed type, so the testee has to choose between a limited number of responses. secondly, a fairly elaborate system of statistical procedures has been evolved for developing and evaluating this kind of tests. such a test is objective in terms of scoring since whoever marks a test the result will be the same. meanwhile, it is characterized by a ready-made set of methods and criteria for 10 analyzing and evaluating tests. as a result, language testers enthusiastically adopted the methods and terminology of the psychological tests to evaluate language proficiency, which is now termed psychometric. the present-day multiple-choice test is the most easily recognizable legacy of this school. 1.3.2 structural linguistics structural linguistics stresses the importance of language as a system and investigates the place that linguistic units such as sounds, words, sentences, have within this system. structural linguists, for example, studied the distribution of sounds within the words of a language; that is, whether certain sounds appear only at the beginning of words or also in the middle or at the end. they defined some sounds in a language as distinctive and used in the identification of words (see phoneme), and some as variants (see allophone). similar studies of distribution and classification were carried out in morphology and syntax. (longman dictionary of applied linguistics, 1987:276). when it comes to what kind of thing should be tested in a language test, naturally enough, structualist linguists who are of the opinion that language learning is chiefly concerned with the systematic acquisition of a set habits make use of the same framework that is being used to devise the teaching programs as well as for testing purposes. 1.3.3 psychometric-structuralinguistic era the combination of structuralism in linguistics and behaviorism in psychology formed a strong wave that drove away the old grammar-translation method from the classroom and brought about the audio-lingual method. on the testing side, a new language testing approach described as discrete-point testing with various formats came into being and, unlike the new teaching method, it met with little objection and survives even today. testing discrete linguistic points yield easily quantifiable data as well as allows a wide coverage of items. tests which focus on discrete linguistic items are efficient and have the usual reliability of marking associated with objectively scored tests. while multiple-choice, the typical format of this kind of testing, was flourishing in the schoolyard, its theoretical basis structural linguistics was attacked fiercely by some renowned linguists. john, w.oller (1979:212) outlines the deficiencies of this approach in terms of their construct validity: discrete point analysis necessarily breaks the elements of language apart and tries to teach or test separately with little or no attention to the way those elements interact in a larger context of communication the whole is greater than the sum of its parts such tests yield artificial, sterile and irrelevant types of items that have no relationship to the use of language in real life situations. in morrows (1979:145) view, knowledge of the elements of a language in fact counts for nothing unless the user is able to combine them in new and appropriate ways to meet the linguistic demands of the situation in which he wishes to use the language. in other words, if we are to assess proficiency, it will be more valuable to test an ability to apply the rules and processes by which these discrete elements are synthesized into an infinite number of grammatical sentences and then selected as being appropriate for a particular context, 11 rather than simply to test knowledge of the elements. obviously these linguists point out the defects of the discrete point approach and meanwhile lay strong emphasis on the interaction or incorporation of language elements and the ability to function in a natural language situation (real-life situation). moreover, noam chomskys transformational-generative grammar and other sociolinguists research achievements challenged the structural-linguistics theories. all this c