How Can Classroom Tests Help Students?

Classroom language testing in its all 3 phases; pre-test, test and post-test; helps learners in different aspects. These aspects could be related to the language learning or to the future life in general. Before discussing the advantages of the classroom language tests for learners, we need to define the term test and other related terms, evaluation and assessment.

Staring from the big circle evaluation is "the process of gathering information in order to determine the extent to which a language program meets its goals" (Loannou and Pavlou, 2003, as cited in socyberty.com). This definition shows that evaluation deals with the whole educational elements to find out whether the general goals were achieved or not. Assessment takes place at the middle circle as a tool of evaluation. Nunan (2004, p118, as cited in socyberty.com) defines assessment as "the set of processes by which we judge students learning."  It is obvious from the definition that assessment concerns with a more specific educational element that is learners' performance. Small circle represents test which is defined as "one of the procedures that can be used to assess child's performance. A test has a certain objective, for example, to see to what extent a child understand a written text." (Loannou and Pavlou, 2003, p.4, as cited in socyberty.com).

The aforementioned definitions show that testing is one of many instruments that help us to answer many questions that are related to the teaching/learning process such as, to what extent do our learners reach? Are we, as teachers, doing well in class? ...

But what are the good things that learners can gain from classroom language test? To answer this question I will talk about each phase of classroom test taking starting with the pre-test phase. Tests or marked tasks derive learners to make real revision or study to get good marks. This will help learners to go over lessons and try to understand them. If the learner finds difficulty in certain points he will try hardly to get the correct answer by asking the teacher or even a classmate. Preparing for the tests or marked tasks involve searching for some extra help using the web which might helps learner to understand a piece of information through different resources specially with the availability of multimedia.

The second phase is the test taking. In this phase learners start to use the main four skills independently. They read/listen to comprehend the instruction, they negotiate the meaning to difficult or unfamiliar words after trying to guess their meaning, they follow the roles of writing …etc. This will help learners to use language in more authentic setting. Tests usually focus on important knowledge i.e. knowledge that is needed either for upper stages on for the real life situations.

The last phase is post-test. In this phase learners get benefits of feedback from teachers. Discussing mistake correction with learners one by one helps them to know how they can answer using the context. Learners may motivated by their scoring either to keep it high or to improve it. Regular tests make learners in a continuous contact with the subjects that they suppose to study. Crooks (1988, as cited in Gibbs & Simpson, P 12) mentioned that tests, as self-evaluation, help learners to track their progress. They also help them to feel the sense of achievement.

To sum up, although tests are designed by the teachers to give them an overview about the efficiently of what they do in the class and about their learners progress, learners can get benefits from these tests in different phases and aspects. Each phase of the test has its advantages. For the learners either in the language learning processes as in going over and over subjects, looking for the information using different resources, using the skills authentically and motivating them to do better in their upcoming tests or in their future life as classroom tests prepare them for more important tests like placement tests and job interviews.

References

- Gibbs, G & Simpson, C (2004) ‘Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning’, Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, Issue 1

- Testing, testing… what is a language test?, Oxford University Press

- socyberty.com