Abstract
This chapter reports findings from Stage I of the two-stage study. Stage I sought the comparative viewpoints of teachers as principal stakeholders on the usefulness of interact in comparison with converse, measured against six qualities of usefulness: construct validity, reliability, interactiveness, impact, practicality and authenticity. Findings were derived from two sources: an anonymous paper-based nationwide teacher survey (n = 152) targeted at the range of FLs taught in New Zealand, and interviews with teachers who had been using interact since its introduction (n = 14). The chapter presents results and analyses from Section I of the survey, a closed-ended section designed to tap into the different facets of the test usefulness construct, and findings from Section II, an open-ended section of the survey. These findings are compared to those elicited from the teacher interviews. The chapter focuses on perceived comparative advantages of interact. Implications for washback are also presented.
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Notes
- 1.
This presentation is an expansion of data reported in an article in Language Testing (East, 2015), first published 14th August, 2014, and available on-line: doi:10.1177/0265532214544393
- 2.
Findings presented here and elsewhere incorporate some data reported in an article in Assessment Matters (East, 2014).
- 3.
When a Bonferroni correction was applied because of the use of four ANOVAs (resulting in an alpha level of .0125), the differences between the two groups were highly significant for all but the sub-construct of practicality.
References
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© 2016 Springer Science+Business Media Singapore
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East, M. (2016). The Advantages of Interact . In: Assessing Foreign Language Students’ Spoken Proficiency. Educational Linguistics, vol 26. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-0303-5_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-0303-5_5
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