English, being an international language, forms a basis as a core subject in Nepal. National Curriculum Framework (NCF) of school education establishes English as a compulsory subject to be taught from primary to secondary levels (CDC, 2076, B.S.). It calls for the standardized assessment to produce competing human resource in future. This chapter explicates how reading and writing skills of the students appearing in Secondary Education Examination (SEE) are assessed. It describes the elements of summative assessment of the English language as a subject in the SEE. The chapter also explains how students' performance and metacognitive behaviour in reading and writing practices are measured and reported. This framework also provides important guidelines to the item developers to assess students' levels of learning in the English language.
Level-wise Competencies, Learning Outcomes and Assessment Domain
The curriculum for Grade 10 aims at providing the young adults with a definite linguistic base in English for their future academic and career engagements. The curriculum expects to achieve nine competencies by the end of Grade 10 (CDC, 2077 B.S.). For instance, the students can communicate with reasonable accuracy and confidence on familiar topics and can read a variety of texts for information and understanding.
Learning outcomes in the English curriculum expect varied skills from the students. All the LOs under each skill may not present the scope to be tested as some of the LOs may need to be assessed in other ways. The curriculum envisions that the students can extract relevant information from the texts as a learning outcome, for instance, to evaluate the reading skills of Grade 10 students. Out of 36 learning outcomes, the curriculum outlines 10 learning outcomes for assessing reading and writing skills each, six for listening and 12 learning outcomes have been outlined for assessing speaking skill. Since grammar and vocabulary are equally significant for developing all four skills of language, the curriculum aspires to teach them in an integrated manner. The same applies for testing as well. They can be assessed via listening, speaking, reading and writing in an incorporated way. (See curriculum for detailed competencies and LOs)
The curriculum aspires the assessment of all four skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing. Listening and speaking skills are assessed in internal assessment whereas Reading and Writing skills are assessed in external assessment.
Assessment of Listening: Assessment of listening is done during the classroom teaching and learning. Each assessment needs to be recorded. (See internal assessment section for details.)
Assessment of Speaking: Assessment of speaking is done during the classroom teaching and learning. Each assessment needs to be recorded. (See internal assessment section for details.)
Assessment of Reading: Reading can be defined as understanding, using, reflecting on and engaging with written texts, in order to achieve one's goals, develop one's knowledge and potential, and participate in the society (OECD, 2018). Reading refers to an active and complex process of understanding a written text, developing and interpreting meaning and using meaning as appropriate to type of text, purpose and situation. It involves both literary and informational texts. Literary texts cover passages from fiction and science fiction, drama, monologue, and poetry as well as nonfiction texts such as essays, autobiographies and biographies, news stories, newspaper articles, diary entries, book or film reviews, travelogues and so on. The informational texts include exposition, argumentation and persuasive texts along with procedural texts and documents as well as correspondence texts such as letters, emails, blog posts, manuals, etc.
There will be four reading texts: two from textbooks and two from outside but from authentic sources. The reading passages are selected only via expert judgement but not based on readability formulae for passage selection i.e. text analyzer.
The present curriculum mentions broader learning outcomes for testing reading comprehension. However, item developer needs to consider certain abilities of reading comprehension while developing the items. These abilities include: locate explicitly stated information; identify explicitly stated main ideas and supporting details and summarize what is read; determine the main idea of a text by thinking about the details in the text and summarize the information in students' own words; interpret and use information from charts, graphs, diagrams, timelines; explain how authors support ideas by noting the similarities and differences in the point of view they represent; infer the meaning of words from the given context; accurately quote and draw inferences from the given text; explain what a piece of information teaches by referring to details and examples in the text; infer implicit information using context clues and evidence; use information to demonstrate understanding; compare and contrast the most important points of a piece of text; compare and contrast characters, settings or events; understand figurative language, word relationships and nuances in word meanings; describe how a narrator's or speaker's point of view influences a story; refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text; identify a theme of a story, drama or piece of poetry; compare and contrast the point of view from which different stories are narrated; reflect on the theme of a story, drama or a piece of poetry; determine the purpose of the text; interpret multiple levels of meaning such as literal, contextual and intended; appreciate literary texts of grade level; determine the writer's attitude, perspectives, purposes; express opinions and make judgments about ideas, information, experiences presented in the text; arrive at a conclusion; can refer to the referents; can reorganize the ideas and construct students' own meaning; can make predictions about upcoming events in the narrative texts.
Consideration on Text Selection and Text Complexity
The selected text for unseen reading comprehension should be appropriate in content and relevant to the students' age at the target grade level. They should contain materials that students are not likely to have encountered; for example, it should not come from a textbook or other frequently-used teaching resource. The text should be factually accurate; be grammatically correct; be appropriately illustrated; be appropriate in terms of socio-cultural context; be gender-sensitive; be fair, that is, equally accessible for students from all backgrounds likely to take part in the assessment; and be inclusive in the usage of texts and graphics to support and extend meaning. The text should not make students/test-takers emotional. Therefore, test developers should be very careful while selecting the text. The text should be grade level appropriate in terms of difficulty. The following section briefly summarizes the nature of low, moderate and high complexity of the text for reading comprehension.
Assessment of Writing: The ability to write well is essential to productivity and to personal and social advancement. Good writing instruction empowers students to acquire new knowledge and to develop critical thinking skills. The curriculum envisions to encourage the student writers to gradually move from prescriptive to more creative writing approaches. Therefore, both guided and free writing tasks are included in the assessment. Both of these writing tasks measure the students' ability to convey experience, real or imagined, in order to communicate individual and imagined experience to others. It also measures the students' ability to persuade in order to change the reader's point of view or affect the reader's action. Basically, writing assessment aims to assess the students' ability to inform others of ideas and concepts to readers of information-driven society. There will be four writing tasks: two guided and two free writing tasks.
The present curriculum does not specify the cognitive levels of the writing tasks. However, the item developer needs to focus on giving stimulus or contexts to clarify the writing tasks to measure the expected learning outcomes. The writing task should address real-world, age-appropriate and grade appropriate topics which must be familiar and accessible to students and not controversial in nature. The topics need to encourage the use of effective approaches to thinking and writing. The purpose of the writing task should be clearly stated and be consistent with the audience identified in the writing task. Similarly, the audience should be specified or clearly implied by the context of the task so that students will make choices within parameters provided by the writing task. For example, a writing task intending students to persuade a classmate to read his/her favourite book and the writer would choose the book to write about. The guided writing must provide students with the content while the free writing task must provide students with the stimulus.
The communicative purpose of the writing tasks are to persuade, to explain, and to convey experience. Example audience are principals, parents, peers, community leaders, teachers and government officials, etc. Example approaches to thinking and writing are analyzing, describing, evaluating, narrating, summarizing, synthesizing, reflecting, questioning, and arguing. The writing tasks are measured in terms of depth and complexity, approaches to thinking and writing, details and examples relevant to content while text structure, coherence and focus are measured in organization of ideas. Sentence structure and sentence variety, word choice, voice and tone, grammar, usage and mechanics are other facets of measuring writing responses.
Assessment of Grammar: The curriculum envisions assessment of grammar through reading and writing tasks. However, there will be two types of grammar tasks: reproduction and grammar in context as given in the test specification grid.
Specification Grid
Specification grid is a roadmap of assessment. It mirrors a clear image of the items for the item developers. Without creating a good test, it is almost impossible to obtain valid and reliable result. It is a must for any high-stake test.
Table 1: Specification Grid for Reading
| Area | Text types | Content | Multiple Choice | Sequencing | Matching | Fill in the gaps (without choices) | True / False | Short Answer Question | Vocabulary Question | Marks |
|---|
| Reading | Seen text 1 (100 words) | Any text of appropriate length from the textbook. (5 items of any one type) | | | | | | | | 5 |
| Seen text 2 (200 words) | Any text of appropriate length from the textbook. (10 items of any two types) | | | | | | | | 10 |
| Unseen text 1 (200 words) | story, notice, advertisement, product guide, letters, news story, brochure, instruction/manual, diary entry, interview, letter, recipe (10 items of any two types) | | | | | | | | 10 |
| Unseen text 2 (300 words) | biography, autobiography, essay, newspaper/magazine article, science article, book/film review, travelogue, editorial, report, BlogSpot (15 items of any three types including one type of items for vocabulary testing) | | | | | | | | 15 |
N.B. Out of 40 items, reading comprehension questions comprise of 16 literal comprehension, 8 reorganization, 8 inference and 3 evaluation and reflection types of questions and 5 questions for testing vocabulary.
Table 2: specification Grid for Writing
| Area | Task Type | Description | Marks |
|---|
| Writing | Guided Writing 1 | Any one task: Paragraph, description of tables/charts/diagrams, a set of instructions, recipe, menu, a set of rules and regulations, advertisement and notice. Expected response: about 100 words | 5 |
| Guided Writing 2 | Any one task: News story, skeleton story, message of condolence, message of congratulations, invitation letter, thank you letter, biography. Expected response: about 100 words | 5 |
| Free Writing 1 | Any one task: Paragraph (presenting views, opinion, experience, feeling), leave application, job application, dialogue. Expected response: about 150 words | 6 |
| Free Writing 2 | Any one task: Personal/official letter, letter to the editor, email, short essay (narrative, argumentative, descriptive), diary, newspaper article, editorial, book review/film review. Expected response: about 200 words | 8 |
| Grammar | Reproduction | 6 tasks representing each of Tense, question tag, reported speech, voice, and interrogation and negation | 6 |
| Grammar in context (MCQ in text form) | 10 MCQs representing articles, prepositions, tense, question tag, voice, reported speech, connectives, conditional sentence, subject verb agreement, causative verbs, modals, adjectives and adverbs, and relative pronouns | 5 |
Assessment Types
The curriculum recommends the inclusion of both internal and external assessments. The internal assessment is conducted to assess listening and speaking skills of the students. It includes 12% for participation and attendance, 32% for listening and speaking each and 24% for score from terminal examinations. The external assessments will be used to assess student performance in reading and writing, and, generate the appropriate grades. The internal assessment will carry 25% of weightage and the external assessment will carry 75%. External assessment covers 40 marks for reading and 24 marks for writing and 11 marks for grammar. The external assessment focuses on reading comprehension and writing along with grammar and vocabulary tasks. This section presents the SG on each assessment area in the external assessment.
Item Format
The present specification grid of English for Grade 10 presents the following item format for assessing reading and writing skills of the students via external examination.
Item Format for Reading
Four reading texts of different genres will be asked. Two short texts are taken from the Grade 10 English Textbook and two short texts are taken from outside source. In order to assess reading comprehension of the students the following item formats will be used.
A. True/False/Not Given items
TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN statements are one of the most difficult items to create. The statements are true only if the given statement gives the same but not similar meaning given in the passage. They are false if the given statements contradicts the information given in the text. Not Given statements are not false statements. They reflect the similar information but this information is not given in the text.
Example: Read the following text and decide whether the given statements are TRUE/FALSE OR NOT GIVEN.
READING TEXT 1
Last month, at an auction house in Germany, a single page from a medieval manuscripts went up for sale. Among those who were trying to buy it was David Gura, the curator of Ancient and Medieval Manuscripts at the University of Notre Dame. It was another chance for him to save part of a 15th century Book of Hours, which only a few years earlier had been broken up. He is now in a race to find the remaining pages of this manuscript before they disappear.
a. David Gura was trying to buy a book before it gets broken up.
b. David Gura worked for the University of Notre Dame.
c. Only a small number of pages remained of The Book of Hours.
Table 3: Item Explanation
| Statement | TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN | Close matching information | EXPLANATION |
|---|
| David Gura was trying to buy a book before it gets broken up. | FALSE | A single page from a medieval manuscript went up for sale. Among those who were trying to buy it was David Gura | This statement is FALSE because the text clearly states that a single page went up for sale, not a book. |
| David Gura worked for the University of Notre Dame. | TRUE | David Gura, the Curator of Ancient and Medieval Manuscripts at the University of Notre Dame. | This statement is true because David Gura is the curator of ancient and Medieval Manuscripts at the university. |
| Only a small number of pages remain of The Book of Hours. | Not Given | He is now in a race to find the remaining pages of this manuscript before they disappear. | There are remaining pages but it is difficult to conclude how many. |
B. Fill in the gaps items
Fill in the gaps items contain questions that contain individual sentences or sometimes a paragraph with missing information with blank space. This space represents a word, a chunk of words or expressions, phrases, number, symbol that an item developer has left out on purpose. The students are expected to fill in the exact word, phrase or information in order to get the answer correct. Fill in the gaps items mostly test the recall power of the students. However, it may also contain higher ability items as well. It is important to note that these questions have only one accurate answer.
Example: Read the given text and fill in the blanks with the correct words highlighted in the text. [Refer to Reading Text 1]
a. Our teacher has just submitted the ...... of the grammar book to the publisher.
C. Multiple choice questions
Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) refer to questions in which students/respondents choose a single option as the correct answer from the alternatives given. They consist of a stem i.e. the question and several alternatives i.e. options. A multiple choice item for Grade 10 has a minimum of four alternatives. Out of the given alternatives, one option is the answer i.e. KEY and other three options are called 'distracters'.
Example: Read the text and choose the correct option to answer the question that follows.
READING TEXT 2
One day Kintaro took a hatchet, climbed onto the bear's back, and went off into the mountains with his friends. On the way, they came to a cliff overlooking a big stream and found that there was no bridge across. "I'll knock a tree over and make us a bridge," said the bear. But even though he pushed and pushed, the tree didn't budge. "I'll give it a try," said Kintaro, and he began to push with all his might. When he pushed, the tree began to move, and with a loud crack it fell over and spanned the river. "Hooray!" shouted all of Kintaro's friends.
Which sentence tells us about the most important event in the story?
A. Kintaro climbs a mountain and finds a stream.
B. The bear carries Kintaro on its back.
C. The bear helps Kintaro to build a bridge.
D. Kintaro pushes a tree with all his might and makes a bridge.
D. Matching items
Matching items involve questions with two parts in which students require matching a series of stems or premises to a response or principle. They consist of a set of directions, a column of statements and a column of responses. Matching items in each column must be kept as homogeneous as possible and the list of responses need to be arranged systematically as far as possible either chronologically, alphabetically or numerically.
Example: Read Text 1 above and match the meaning given in column A with the words given in column B.
Column A: I. a book, document, or piece of music written by hand | II. a public sale of goods or property | III. relating to the middle ages
Column B: A. auction | B. medieval | C. manuscript | D. remaining
E. Ordering of information
With ordering questions, students select the correct sequence of a series of items based on the text. The text based on historical events or a biography of a person has events on chronological order. Item developers can ask ordering questions expecting the correct order of the events or information.
Example: Read Text 2 and write the following sentences in correct order as they appear in the text.
a. Bear wanted to knock the tree down.
b. Kintaro and his friends reach a cliff facing a stream.
c. Kintaro was able to build the bridge of the fallen tree.
d. Kintaro's friends became happy.
e. The bear was made to carry Kintaro on its back.
Answer Key/Marking Scheme: Award 1 mark to each correct answer. e. The bear was made to carry Kintaro on its back. a. Bear wanted to knock the tree down. c. Kintaro was able to build the bridge of the fallen tree. b. Kintaro and his friends reach a cliff facing a stream. d. Kintaro's friends became happy.
F. Short answer questions
Short answer questions require students to construct a concise and focused response that may be factual, interpretive or a combination of the two.
Example: [Refer to Reading Text 2]
a. Who is stronger, Kintaro or the bear? How do you know?
b. Why was the bear not able to make a bridge? Give a reason.
c. Why do you think Kintaro was able to knock the tree?
Cognitive Levels for Reading Tasks
The specification grid clearly mentions four types of comprehension questions viz. literal comprehension, reorganization, inference and evaluation and reflection to assess reading. However, writing assessment is done through writing with clues (Guided Writing) and the students' own writing (Free Writing).
(i) Literal Comprehension: Literal comprehension occurs at the surface level. The details are stated and clear for anyone to identify while reading a particular text. Literal comprehension is often referred to as 'on the page' or 'right there' comprehension. This is the simplest form of comprehension. Items to test literal comprehension includes the following:
- Locating or identifying explicitly presented facts in the text
- Recognizing or recalling details and main ideas, sequencing, comparing, examining cause/effect relationships and character traits
- Understanding of information and facts such as dates, times, and locations, etc. which are directly stated in the text
Literal comprehension is recognized as the first and most basic level of comprehension in reading.
Examples:
Questions: In which country did the auction take place? (Refer to Reading Text 1 above.)
Answer: in Germany.
Who is stronger, Kintaro or the bear? (Refer to Reading Text 2 above.)
Answer: Kintaro.
Explanation: The above questions are literal comprehension questions as their answers are not only in the sentence level but the students can locate them easily as they are explicitly stated in the text.
(ii) Reorganization: Reorganization covers the literal understanding of the text by combining information from various parts of the text. Reorganization comprehension requires some curiosity and creativity. Reorganization often requires students to analyze, synthesize, and/ or organize ideas or information explicitly stated in the text. Reorganization items involves the following:
- Rearranging information gained from various parts of the text into new patterns that integrate them into the students' own idea for further understanding.
- Understanding of the coherence of the text which can range from recognizing local coherence between adjacent and/or non-adjacent sentences to understanding the relationship between several paragraphs across a text.
- Retrieving details and facts from within a text whether it is at the beginning of the text or embedded at the end of the text
- Identifying the information to answer the reorganization questions, test takers often involve in more than one activity like scanning, skimming, searching for, locating and selecting relevant information.
Overall, the difficulty of the item is determined not only by the complexity of the text but also by whether the information is explicitly stated or whether the student has to categories information, discriminate between two similar pieces of information or go for competing information.
Example: (Refer to Reading Text 2 above.)
Question: What does the word 'they' in the second line refer to?
Answer: Kintaro and his friends.
Explanation: This question is a reorganization question because the students have to read the various parts of the text (i.e. two consecutive sentences) and come up with the answer by combining information which are explicitly stated in the text.
(iii) Inference: Inference level covers use of cognitive process to deduce implied, inferred or assumed meaning based on evidence and reasoning. Item developers must always look for the evidence or the clue while creating inference items so that test takers use their prior knowledge based on the evidence or the clue to answer the question. Making inferences involves more than a literal understanding. Inference tasks often involves the following:
- Inferring that one event caused another event
- Comparing and contrasting text information
- Identifying the logical order of the various parts of a text
- Making sensible predictions based on the given text
- Discerning the overall message or theme
- Describing the relationship between two characters
Example: (Refer to Reading Text 2 above.)
Questions: Why were Kintaro's friends happy?
Answer: Because Kintaro fell the tree and made the bridge.
Explanation: This question is an inference questions as it seeks clues and evidence such as Kintaro, push, loud crack, fell over, spanned, shouted, bridge to answer this question.
(iv) Evaluation and Reflection: Evaluation and Reflection level covers reading beyond lines that requires personal judgment i.e. analyzing, evaluating and creating. Evaluation requires the students to give a global or comprehensive judgment about some aspect of the text. Evaluation and reflection items often expects the following:
- Making generalizations, judgments, recommendations, suggestions and decisions
- Creating alternative ideas based on the text
- Demonstration of a full and detailed understanding and integration of one or more paragraphs to deal with unfamiliar ideas, in the presence of prominent competing information, often requires multiple inferences, comparisons and contrasts
- Evaluating a complex idea critically
- Applying sophisticated understandings from beyond the text being based on multiple criteria or perspectives
- Locating and organizing several pieces of deeply embedded information, inferring which information in the text is relevant
- Evaluating, hypothesizing or drawing on specialized knowledge based on the text
- Detailed understanding of a text whose content or form is unfamiliar
- Using formal or public knowledge to hypothesize about or critically evaluating a text
Example: Refer to Reading Text 1 above.
Do you think David Gura is likely to buy even the remaining pages of the manuscript? Give a reason.
Answer: Any answer that mentions 'Yes' with the idea because of the fear of its disappearance/ because it's a holy book'. OR Any answer that mentions 'No' with the idea 'since the gravity of the book, it's beyond his access.'
Would you buy the page of the manuscript if you were David Gura? Why, why not? Give a reason.
Answer: Any answer that mentions 'Yes' with the idea 'I would in order to preserve the sacred book.' OR Any answer that mentions 'No' with the idea 'I wouldn't because it wouldn't draw my attention as I am an atheist.'
Explanation: These questions are evaluative in nature because they do seek a logical answer from the students' head by relating their views with the text.
The curriculum does not clearly specify the cognitive levels for assessing writing skills of the students. However, since guided writing provides clues to the students, they aim at understanding and application levels of cognitive behavior whereas free writing is considered higher levels of behavior as it is creative in nature.
Elaboration of Specification Grid
The present SG only states the type and the number of items to be constructed but does not present the details of the necessary components an item writer needs to be aware of. These components include information such as how many items on each comprehension levels, which items attempt to test particular learning outcome and the percentage of the weightage. The elaborated SG attempts to address the comprehensive details to help an item writer to develop the items to measure the student's ability to respond. Development of the standardized tools includes administration guidelines and evaluation criteria such as rubrics to ensure a robust and reliable assessment. Another aspect to be considered would be the time and resources needed for a technically robust assessment of these skills. The present specification grid needs elaboration to clarify some areas.
Item Card
Test developers are required to use the item cards so that learning outcomes are aligned with the course contents and assessment as they are stipulated in the curriculum. A sample item card is given below.
Sample item card (Writing)
1) Subject: English
2) Item cell code: XXX, Grade 10, Unit, LO
3) Elaborated item code (for English): GW 5 2, Area (R/W) GW, If R - skill, Format Chart Interpretation, Marks 5, text type Non continuous (See Annex for description)
4) Learning outcome (from curriculum): Interpret charts, tables and diagrams.
5) Objective of the item (in line with learning outcome): The objective of the item is to measure whether students will be able to interpret the information given in the charts.
6) Item: The bar graph below shows the number of men and women studying engineering at different universities in Nepal over the years. Interpret the information in the chart in about 100 words by selecting and reporting the main features. Make comparisons where relevant. You may use words such as illustrate, fall slightly, increase sharply, grow steadily and so on.
[Bar Graph Data described: No. of students studying engineering: 2013 (Men ~2500, Women ~1500), 2018 (Men ~3500, Women ~1800), 2023 (Men ~5000, Women ~2500)]
7) Key answer/marking scheme (in English only):
Answer Key/Marking Scheme: Award marks as per the rubrics attached.
Descriptive Structure: introduction, overview, body paragraphs and conclusion. [e. g. The chart illustrates/shows the number of male and female students studying.....]
Key features: key features of the chart, such as highs, lows, changes, and usual data. [e. g. Both male and female students follow the increasing trend. However, the number of female students is increasing slightly over the years in comparison to the male students.]
Information Grouping: Information grouped together in terms of similar trends or categories.
Important Details: Important information should not be missing.
Factual: The writing must be avoiding opinions and incorrect information.
Word Limit: The work should be at least 100 words, and 0.5 marks will be deducted if the word limit is not met as far as the writing is praiseworthy.
Marking Scheme (Rubrics)
Content: 2
- Effectively stated and strongly supported content by fully addressing the prompt 2
- Partially stated, often misinterpreted/repeated content with some support 1.5
- Limited content often with broken sentences with no support 1
- Ideas show thought but not tied to the topic 0.5
- No relevant content at all 0
Vocabulary, Layout and Organization: 2
- Appropriate layout, varied vocabulary, coherent sentence structures and linking words 2
- Appropriate layout, varied vocabulary, coherent sentence structures and linking words with occasional lapses 1.5
- Appropriate layout, limited vocabulary, fairly organized sentence structures and linking words 1
- Limited vocabulary, comprehensible but haphazard sentence structures with repetition 0.5
- Incomprehensible vocabulary and sentence structures 0
Grammar and Mechanics: 1
- Negligible grammatical, punctuation and spelling errors 1
- Occasional grammatical, punctuation and spelling errors 0.5
- Significant grammatical, punctuation and spelling errors 0
N.B. Proper training to teachers for capacity building is expected for developing items with appropriate cognitive behaviour and for writing descriptors for marking schemes.
Item assembling for test set generation
Test developers generate test set by assembling the items using the item cards and a test matrix. A number of test matrix can be developed through the specification grid. A sample test matrix is given below.
Table 4: Sample Test Matrix for a single set
| Area | Text types | Multiple Choice | Sequencing | Matching | Fill in the gaps (without choices) | True / False | Short Answer Question | Vocabulary Question | Marks |
|---|
| Reading | Seen text 1 | | | | | Poem 5 | | | 5 |
| Seen text 2 | | | | | Biography 5 | Biography 5 | | 10 |
| Unseen text 1 | | | Job Advertisement 5 | | | Job Advertisement 5 | | 10 |
| Unseen text 2 | | | | Essay 5 | | Essay 5 | Essay 5 | 15 |
| Writing | Guided Writing 1 | Recipe (with clues) | 5 |
| Guided Writing 2 | Invitation letter (with clues) | 5 |
| Free Writing 1 | Views and attitudes (on current/important issues) | 6 |
| Free Writing 2 | Letter and email (formal/informal) | 8 |
| Grammar | Reproduction | 6 tasks representing each of tense, question tag, reported speech, voice, and interrogation and negation | 6 |
| Grammar in Context | 10 MCQs representing articles, prepositions, tense, question tag, voice, reported speech, connectives, conditional sentence, subject verb agreement, causative verbs, modals, adjectives and adverbs, and relative pronouns | 5 |
Internal Assessment
Internal assessment covers 25 marks. For the purpose of internal assessment, all classroom activities along with student's individual work such as project work, test papers or other proof of the students' performance will be recorded and documented by creating individual student's portfolio. Along with the skills of language, the participation of students in classroom activities as well as their score from terminal exams will be included in the internal assessment component. The table below shows the marks allocated to each assessment area in the internal assessment.
Table 5: Internal Assessment- English
| Assessment Area | Marks |
|---|
| Participation | 3 |
| Listening Test | 8 |
| Speaking Test | 8 |
| Score from Terminal Examinations | 6 |
| Total Marks | 25 |
Elaboration of Internal Assessment
a. Participation: Participation of the students is assessed based on their attendance and their performance in teaching learning activities. Out of 3, student attendance carries 1 mark and the participation of students in learning carries 2 marks.
b. Listening Test: As per the curricular provision, teachers need to prepare two listening tasks themselves so as to assess the students' performance. Each task comprises of 4 questions carrying 1 mark each. The sound files may contain lectures, talks, presentations, radio/TV broadcasts, podcasts/vodcasts, commentaries, interviews, conversations, short discussions, personal accounts (oral anecdotes, past experiences) narratives (e.g. radio dramas), instructions and directions, factual accounts (e.g. news reports, eyewitness accounts) explanations, public announcements, weather forecast, etc. The sound files should be authentic and clearly articulated at normal speed of delivery. Each sound file should be a maximum of three-minute long. The types of questions include multiple choice questions, matching, fill in the blanks and short answer questions. There is a provision of alternative test method for students with hearing impairment. For the hearing-impaired students, any one of the tasks (paragraph writing on a given topic, writing a letter or writing a description of something) can be given. The allocated time for this is 20 minutes. The record of the task and students' performance should be maintained in portfolios.
c. Speaking Test: The speaking test will be administered practically in the classroom. It can be done without any formal setting even during the class. However, teacher should have his/her internal advance planning for this. The teacher should prepare the task themselves. The test starts with a greeting and introduction to make the students feel comfortable. The speaking test consists of the following sections and tasks:
1. Contextual interview or conversation/Describing pictures (4 marks). The teacher can use any one of the task: Contextual interview/conversation or describing pictures. The students will be asked at least four questions on their personal affairs and immediate contextual situation i.e. situation created to respond using the exponents of language function. (Introduce yourself. Suppose your friend has recently won a speech contest. How do you congratulate him/her for winning the speech contest? You need to be out of the class for sometime. Ask for permission from your teacher, etc). For this type of task, teacher can also make students talk to each other with a partner and assess them. Instead of the above type of task, the students can also be asked to describe the pictures. For this, the students will be given a picture or a set of pictures. They are expected to describe the picture/s in at least 8 sentences. The teacher marks based on their performances.
2. Speaking on a given topic/presentation of a project work (4 marks). These two types of tasks are very common and effective in language teaching. These types of tasks are done regularly in course of teaching learning process. Therefore, the teacher can use any one type of the task: speaking on a given topic or presentation of a project work for internal assessment record keeping purposes. For speaking on a given topic, the students will be given a topic like; my school, my hobby, my family, etc. They will get one-minute to think over the topic before speaking on it. This will be done individually. Instead of the task of speaking on a given topic, presentation of a project work can also be used for assessing students' oral presentation skills. The language project the students do in the class in groups or individually can be used for this. Time allocated for this task is 10 to 15 minutes per student.
Alternative test method for students with visual difficulties: For students with visual difficulties, teachers have to ask those students to narrate a sequence of events instead of 'describing pictures'.
Alternative test method for students with speech and hearing difficulties: For students with speech and hearing difficulties, teachers should give a reading comprehension task worth 8 marks. It will be assessed based on the given rubrics. It is mandatory for the teachers to maintain the record of the tasks used for assessing students' performance so that it can be presented as portfolio or evidences when asked later.
c. Terminal Test: Terminal test carries 6% marks of marks in the external assessment. At least two terminal tests should be administered and its record should be kept for the external examination. The full marks and weight of written examination of reading and writing (including grammar) will be as per the specification grid developed by Curriculum Development Centre. The marks obtained in the terminal test should be converted to 6% mark and its record should be kept for the final examination. If there are two terminal tests, each terminal test will have the weight of 3 percent. If there are more than two terminal tests, number of any two terminal tests will have to be calculated for the final examination or grade sheet. N.B. Refer to the internal assessment directives published by CDC for detail.
Result Analysis for Improving Classroom Teaching and Learning
This section presents how result analysis assists classroom teaching and learning.
Area: Reading Comprehension
There are eight planets in the Solar System, and each one is very different. Some planets like Jupiter and Saturn are very large. Others, like Mercury and Mars are smaller. Jupiter has moons that are larger than Mercury. The planets also have different atmospheres. Uranus, Jupiter and Saturn have atmospheres of hydrogen and helium. The atmosphere on Venus is made up of carbon dioxide. Earth has a nitrogen and oxygen atmosphere. Neptune's atmosphere is mostly hydrogen. The planets also have different temperatures. Uranus is the coldest and Venus is the hottest.
Q1. Do the planets have similar atmospheres? Give a reason.
Possible Answers: Students are likely to write the following answers.
A1: No.
A2: No, the planets do not have similar atmosphere because they have different types of gases in their atmosphere.
A3: The planets also have different atmospheres. Uranus, Jupiter and Saturn have atmospheres of hydrogen and helium. The atmosphere on Venus is made up of carbon dioxide. Earth has a nitrogen and oxygen atmosphere. Neptune's atmosphere is mostly hydrogen.
A4: There are eight planets in the Solar System, and each one is very different. Some planets like Jupiter and Saturn are very large. Others, like Mercury and Mars are smaller. Jupiter has moons that are larger than Mercury. The planets also have different atmospheres.
Analysis: Those students who may write A1 have not read the question carefully while those who write A2 have comprehended the text and the question. Those who write A3 and A4 have simply copied the lines without understanding the text.
Classroom Strategies: Teach students the strategies for dealing with the reading comprehension. Some strategies may be teaching vocabulary others may include guessing meaning in the context, relating one sentence with the other, making inferences, etc.
Conclusion: Teaching reading comprehension is the must in the classroom scenario.
Grammar
1. I trust him completely. His conduct is ...(over/under/below/above) suspicion. (Choose the correct option to fill in the blanks and complete the sentence.)
Possible Answers: Students are likely to write the following answers.
A1: I trust him completely. His conduct is over suspicion.
A2: I trust him completely. His conduct is under suspicion.
A3: I trust him completely. His conduct is below suspicion.
A4: I trust him completely. His conduct is above suspicion.
Analysis: Those students who may write A4 have clearly understood the use of over, under, below and above while those who go for A1, A2 and A3 have neither understood the usage of over, under, below and above nor are they able to match the meaning between the first and the second sentence.
Classroom Strategies: Teach students with a clear idea about the distinction between the usage of over, under, below and above with varied examples so that they get a clear concept. Moreover, guessing meaning from context by matching two sentences to come up with a solution is also required to be practiced.
Conclusion: Teaching preposition usage with varied examples is a must.
