Revista simpozionului Eficienta si calitate in educatie 2018 Revista simpozionului | Page 46

Accordingly, tests are still probably the most common form of assessment.
However, writing tests is not an easy task that requires time and effort, they are
commonly used because of their efficiency.
The central issue of the school assessment is the correct, precise mark and its
objectivity. Therefore, the teacher's grade must be objective, correspond to the
actual level of student training. For this it is necessary for the teacher to appreciate
the knowledge, skills and abilities that the students have mastered.
“Writing a good test is an extremely complex task, and requires not only a lot of
time and resources, but also some expertise in statistical analysis. For this reason,
it tends to be large organisations such as governments and universities that write
big tests, mainly because they need to keep the same norm-referenced standards
year after year” (Baxter, 14).
The teacher has the duty to inform students about the way the assessment will be
conducted, what they needs to know, how they will be evaluated, what criteria will
be used in awarding the marks, setting a score in relation to the difficulty of the
subject, the marking scheme (for written tests) so as to eliminate any traces of
subjectivism. “The score is intended to reflect the level of performance the student
has attained during the grading period” (Marzano, 320).
It is indeed necessary and useful to correct students, in order to give feedback or
to help them understand better, but there are situations when we can leave
correction and focus on fluency, let children express freely and simply enjoy using
language. To conclude, the mark is a measure of the students' work, not a
sanction and it should reflect the learning effort and the real capacities of the
pupils.
Bibliography:
Baxter, Andy, Evaluating Your Students, Richmond Publishing, 1997
Gardner, John. Assessment and Learning, Sage Publications, 2006
Jeremy Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, Longman, 3rd
edition, 2005
Kauchak, Donald, Eggen, Paul, Learning and Teaching, Longman, 4th edition
Marzano, Robert, Pickering, Debra, Dimensions of Learning, McREL, 1997
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