Testing Oral Ability

Operations

• Expressing: Likes, dislikes, preferences, agreement/disagreement, requirements, opinions, comment, attitude, confirmation, complaints, reasons, justifications, comparisons.

• Directing: Instructing, persuading, advising, prioritizing.

• Describing: Actions, events, objects, people, processes.

• Eliciting: Information, directions, clarification, help.

Operations

Narration: Sequence of events.

Reporting: Description, comment, decisions and choices.

Types of text: Discussion

Addresses: ‘Interlocutor’ (teacher from candidate’s school) and one fellow candidate

Topics: Unspecified

Dialect, Accent and Style: Unspecified

Informational skills;

candidates should be able to:

• Seek permission
• Apologize
• Elaborate an idea
• Express opinions
• Justify opinions
• Speculate
• Analyze
• Make excuses
• Paraphrase
• Make suggestions
• Express preferences
• Draw conclusions
• Make comments
• Indicate attitude

• Provide personal information
• Provide non-personal information
• Describe sequence of events (narrate)
• Give instructions
• Make comparisons
• Give explanations
• Present an argument
• Provide required information
• Express need
• Express requirements
• Express need
• Express requirements
• Summarize (what they have said)
• Elicit help

Informational

Interactional skills;

candidates should be able to:

• Express purpose
• Recognize other speakers’ purpose
• Express agreement
• Express disagreement
• Elicit opinions
• Elicit information
• Question assertions made by other speakers
• Modify statements or comments
• Justify or support statements or opinions of other speakers
• Attempt to persuade others
• Repair breakdowns in interaction
• Check that they understand or have been understood correctly
• Establish common ground
• Elicit clarification
• Respond to requests for clarification
• Correct themselves or others
• Indicate understanding (or failure to understand)
• Indicate uncertainty

Interactional

Skills in managing interactions;

candidates should be able to:

• Initiate interactions
• Change the topic of an interaction
• Share the responsibility for the development of an interaction
• Take their turn in an interaction
• Give turns to other speakers
• Come to a decisión
• End an interaction

Managing interactions

• Presentation (Monologue)
• Discussion
• Conversation
• Service encounter
• Interview

Part 1

Other Speakers

(Addressees)

• May be equal or higher status

• May be known or unknown

Part 2

TOPICS

Which are familiar or interesting to the candidate

DIALECT

Standard British English or Standard American English

ACCENT

Standard American

STYLE

Formal and Informal

Part 3

VOCABULARY RANGE

Non- technical except as the result of preparation for a presentation.

RATE OF SPEECH

Will vary according to the task

Format 1

Interview

Questions and requests for information

Pictures

Role play

Interpreting

Prepared Monologue

Reading Aloud

Interaction with fellow candidates

Discussion

Role Play

Format 2

Responses to audio or video recordings

Described situations

Remarks isolation to respond to

Stimulated conversation

Format 3

1. Make the oral tests as long as fleasable

2. Plan the test carefully

3. Give the candidate as many fresh starts as posible

4. Use a second tester for interviews

5. Set only tasks and topics that would be expected to cause no difficulty in their own language.

6. Carry out the interview in a quiet room with good acoustics.

7. Put candidates at their ease so they can show what they are capable of.

8. Collect enough relevant information

9. Do not talk too much .

Create appropriate scales for scoring considering...

• Accuracy

• Range

• Size

• Appropriacy

• Flexibility