scholarly journals Quality Assurance and Foreign Languages - Reflecting on oral assessment practices in two University Spanish Language Programs in Australia

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 4-19
Author(s):  
Adriana R. Díaz ◽  
◽  
Hugo Hortiguera ◽  
Marcia Espinoza Vera ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
Foreign Languages ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Language Programs ◽  
Oral Assessment ◽  
The One ◽  
Programs Of Study ◽  
Achievement Standards

In the era of quality assurance (QA), close scrutiny of assessment practices has been intensified worldwide across the board. However, in the Australian context, trends in QA efforts have not reached the field of modern/foreign languages. This has largely resulted in leaving the establishment of language proficiency benchmarking up to individual institutions and programs of study. This paper discusses the findings of a cross-institutional collaborative research project focused on the comparative analysis and review of assessment practices in the Spanish language majors at the University of Queensland (UQ) and Griffith University (GU), both members of the Brisbane Universities Languages Alliance (BULA). The project had a two-pronged focus; on the one hand, establishing comparable student academic achievement standards, specifically for oral assessment in intermediate level courses; and, on the other hand, providing tools and resources to train teachers (continuing and sessional staff) in consensus moderation (CM) practices through an online platform. The results presented here offer practical pedagogical suggestions to support planning and review of oral assessment, thus contributing to QA management in languages other than English.

scholarly journals Assessment in Spanish heritage language programs

2020 ◽  
pp. 101-110
Author(s):  
Clara Burgo
Keyword(s):  
Language Learners ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Heritage Language ◽  
Personal Narratives ◽  
Placement Test ◽  
Heritage Language Learners ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Language Programs ◽  
Language Brokers ◽  
Variation Assessment

Spanish heritage language learners (HLLs) are heterogeneous in nature. Thus, how can we assess these students? Most of the literature on this has been on placement exams (Polinsky & Kagan, 2017, among others), but the focus of this article is on assessment in Spanish heritage courses. Placement test results should be indicators of what should be included in the curriculum. One of the main challenges is the lack of the following components: specific proficiency indicators for HLLs, consensus in defining key concepts, understanding dialect variation, assessment for measuring linguistic skills, and finally research on HLLs’ assessment (Malone, Kreeft Peyton, & Kim, 2014). Thus, assessment is the biggest challenge in HL education due to the dominant monolingual ideologies, so formative assessment practices are recommended to confront them by allowing HLLs to negotiate their linguistic identities via multilingual perspectives (King, Liu, & Schwedhelm, 2018). What are specific tools or activities to negotiate these? Personal narratives of US Latinos were collected by Carreira and Beeman (2014) for the sake of reflections of HLLs as language brokers. González-Davies (2004, 2018) also mentions the importance of peer-to-peer strategies for translation competence. These projects can also become group projects, like the manifestos implemented by Moreno and MacGregor-Mendoza (2019) in a course in which language, culture, and community are the goals. All these activities are examples of the kinds of assessment that may be effective in the heritage classroom and may guide their instructors. The goal of this article is to suggest activities to connect HLLs with their communities at the same time that their learning gains are assessed in terms of language proficiency.

scholarly journals Assessment Practices in the English and French Component of a Foreign Languages Teacher Education Program

Lenguaje ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 353-382
Author(s):  
Carmen Cecilia Faustino Ruiz ◽  
Irina Kostina ◽  
Omaira Del Socorro Vergara Luján
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Education Institution ◽  
Foreign Languages ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Public Higher Education ◽  
Self Assessment ◽  
Language Programs ◽  
Teachers And Students

This article reports on part of an evaluative investigation of the academic processes of a Foreign Languages Teacher Education Program. The study focuses on analyzing assessment practices carried out by teachers in English and French courses and the perceptions students and professors have about these practices. Focus groups were implemented for collecting perspectives from teachers and students. Results show that assessment practices are heterogeneous which is due not only to factors identified in literature but also due to important factors depending on particular situations of a public higher education institution in Colombia. Findings are useful for the self-assessment of language programs in order to improve the curriculum.

Ya Era Tiempo (It’s About Time): Latinas/os Training to be Counselors Share the Meaning of Obtaining Recognition for their Spanish Proficiency

2021 ◽  
pp. 153819272110050
Author(s):  
Fernando Estrada ◽  
Brianna Angèle ◽  
Fannie Martinez
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Students ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Counseling Students ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
Baccalaureate Education ◽  
Post Baccalaureate ◽  
Bilingual Proficiency

In the current study, an initiative that focuses on bilingual proficiency among masters-level counseling students provided the opportunity to qualitatively answer the question: For Latina/o bilingual graduate students who are training to be licensed counselors, what is the meaning behind pursuing and obtaining recognition of their Spanish language proficiency? The thematic findings from ten interviews illuminate topics related to bilingualism in post-baccalaureate education with respect to programing and scholarship.

scholarly journals Auditory Processing of Gender Agreement across Relative Clauses by Spanish Heritage Speakers

Languages ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Daniel Vergara ◽  
Gilda Socarrás
Keyword(s):  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Auditory Processing ◽  
Age Of Onset ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
Auditory Task ◽  
Auditory Modality ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Heritage Speakers ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Spanish Heritage Speakers

Processing research on Spanish gender agreement has focused on L2 learners’ and—to a lesser extent—heritage speakers’ sensitivity to gender agreement violations. This research has been mostly carried out in the written modality, which places heritage speakers at a disadvantage as they are more frequently exposed to Spanish auditorily. This study contributes to the understanding of the differences between heritage and L2 grammars by examining the processing of gender agreement in the auditory modality and its impact on comprehension. Twenty Spanish heritage speakers and 20 intermediate L2 learners listened to stimuli containing two nouns with gender mismatches in the main clause, and an adjective in the relative clause that only agreed in gender with one of the nouns. We measured noun-adjective agreement accuracy through participants’ responses to an auditory task. Our results show that heritage speakers are more accurate than L2 learners in the auditory processing of gender agreement information for comprehension. Additionally, heritage speakers’ accuracy is modulated by their Spanish language proficiency and age of onset. Participants also exhibit higher accuracies in cases in which the adjective agrees with the first noun. We argue that this is an ambiguity resolution strategy influenced by the experimental task.

scholarly journals The System Analysis in Language Teaching and Learning for Technical Students in Russia

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tatiana Sidorenko ◽  
Vladimir Yampolsky
Keyword(s):  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
System Analysis ◽  
Foreign Languages ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Engineering Programs ◽  
Technical Students ◽  
Language Courses ◽  
University Level ◽  
Personal Skills

Integration of the Russian system of engineering education into the global educational domain compelled Russian universities to enhance the importance of humanities in engineering programs with a special focus on foreign languages. However, it must be admitted that the system of language training in Russia at a university level comes up against serious problems of historical, economic or political backgrounds, for which reason there are processes in the system that hamper a solution of the tasks set before the university and the society. The solution requires strong and decisive initiatives capable to improve the situation with the language proficiency among the graduators. Therefore, there is a rapid need in essentially new approaches to teaching foreign languages attain the desired outcomes for engineers, which reflect not only subject-oriented knowledge but also personal skills and the ability to effectively communicate with an opponent or a partner. The need to identify barriers towards high-quality language courses at a university level motivated the authors to carry out a special research based on the methods that are typical to system analysis.

A Preliminary Analysis of Lecturers’ Empathy in Mitigating Challenges of Developing English for Specific Academic Purposes (ESAP) Assessment Materials

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 14-30
Author(s):  
Norkhairi Ahmad ◽  
◽  
Ahmad Mazli Muhammad ◽  
Syafini Ismail ◽  
Harmi Izzuan Baharom ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Language Learner ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Best Interest ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
Course Outcomes

Running English for Specific Academic Purposes (ESAP) courses at tertiary institutions is becoming more challenging due to a number of factors and it leaves impact on lecturers’ emotions. Emotional dimension is among the aspects that significantly influences the way lecturers view assessments and their choice of assessment practices. This paper specifically looks at empathy as one emotional aspects present within lecturers as they undertake tasks of developing assessment materials and mitigate the challenges that they encounter. Six senior ESAP lecturers teaching engineering students at two engineering related universities reflected on this scenario via interviews and self-reflections. Their empathy in planning and developing assessment materials were elicited and scrutinised via qualitative approaches. All the lecturers exuded empathy based on professional grounds and directed towards essential learner factors and the intended ESAP course outcomes attainment. Empathy was found to be consistently demonstrated towards language learner factors and their language learning context that comprise aspects like background of students, language proficiency level, familiarity with language materials, current knowledge and skills required for test-taking. Such empathy for the best interest of the learners have induced careful and selective practices among the lecturers when preparing assessment materials. The presence of empathy in assessment practices appeared to be second nature to the lecturers and it helps to complement assessment best practices and upholds quality delivery of the ESAP courses. Empathy at a positive level has enabled the lecturers to embrace the spirit of assessment for learning where more time and efforts were devoted towards planning suitable assessments that promote understanding and mastery of the language, before going for the assessment of learning or summative assessments.

Between Global and Local Contexts: The Seoul Linguistic Landscape

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kapitolina Fedorova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
South Korea ◽  
Public Space ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Foreign Languages ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Urban Contexts ◽  
Historical Sites ◽  
The One ◽  
Global And Local

Multilingualism in urban spaces is mainly studied as an oral practice. Nevertheless, linguistic landscape studies can serve as a good explorative method for studying multilingualism in written practices. Moreover, resent research on linguistic landscapes (Blommaert 2013; Shohamy et. al. 2010; Backhaus 2006) have shed some light on the power relations between different ethnic groups in urban public space. Multilingual practices exist in a certain ideological context, and not only official language policy but speaker linguistic stereotypes and attitudes can influence and modify those practices. Historically, South Korea tended to be oriented towards monolingualism; one nation-one people-one language ideology was domineering public discourse. However, globalization and recent increase in migration resulted in gradual changes in attitudes towards multilingualism (Lo and Kim 2012). The linguistic landscapes of Seoul, on the one hand, reflect these changes, and However, they demonstrates pragmatic inequality of languages other than South Korean in public use. This inequality, though, is represented differently in certain spatial urban contexts. The proposed paper aims at analyzing data on linguistic landscapes of Seoul, South Korea ,with the focus on different contexts of language use and different sets of norms and ideological constructs underlying particular linguistic choices. In my presentation I will examine data from three urban contexts: ‘general’ (typical for most public spaces); ‘foreign-oriented’ (seen in tourist oriented locations such as airport, expensive hotels, or popular historical sites, which dominates the Itaewon district); and ‘ethnic-oriented’ (specific for spaces created by and for ethnic minority groups, such as Mongolian / Central Asian / Russian districts near the Dongdaemun History and Culture Park station). I will show that foreign languages used in public written communication are embedded into different frameworks in these three urban contexts, and that the patterns of their use vary from pragmatically oriented ones to predominately symbolic ones, with English functioning as a substitution for other foreign languages, as an emblem of ‘foreignness.’

Successful Application of Ground-Penetrating Radar for Quality Assurance-Quality Control of New Pavements

2003 ◽  
Vol 1861 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Imad L. Al-Qadi ◽  
Samer Lahouar ◽  
Amara Loulizi
Keyword(s):  
Quality Control ◽  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Ground Penetrating Radar ◽  
Test Section ◽  
Base Layer ◽  
Quality Control Tool ◽  
Granular Base ◽  
The One ◽  
The Time Domain ◽  
Ground Penetrating

The successful application of ground-penetrating radar (GPR) as a quality assurance–quality control tool to measure the layer thicknesses of newly built pavement systems is described. A study was conducted on a newly built test section of Route 288 located near Richmond, Virginia. The test section is a three-lane, 370-m-long flexible pavement system composed of a granular base layer and three different hot-mix asphalt (HMA) lifts. GPR surveys were conducted on each lift of the HMA layers after they were constructed. To estimate the layer thicknesses, GPR data were analyzed by using simplified equations in the time domain. The accuracies of the GPR system results were checked by comparing the thicknesses predicted with the GPR to the thicknesses measured directly from a large number of cores taken from the different HMA lifts. This comparison revealed a mean thickness error of 2.9% for HMA layers ranging in thickness from 100 mm (4 in.) to 250 mm (10 in.). This error is similar to the one obtained from the direct measurement of core thickness.

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