Chapter 28 Assessing Students' Grammatical Ability

teaching methodology has been with us for a long time and modem textbooks place great 
emphasis not only on correct grammatical form, but also on the effective and appropriate 
use of structures to convey meaning. 
Whether or not we use a test to independently assess grammatical ability depends 
on the purpose of the assessment. There are occasions when the knowledge gained from 
detailed information is beneficial for teachers and students. For instance, diagnostic and 
placement tests often have a grammar element since detailed information may be required 
regarding a student's grammatical ability; a separate test is conducive to the assessment 
of a wider range of grammatical structures than can be tested when assessing a student's 
writing and speaking abilities. Furthermore, it is possible to test and score a consider­
ably large number of items in a relatively short period of time. Similarly, in achieve­
ment and proficiency tests, the inclusion of a grammar component, such as the "Use 
of English" paper in the higher-level Cambridge ESOL examinations, might be deemed 
necessary simply as it can give us more information regarding students' 
grammatical 
ability. 
Finally, the choice of appropriate 
test methods or test tasks is paramount due to the 
potential negative effects they might have on test perfonnance. Weaknesses of testing 
formats like multiple choice, however, may often result from the way that they have been 
used rather than because of some inherent defect. For instance, employing only multiple­
choice questions to assess a students' grammatical knowledge is severely limiting and may 
prove detrimental to a test taker's performance, so teachers should be encouraged to use a