Reconceptualizing language teaching: an in-service teacher education course in uzbekistan

Interviewer: Why do you choose these skills to assess?
Teacher: They are easy to check; we do not have to spend much 
time on scoring. 
Interviewer: What happens after the tests?
Teacher: We check the tests without any criteria and announce 
scores. Then, these scores are used to provide a final score for the student.
Interviewer: OK, what happens after? 
Teacher: That’s it. We finalize. Students receive their scores.
Interviewer: Do you ever analyze the students’ scores?
Teacher: No, we do not have time. We need to start the new term.
REFLECTION
Think about the case above. What issues come up? Is the teacher’s 
assessment procedure similar to others at your university? Having been 
introduced to Assessment for Learning and Assessment of Leaning what 
can you suggest a teacher can and should do with the test results?
KEY CONCEPTS
There are seven concepts in this section: Objectively-scored assess-
ments; Measures of Central Tendency; Mean; Median; Mode; Measures of 
Dispersion; Standard Deviation. We will briefly explain each one below.
Objectively-Scored Assessment. An Objectively-scored item is a 
question where there is only one fixed correct answer. It is also known as 
closed-answer test. One of the strongest advantages of using this type of 
assessment is its high reliability and accuracy in generating a total score. In 
the Uzbekistan context, using objective scoring to measuring language has 
been the main approach in assessment. The most popular is being multi-
ple-choice tests with four variants of responses. Even though it is a highly 
reliable method of testing, it does have certain dangers. Multiple-choice 

---

125
CHAPTER THREE: LANGUAGE ASSESSMENT/TESTING
items are notoriously hard to design. Other closed-response item test 
method types might be easier to develop but even they are fraud with 
issues, like guessing. Therefore, statistics can reveal not only the quality of a 
test but also the preparedness of students.