В настоящее время объектом активного изучения лингводидактики стало

 
 
VIII. INNOVATIONS IN ASSESSMENT OF THE 
LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY 
 
Topics to be discussed: 
1. The concept of “assessment”.
2. Types and methods of assessment. 
3. Criteria of assessment and grading. 
4. Testing and its types. 
5. Specificity of feedback and error correction in the context of 
approaches to FLT. 
6. Language portfolio. 
 
Spark: 
 
1. Think about your experience as a language learner. What do 
you have associations with assessment?
2. What is the essential difference between assessment, 
evaluation and correction?
3. Can you remember how you felt about the ways teachers 
responded to your written work when you were learning a foreign 
language?  
 
1. The concept of “assessment”
 
Assessment in teaching EL plays a great role. Expanding the 
CEFR throughout the European countries makes us to use 
innovative technologies in assessment too. 
Assessment is a very broad term and has different meanings 
relating to the context. In special literature various definitions of 
assessment can be found.
Assessment is directed to determine the ways of improving 
learning of students and data collection about student learning 
which includes using the time, knowledge, expertise and available 

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resources in order to inform decisions about the ways of improving 
learning. In our view, assessment is the process of establishing 
clear, measurable expected outcomes of students’ learning by 
systematically working and gathering information, analyzing and 
interpreting it, there is a possibility of getting a positive solution of 
the question. 
In FLT methodology assessment has different meanings which 
can be defined depending on the context and sometimes it is 
confused with evaluation. We should know that assessment and 
evaluation use similar methods but have different ultimate goals.
Evaluation means to think carefully about something before making 
judgment about its value, importance and quality. In turn, in the 
context of education the focus of assessment is on learning process. 
The main purpose of assessment is to improve students’ learning. 
Assessment allows for evidence-based decision making about 
curriculum, pedagogy, advising and students support. At the 
program level, assessment as evaluation provides program faculty 
evidence that allows them to improve program outcomes. At the 
course level assessment helps instructors evaluate whether students 
achieved the identified course objects, and provides information to 
improve the course.
Program assessment and procedure assessment are 
differentiated in the pedagogical literature. Program assessment is 
an ongoing process of identifying goals and objectives collecting 
and analyzing data, and making modifications. Programs need not 
assess every goal and objective every year, but the program should 
have a plan for periodically assessing all aspects. A program might 
choose to adopt a process of rotating through the goals and 
objectives or a regular schedule. It might also opt to initially 
prioritize and target particular goals. Program assessment can 
provide data that will help course instructors, programs and 
departments to make informed decisions in terms of the program 
strengths and areas for improvement. In addition, the data collected 
for assessment can also be used for other purposes such as annual 
reviews. A good way to start the program assessment process is to 
appoint an assessment coordinator or committee. The committee can 
then begin by identifying program goals – there are two ways to 

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identify goals. One way is to gather examples from other programs 
and edit them, and the second one – teachers might review course 
syllabi and identify themes, common expectations of students 
learning, or sequential expectations that all students are expected to 
meet upon program completion. Once you have identified broad 
goals, the next step is to write measurable objectives that will 
address those goals.
The role of assessment in educational process is essential; 
before organizing FLT process a teacher should be aware of the 
aims of assessment and what an assessment is, how assessment 
differentiates from evaluation, why a teacher should have 
differentiated them. 
Thus, assessment is an integral element of the teaching 
experience through which facilitators verify the understanding and 
aptitudes of learners and organized as a process that determines, 
reconciles and dissects degree of achieving educational aims at 
certain stage of the process of education based on criterion created 
in advance.