This book documents a major study comparing the Cambridge First Certificate in English (FCE) with the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) to investigate similarities in test content, candidature and use. While both tests were designed to measure many of the same abilities, they represent radically different approaches to language test development, reflecting deeper differences between educational measurement traditions in the US and UK. The thorough investigation of the fundamental characteristics and operational utility of two of the most widely used English tests for foreign...

This volume explores the use of summary tasks as an effective means of assessing reading comprehension ability. It reports on a series of empirical studies that investigated the development and trialling of text-removed summary completion tasks and discusses the correlation of these tasks with results from independent measures to validate text-removed summary completion as a measure of reading comprehension ability.

This volume charts the development of the Cambridge teaching qualifications and tests, and presents case studies demonstrating their impact. Described by teacher and teacher educator Scott Thornbury as 'a very welcome addition to the literature on teacher assessment', this edited volume discusses key issues in assessing language teachers' professional skills and knowledge. It also provides case study illustrations of how teacher knowledge and teaching skills are assessed at pre-service and in-service levels within the framework of the Cambridge English Teaching Qualifications, and includes...

This volume explores the impact of multilingualism on learning, teaching and assessment, viewed from the perspective of policies, procedures and challenges.

This volume provides a theoretical and practical discussion of mixed methods research and its application in language assessment.

This volume outlines the general principles of Learning Oriented Assessment (LOA), placing it in the context of European language learning policy. The authors pose three key questions central to LOA: 'What is learning?', 'What is to be learned?' and 'What is to be assessed?'. It focuses on the use of evidence, and how it can be collected and used to feed back into learning, overviews large-scale assessment as practised by Cambridge English and learning-oriented classroom assessment practices, and concludes with a look at implementing LOA in practice. With fresh insights into the role of...

This volume brings together 11 TIRF-related research papers on English language assessment.

This volume outlines the general principles of Action Research and provides case studies of the application of Action Research in a range of classroom contexts with a focus on assessment.