Assessing Reading

Posted by:

Licda Cleopatra Noel Drummond

The third chapter of the book a practical guide to Assessing English Language Learners is related to how to assess reading but what is reading?  Reading is a complex cognitive process of decoding symbols for the intention of constructing or deriving meaning (reading comprehension). It is a means of language acquisition, of communication, and of sharing information and ideas. Like all language, it is a complex interaction between the text and the reader which is shaped by the reader’s prior knowledge, experiences, attitude, and language community which is culturally and socially situated. The reading process requires continuous practices, development, and refinement. 

The approaches to reading for most English language teachers reading includes both bottom up skills - recognizing and making sense of letters, words, and sentences - and top down processing that deals with whole texts. teachers would also agree taht text applies to booth linear passages of prose as well as a wide variety of non linear sources of information such as maps and pie charts.

Reading Subskills

The reading subskills can be divided in two stages:

Major reading skills that includes:

• Reading quickly to skim for gist, scan for specific details, and establish overalll organization of the passage.
• Reading carefully for main ideas, supporting details, author's argument and purpose, relationship of paragraphs, and fat versus opinion.
• Information transfer from nonlinear texts

Minor or enabling reading skills include:

• Understanding at the sentence level.
• Understanding at inter-sentence level.
• Understanding components of nonlinear texts. 

The specifications help teachers and administrators establish a clear link between the overall objectives for the program and the design of particular assessment instruments. Some typical features of specifications are:

1. content.
2. conditions.
3. grading criteria.

There are many sources for reading texts. Texts can be purpose written, taken directly from authentic material, or adapted. The best way to develop good reading assessments is to constantly watch for appropeiate material. Reading texts include both prose passages and non-linear texts such as: tables, graphs, schedules, maps, advertisements, and diagrams.

Assessing reading is also related to questions and formats which the teachers are in the need to build the appropriate reading comprehension in their classrooms, in which they apply the adequate format and the questions that are need to achieve the goal.

Teachers should take in consideration these tips whenever they are going to apply an assessment in reading such as:

• Make sure your assessment matches your reading program.
• Use authentic or asapted texts whenever possible.
• Exploit the entire text.
• Include grammar and vocabulary in context.
• Assess inferencing and critical thinking.

GLOSSARY

1. Schemata: An outline, diagram, plan, or preleminary draft.

2. Interwoven: To weave together; interlace.

3. Gist: The essencial point or meaning of something.

4. Inferences: A conclusion draw from evidence or reasoning.

5. Washback:Is the influence that a test has on the way students are taught.

6. Coverage: The attention gives an event or topic by newspapers, radio, and televsion in their reporting.

7. Allocated. To give something to or set something aside for a person or purpose.

8. Collocations: The association between two words that are typically or frequently used together.

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