Content-based Instruction

Module 5 – Assessment

Welcome to the last week of the MOOC! During this last week, we will focus on assessment.
Appropriately, we have a post-test in this module; it is #7 in the activities listed below. Reviewing
the glossary is one good way you can review the course materials. The module's various activities are
listed below, followed by approximate times for each activity. However, timing will vary depending on
your experience and interest in the topic.

Suggested Module 5 Dates: March 18 – 24

1. Watch a video or read a text that presents basic concepts and terms associated with assessment in
CBI contexts (25 minutes)
2. Take a comprehension quiz about the previous text (15 minutes)
3. Watch a video or read a text about the challenges that language learners face when tested in their
L2 (25 minutes)
4. Work with assessment items. Identify sources of task difficulty that are not essential to the
assessment objectives (35 minutes)
5. Read a text about error correction in CBI (25 minutes)
6. Discuss different ways of correcting students’ errors in a CBI class (35 minutes)
7. Take the post-test (25 minutes)
8. Take an end-of-course self-assessment
9. Participate in one last discussion. Here you will discuss what you have learned in this class and what
you plan to do with this new knowledge

© 2019 by World Learning. CBI MOOC Module 5 Packet for the AE E-Teacher Program, sponsored by the U.S. Department
of State and administered by FHI 360. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, except
where noted. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
This is a program of the U.S. Department of State
administered by FHI 360 and delivered by World Learning
Module 5: Assessment in CBI

“Assessment is the engine that drives student learning.” (J. Cowan, quoted in Rice,
2003)

For many teachers, assessment is one of the most challenging parts of their job, probably because it
puts a tremendous amount of responsibility on their shoulders: they have to select tools and tasks that
will accurately determine student learning and achievement, and, at the same time, motivate students
to improve their performance and continue learning. CBI teachers are invested with even greater
responsibility: they have to assess both language and content knowledge and skills. What kind of
instruments do teachers need in order to be able to prepare assessment tasks that have a dual focus
(assessing content and language) and a dual purpose (assess and motivate students)? In other words,
what are the key components of the CBI assessment engine? How can it be designed to drive both
content and language learning?

The good news is most of the assessment methods employed in CBI are already familiar to teachers,
because they build upon good assessment practices established through research in the fields of
education and language learning (Kiely, 2009; Massler, 2011). In the following text, we will go over some
key assessment concepts and discuss their relevance for CBI.

Summative assessment is a culminating assessment, which measures and reports whether a student
has learned a prescribed set of content and acquired a prescribed set of skills. It is usually administered
at the end of a learning period to determine to what extent a student has met the learning outcomes
specified in the curriculum (Brown, 2004, p. 6).

CBI summative assessment should assess both language and content learning, which means that it
should clearly indicate what students can do in specific subject areas (e.g. can read how to play musical
notes together, or can explain the stages in a food chain), and how successfully they can use English
when dealing with relevant academic content.

Formative assessment measures how students are doing during a lesson or a series of lessons. Its main
aim is to give feedback to students that will help them improve their learning, as well as to teachers, to
help them adjust or modify their teaching to better support student learning (Brown, 2004, p. 6).

The particular challenge for CBI formative assessment is to differentiate as clearly as possible whether
students need language support, or whether they have issues with acquiring the subject matter. For
example, “If a child in a primary school assessment task in geography performs poorly, is it because of
her limited understanding of the geography concepts or details, because she has not understood the
question or because she cannot express her understanding clearly?” (Kiely, 2008).

Validity is the extent to which an assessment task measures what it was designed to measure. For
example, if the teacher wants to assess students’ writing, she should not give them a task that relies
heavily on reading or listening (Brown, 2004, p. 22-27).

In CBI assessment, validity is of great significance, because students have to be sure what they are
assessed on – content or language. Teachers can assess content and language separately. Content and

2
language can also be assessed in one task, but then teachers should prepare separate and clear criteria
for each area (McKay, 2006, p. 122).

Reliability is the degree to which an assessment tool produces constant and reliable results. If another
teacher uses the assessment rubric you designed, will he mark the students’ essays the same way you
would? Does the test you designed assess both content knowledge and language abilities? If the answer
to both of these questions is “yes,” that would mean that your test is most likely reliable. Also, reliable
tests give students clear directions for learning and offer administrated rubrics for grading or evaluation
(Brown, 2004, p. 27).

Washback is related to the effects that your assessment practice can have on students. These effects
can be positive or negative. If students are given only multiple choice items, they may focus on
practicing these task types only and neglect the rest. If they are given tasks that only assess their
language skills, they are likely to neglect content learning. Well-balanced assessment tasks that target
both content and language skills are likely to have a positive washback impact and motivate students to
advance their knowledge in both areas. (Brown, 2004, p. 28)

Good assessment tasks and tests are practical, which means they are easy to administer, relatively
inexpensive, and do not take too long to score (Brown, 2004, p. 26-27).

References
(This content is copyrighted, and cannot be adapted in any way, or distributed after the end of this course. It is not Public Domain or Creative
Commons-licensed, and therefore not for public use.)

Brown, H.D. (2004) Language assessment. Principles and classroom practices. White Plains: Longman.

Kiely, R. (2009). CLIL –The question of assessment. DevelopingTeachers.Com. Retrieved

from https://www.unifg.it/sites/default/files/allegatiparagrafo/20-01-2014/kiely_r._clil_assessment.pdf

Massler, U. (2011). Assessment in CLIL learning. In S. Ioannou-Georgiou & P. Pavlou (Eds.), Guidelines for
CLIL implementation in primary and pre-primary education (pp. 114–136). Socrates Comenius.

McKay, P. (2006). Assessing young language learners. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.

Rice, P. (2003) Designing assessment to enhance student learning. Retrieved from

http://www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/docs/workshop/designing-assessment-to-enhance-student-
learning-paper.pdf

Suggested Further Readings

(This content is licensed under CC BY 4.0 or CC0 and is free for public use.)

Jennings, D. 2012. Concept maps for assessment. UCD Teaching and Learning, UCD, Ireland. Retrieved
from https://www.oercommons.org/courses/using-concept-mapping-for-assessment

Jennings, D, McMahon, T and Surgenor, P. 2013. Assessment in practice. UCD

Teaching and Learning, UCD, Ireland. Retrieved
from https://www.scribd.com/document/138488474/Assessment-in-Practice-Ass-WkBk13-Scd

3
To cite this page:

World Learning. (2019). Assessment in CBI. In “Content-based Instruction” [MOOC].

4
Module 5: Assessment in CBI – Follow-on Quiz


Answer these 5 questions about “Assessment in CBI.” You are encouraged to try to do it without looking
at the article. When you are done, be sure to look at the feedback. You can take the quiz as many times
as you like, and you will keep your highest score. Remember that you need to score 70% or higher in
order to continue advancing in the module.





<<This diagnostic can only be completed online.>>

5
Module 5: Assessment Challenges for English Language
Learners

These videos - Part 1 (5:02) and Part 2 (3:09) - discuss ways in which tests can present students with
linguistic (language-related) challenges that are not connected to our learning objectives. You can read
the entire transcript of the video below.

[Video available online for viewing. Script and presentation slides below.]

Balancing content and language
When a CBI student gives a poor answer, can we tell whether the source of the problem is the student’s
understanding of the content or if the problem is a language-related issue? Unfortunately, the answer is
frequently no. CBI teachers tend give students who have better target language skills higher content
grades (Hönig, 2010).

Usually we grade content and language at the same time – that is, in through the same test or same
assignment. However, to make sure that our grading is fair and valid, we should be clear which part of
the grade comes from content, and which part comes from language. This process begins at the
planning stage. First, we should set clear content learning objectives and clear language learning
objectives. Next, we should plan our lessons to address the objectives we have set. (Recall that we
focused on these issues in Module 4). Then, as we are preparing our means of assessment, we need to
keep in mind these separate learning objectives and how they were taught.

For fair and valid assessment in CBI, our assessments should challenge students according to the
learning objectives. We want to eliminate – as much as possible – sources of difficulty that are not
related to our learning objectives. To help us think about this, we can use the matrix shown in Figure 1.
This matrix was originally proposed by Cummins (1984), adapted by Coyle et al. (2010), and then even
further developed by Leal (2016). This matrix is divided into four quadrants and helps us separate task
difficulty that is associated with content versus task difficulty that is associated with language.

Linguistic demands versus cognitive demands

If you are an EFL teacher, it is probably easy for you to know right away what we mean by “high
linguistic demands.” These are any items that are difficult because of the language skills required (could
be reading, writing, listening, or speaking).

The difficulties that are referred to by “cognitive demands” could have multiple sources. One is how
abstract the item is. If an item or task is difficult for the students to relate to (that is, if they cannot
relate it to their own lives), then it is abstract, and this means that it is more cognitively demanding.
Another source of cognitive difficulty relates to the level of thinking that it requires. Low-level thinking
processes (Refer to Bloom’s Taxonomy), where the student simply produces memorized information,
are less cognitively demanding. Higher-level thinking – understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating,
and creating – are more cognitively demanding.

6
Items in Quadrant 1 are easy both in terms of linguistic (language) demands and cognitive (content)
demands. For testing purposes, these might be useful as a warm-up, to help students gain confidence.
When we are focused primarily on testing content, we will want to have most of our items belonging to
Quadrant 2. That is, we want to challenge our students in terms of the content, without making the
linguistic demands too high. Items or tasks that fall into Quadrant 3 will probably represent too much of
a cognitive load on our students (Zappa, n.d.). It should be noted that for teaching purposes, it is a good
practice to start a lesson in Quadrant 1 (perhaps by reviewing related vocabulary), and then moving
students to Quadrant 2 and finally to Quadrant 3 (Coyle, et al., 2010).

Figure 1. "Cummins' Matrix" is licensed under CC BY 4.0

Language challenges
Below are a few specific ways that language can present an unnecessary source of difficulty to CBI
students in a testing situation.

• Instructions. Even if the test instructions are similar to or the same as instructions that students
have seen before, the students may not be able to understand them. If you expect your students
to learn the language of the instructions, you should teach this in class. Some teachers even share
with their students ahead of time the instructions they will see on the test. If this does not fit with
your learning objectives or teaching philosophy, you should simplify the instructions on the test
or help your students understand them on the day of the test.

• New modes of presentation. In class you probably offer a lot of scaffolding and contextualization.
If the first time you take that away is during a test situation, your students may not know what to
do. For example, if you are a teacher who uses a lot of gestures when talking, but on test day you
stop using hand gestures, this could be too much of a difference for students. You should either

7
 gradually use less and less scaffolding in class, as you approach a test date, or you should provide
the same kind of scaffolding to students on test day as you do during regular class.

• Readability. All of the factors mentioned in Module 4 in “Readability” affect the linguistic
demands of test items. This includes word frequency, syntactic (grammatical) complexity, visual
layout, and length. In a study done by Abedi and colleagues (1997), L2 speakers were found to do
worse than their native speaking peers on test items that were three lines or longer.

Culture
We should remember that culture also plays a role in how well a person can understand something. If
you use a test item from an OER, check to see if there are cultural references that your students might
not understand. As a more advanced English speaker, you might not even think about the culturally-
specific nature of something in a test item. Remember to take a moment to ask yourself if there are
some culturally specific features of your test items that are not related to your learning objectives.

References
(This content is copyrighted, and cannot be adapted in any way, or distributed after the end of this course. It is not Public Domain or Creative
Commons-licensed, and therefore not for public use.)

Abedi, J. (2010). Performance assessments for English language learners. Stanford, CA: Stanford
University, Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education. Retrieved
from https://scale.stanford.edu/system/files/performance-assessments-english-language-learners.pdf

Abedi, J., Lord C., & Plummer, J. R. (1997). Final report of language background as a variable in NAEP
mathematics performance (CSE Report No. 429). Los Angeles: National Center for Research on
Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing.

Barbero, T. (2012). Assessment tools and practices in CLIL. In F. Quartapelle (Ed.), Assessment and
evaluation in CLIL (pp. 38–56). Ibis. Retrieved
fromhttps://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/promoitals/article/viewFile/2827/3030

Coyle, D., Hood, P., & Marsh, D. (2010). Content and language Integrated Learning. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.

Cummins, J. (1984) Bilingual education and special education: Issues in assessment and pedagogy San
Diego, CA: College Hill.

Hönig, Ingrid (2010), Assessment in CLIL: Theoretical and empirical research. Saarbrücken: VDM.

Leal, J. P. (2016). Assessment in CLIL: Test development at content and language for teaching natural
science in English as a foreign language. Latin American Journal of Content and Language Integrated
Learning, 9(2), 293–317. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1132154.pdf

Wewer, T. (2013). English language assessment in bilingual CLIL instruction at the primary level in
Finland: Search for updated and valid assessment methods. Zeitschrift für Interkulturellen
Fremdsprachenunterricht,18(2), 75-87. Retrieved from http://tujournals.ulb.tu-
darmstadt.de/index.php/zif/article/view/52/48

8
Zappa, F. (n.d.). CLIL -- Some problems and some solutions. Retrieved
from http://eltnotebook.blogspot.com/2011/10/clil-some-problems-and-some-solutions.html

To cite this page:

World Learning. (2019). Assessment challenges for English language learners. In “Content-based
Instruction” [MOOC].

9
Assessment Challenges for English Language Learners Presentation Slides

10
11
12
13
14
15
Module 5: Adapting Test Items

Answer these questions about “Assessment Challenges for English Language Learners.” These questions
are meant to help you think of ways to minimize task difficulty that is unrelated to your learning
objectives. After you submit your answers, be sure to read the feedback. This activity functions as a quiz,
and you need to score 70% or better in order to continue advancing in the module. You can take the
quiz as many times as you wish, and you will keep your highest score.





<<This diagnostic can only be completed online.>>

16
Module 5: Error Correction
As an EFL teacher, you no doubt have noticed that a teacher cannot correct every error that his or her
students make. To try to do so would be to interrupt students too often and make them very
uncomfortable in the classroom. Now as a CBI teacher, you will see that you cannot focus on language
learning all the time in class. When students are grappling with new concepts, we should not make
excessive demands on the students’ accuracy in their language.

However, providing targeted feedback to language learners can aid their learning (See Learning Principle
#5, Module 3). This text discusses a variety of ways of correcting students’ language errors.

Explicit Correction
One way to give corrective feedback is simply to tell the student that he or she has made a mistake and
to give the correct form. This kind of correction is called explicit correction.

Example:

Student: I see a movie yesterday.1

Teacher: Saw. I saw a movie.

Metalinguistic Feedback and Explicit Correction

When the teacher gives an explanation for why the student’s phrase was wrong, this is called
metalinguistic feedback.

Example:

Student: I don’t know who is this guy.

Teacher: Who this guy is. Remember the word order of embedded questions?

Sometimes, this kind of correction would be very disruptive. If you are having a nice conversation with
your students, to stop the conversation and correct errors, refer to rules, and have students repeat the
correct form may cause the conversation to stop. Sometimes we prefer less obvious and more natural
corrective feedback.

Recast
One form of corrective feedback that is not disruptive is the recast. This is when the teacher models the
correct form in what he or she says back to the student, as part of the conversation.

Example:

Student: I can to cook.

Teacher: Oh really? You can cook? That’s a very good skill to have.

Sometimes this kind of corrective feedback is too subtle and students do not notice. A teacher can call
students’ attention to the correct form by emphasizing the words or adding gestures that indicate that
the words being spoken at the moment need attention.

17
Clarification Request
One way to get a student to be more active in the correction process is to ask them what they mean.
Sometimes we do this because we honestly do not understand what our students want to say. Other
times, we do it as a pedagogical technique, to get the student to correct him- or herself.

Elicitation
Another way to get students to actively participate in the correction process is to indicate where there is
an error and ask them to correct it. This does not have to be very disruptive. The teacher can indicate
that there is an error by repeating what the learner said, emphasizing the error, and adding a
questioning tone. “You see the movie yesterday?” Which will let the student know that a correction is
being requested. Many teachers use a system of hand gestures to guide students in their thinking about
what needs correcting. For example, pointing behind you with your thumb might be the gesture that
indicates “past tense.”

Review
In this text we have reviewed five different ways of giving corrective feedback:

• Explicit correction
• Metalinguistic feedback
• Recast
• Clarification request
• Elicitation

In the next activity, you will have the opportunity to discuss with some of your classmates reasons why
you would choose one type of error correction over another.

FOOTNOTE
(This content is licensed under a Standard YouTube License. You may distribute links to this video or show it as part of a class or training, but
you may not adapt it in any way. It is not Public Domain or Creative Commons-licensed.)

This example relates to the excellent video, “ESL/EFL Oral Error Feedback (test yourself)”,
1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFVSQTNUxtc&t=10s

To cite this page:

World Learning. (2019). Error correction. In “Content-based Instruction” [MOOC].

18
Module 5: Discussion on Error Correction – OPTIONAL
L2 teachers and CBI teachers must not correct all or even most of our students' errors. To do so would
represent far too many interruptions and would make the students not want to keep talking. Thus, we
must choose which errors are worth correcting. We also, as we have seen, have many different ways of
correcting errors in our students' oral production:

• Explicit correction: explicitly indicating the learner’s error and the correction
• Metalinguistic feedback: providing an explanation for why the error is an error
• Recast: providing a model of the correct form in a conversational response to the learner
• Clarification request: asking the learner what he or she said or meant
• Elicitation: indicating where there is an error and asking the student to correct it

Choose one of these techniques and, in 150 words or less, tell us:

1. Within the CBI context, when do you think it is most appropriate to use the technique that you
have chosen? This could depend on the type of student, the type of error, the type of class, the
type of activity, or a combination of these.

2. Describe one CBI-specific context in which this technique would not be the best form of error
correction. Explain your reasons.

3. Tell us the name you would like the rest of us to call you, and tell us where you live.

You are encouraged to respond to other participants' posts.

Note: This is an OPTIONAL activity, and therefore, it will not be graded.

19
Module 5: Post-test

This post-test reviews terms and concepts that have been presented in this course. There are 10
multiple-choice questions. Be careful. On the questions where there is only one right answer, many of
the wrong answers are true, but they are not the correct answer to the question.

You can take this test as many times as you like. You are also free to look at any other materials while
you take the test. Your final grade will be the highest grade you earn. The score will be counted as a
quiz. You must earn 70% or higher in order to keep advancing in the course.

<<This diagnostic can only be completed online.>>

20
End-of-course Self-assessment

This is a questionnaire to find out about your experience in this course. There are no right or wrong
answers. Just give the answer that describes your experience in the class.

There are 10 multiple-choice questions and a space to add optional comments at the end. This is an
ungraded activity and you may only answer the questions once.

<<This diagnostic can only be completed online.>>

21
Module 5: Next Steps & Goodbyes – OPTIONAL

Please share with the whole class your plans for next steps and your
goodbyes.

This is our last group discussion of this course. Please post one or two paragraphs (total) addressing
these areas:

• What do you plan to do with the new perspectives you have gained through this course?
• Have you done anything differently in your teaching as a result of this MOOC? Describe it.
• If anyone you encountered in this course helped you in your learning, this would be a great place
to mention them.
• Please also include your name and where you live.

<<This task can only be completed online.>>

22

Module 5 Check


Please answer one question to verify that you have completed all activities in Module 5. You must
choose "yes" in order to unlock the "After the MOOC" module. This quiz will count as 1 point toward
your grade.

<<This diagnostic can only be completed online.>>

















<<This is the end of Module 5.>>

23