What is writing:
The act or art of forming letters and characters on paper,
wood, stone, or other material, for the purpose of
recording the ideas which characters and words express,
or of communicating them to others by visible signs.
“Nobody in this world wants to read your diary except
your mother."
(Richard Peck, writer of young adult fiction)
What is a test
A test or examination is an assessment intended
to measure a test-taker's knowledge, skill,
aptitude, physical fitness, or classification in
many other topics.
What is the testing writing
A test or an assessment intended to measure
writing skill of students.
Writing Skills
1) Grammatical Skills – the ability to write correct
sentence
2) Stylistic Skills – the ability to manipulate sentences
and use language effectively
3) Mechanical Skills – the ability to use correctly those
conventions peculiar to the written language
4) Judgment Skills – the ability to write in an appropriate
manner for a particular audience in mind, together
with an ability to select, organize and order relevant
information
The components of testing writing
Or What to test
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•
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Grammar
Organization
Content/Substance
Fulfillment of purpose
Vocabulary/word choice
The ways to test writing
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•
•
•
•
•
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Essay
Letter
Paragraph
Short story
Matching Items
Make a synopsis
Rearrange sentence into paragraph
How a writing test should be
• Clearly defined purpose and audience for writing
• Restrict students’ answers
• Test only writing ability, nothing else
• Well-defined and authentic task
• Ensure long enough sample
• Appropriate scales for scoring
Factors to consider in Developing Writing
Tasks
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•
•
•
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The type of writing
The function
The addressee
Process
Product
Characteristics of writing tests
• Authentic and communicative writing
tasks place emphasis on transmitting
authentic/integrative information in
writing.
• Current writing tasks reflect the kind of
writing tasks that the students are
required to do in the L2 oral
communicative situations. Thus, there is
emphasis on the type, and function of
writing as well as the addressee.
Characteristics of writing tests
• Since current teaching of writing
emphasizes also strategies of
writing, the process should get
attention in testing writing as well as
the final product of writing.
The way to score
No
Criteria
score
1
Grammar
20%
2
Organization
20%
3
Content/Substance
20%
4
Fulfillment of purpose
20%
5
Vocabulary/word choice
20%
Conclusion:
Always bear in mind though that the
difficulty of an item may relate to
whether it has been covered in class
or it may give an indication of how
well it was understood. Such test
analysis can give us information
about how effective our teaching has
been as well as actually evaluating
the test. Evaluating tests carefully can
ensure that the test improves after it
is taken and can give us feedback on
improving our test writing…...
Thank you