Department of German

Since the spring semester of 1999, but particularly during the academic year 1999-2000, John Norris gathered extensive information targeting various aspects of assessing the appropriateness and efficacy of our curriculum and the role of assessment within it. The separate overview statement provides a summary of these activities. Gathered at different points of our curriculum renewal, this information and the subsequent qualitative and quantitative analyses prepared by Norris have led to a number of adjustments in the statement of curricular goals and objectives, in materials selection and pedagogical approaches and emphases, and in assessment practices. Thus, though specific results obtained at a given point may have historical value as part of the curriculum construction, implementation, and adjustment process itself they would, presumably, no longer accurately describe the current situation. Furthermore, in light of the complex measurements obtained, it is not possible to report results adequately in this forum. The text below is excerpted from reporting documents prepared by John Norris; interested parties should contact him to inquire about sharable findings from his extensive research efforts. Two particular projects are intended to provide a sense of this work and its results.

• During the spring semester of 1999 a questionnaire was distributed to teachers and students at program Levels I - IV in order to gather students’ and teachers’ judgments about the kinds of tests, grading procedures and other assessment practices that occurred at that time in the sequenced portion of the German language program.

Three major sections comprised the questionnaire:
- Part 1 focused on general issues in assessment practice at each of the four program levels.
- Part 2 questioned the use of particular assessment types at particular program levels.
- Part 3 focused on grading practices in German classes.

In addition to addressing these main sections, students responded to two short sections dealing with the German program placement exam and the German language proficiency exam.

• The German Speaking Test (GST), a tape-based Simulated Oral Proficiency Interview developed by the Center for Applied Linguistics in order to provide a convenient means for eliciting spoken discourse from German language learners and a systematic method for assigning global ratings according to the ACTFL (1986) Proficiency Guidelines for Speaking The ACTFL Guidelines, was administered at three points during AY 1999-2000.

Although not without substantial criticism (see, e.g., Norris, 1997), the use of the GST and the ACTFL Guidelines does provide one means for estimating the oral language abilities of German language learners which can be easily reported and interpreted by those not familiar with other possible indexes (e.g., curriculum-specific measures) of learner language development and achievement.

Summary of GST data collected

Findings

Table 1 shows the number of ratings assigned to students at six levels progressing from the beginning of the integrated and sequenced GU German curriculum to the end of the first three years of study. At the bottom of the table, the Median (middle) and Mode (most frequent) ACTFL rating for the corresponding curricular level are shown. Finally, in the last row of the table, for comparison purposes, average self-ratings of ACTFL level are provided for each curricular level (based on data collected from a separate population of students within the GU German program).

Note that median ACTFL proficiency ratings differ rather consistently in the predicted direction, with median oral proficiency ratings generally advancing as students progress through the curriculum. The majority of students seem to be achieving the Intermediate-Mid level of oral proficiency or higher by the end of the first year of the curriculum (62%), and all but one student received a rating of Intermediate-Mid by the end of the second year of the program (93%), where the median rating fell even higher at the Intermediate-High level. A median rating of Advanced by the end of the third year of the curriculum, as well as a number of Advanced-High and Superior ratings, indicate that students who progress through the third year of German instruction continue to improve their German speaking abilities.

Given these findings, an oft-proposed criterion for oral proficiency achievement associated with the end of two years of U.S. college foreign language instruction—Intermediate-Mid—seems to be easily achievable by students within the GU German program. Naturally, because the data were collected cross-sectionally (not longitudinally, following the same students over several years of instruction within the program), results should be interpreted with caution. Only careful longitudinal data collection would enable the confirmation of these findings. However, given the relatively consistent patterns identified across the 6 curricular levels, findings do seem to support the interpretation of quick and continuing advancement in oral proficiency within the GU German Department undergraduate curriculum.

Table 1. Results on the German Speaking Test (Fall/Spring, 2000)

References

American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (1986). ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines. Hastings-on-Hudson, NY: author.

Center for Applied Linguistics (1995a). The German Speaking Test. Washington, DC: author.

Center for Applied Linguistics (1995b). The German Speaking Test Rater Certification Kit. Washington, DC: author.

Norris, J. M. (1997). The German Speaking Test: Utility and caveats. Die Unterrichtspraxis, 30(2), 148-158.

September 1, 2000