1. SPEAKING PAPER: CATERPILLAR TURNING INTO BUTTERFLY Elena Onoprienko Yulia Polshina Far Eastern Federal University

2. Test as measuring tool … a language test is a procedure for gathering evidence of general or specific language abilities from performance on tasks designed to provide a basis for predictions about an individual’s use of those abilities in real world contexts. (McNamara 2000)

3. Characteristics of a test  Practicality  Validity  Reliability

5. Current practices

6. 100 years of tradition in Russian/Soviet assessment practices  read and translate  read and retell  translate sentences from Russian into English  topics, topics, topics …  Emphasis on reproduction  Highly subjective assessment

7. Why assess speaking?  Linking language production to real-world contexts  Valuing communication over knowledge about the language  Achieving communicative goals effectively  Acquiring competence in educational contexts  Giving learners a sense of achievement  Motivating further learning  Providing useful feedback on learning Glenn Fulcher, 2012

8. Survey: where respondents are from

9. Universities  Moscow State University  Higher School of Economics, National Research University  Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University  Southern Federal University  Far Eastern Federal University  Universities from Chelyabinsk, Surgut, Ulyanovsk, Samara, Yekaterinburg, Tomsk, Saransk, Nizhny Novgorod, Saratov, Kharkiv

10. Skills assessed:

11. Difficult to test:

12. Speaking tasks

14. Nature of Speaking  Spoken language  Speaking as interaction  Speaking as a social activity  Speaking as a situation-based activity

15. What are we assessing?  Accuracy  Fluency  Communication strategies  Discourse and interactional competence  Task completion  Pragmatic and sociolinguistic competence

16. Speaking Paper 1  15 years ago  3 rd year EFL majors  Focus on vocabulary

19. Why?  Internet  Copy-paste  PowerPoint  Movies  No lists

21. Old Task  Talk about your favorite actor.  Criteria: topic vocabulary accuracy fluency

22. Later version Presentation of an actor/actress Imagine that you are your favorite actor/actress agent. You have to promote him/her to get a role in a movie. Focus on background, education, career (ups and downs; emphasize personal qualities that helped to achieve goals), previous roles (what movies he/she played in, what challenges had to be faced, what he/she had to be able do to play this or that role – new skills, appearance, etc., achievements (awards, status). Be specific. Speak about 3-5 min.

23. Sample Speaking Paper 1 The story of becoming an actor/actress Rate from 1 (not exciting) to 5 (very exciting) Versatility Rate from 1 (not versatile) to 5 (very versatile) Awards Rate from 1 (no critical acclaim) to 5 (much critical acclaim) Challenging projects Rate from 1 (nothing challenging) to 5 (many challenging projects) Total Actor # 1 Actor # 2 Actor # 3 Actors Contest: Talk about one actor/actress, focusing on the features in the table. Your goal is to win the most points in each category. Listen to other students’ reports and fill in the table. At the end of the class count the points, discuss them and decide who’s won.

24. Sample Speaking Paper 2 If a college student gets caught cheating in the US, or Canada, or Australia, he/she might be expelled from college. In your opinion, is there a problem of cheating in Russian universities? Comment on different attitudes and express your point of view. Criteria  Content  Duration  Interaction  Fluency  Grammar and Vocabulary

25. Sample Speaking Paper 2 Content 5432 СодержаниеСодержание полностью соответствует заданию; высказывание развернуто, связно и аргументировано; студент иллюстрирует основные аргументы примерами. Содержание в основном соответствует заданию; высказывание развернуто, аргументировано, но аргументы носят общий характер; студент недостаточно ясно формулирует собственное отношение и/или не подкрепляет его примерами. В общем, содержание соответствует заданию, но характеризуется слабой аргументацией, общими словами, отсутствием связности; не всегда понятно, как части высказывания связаны между собой; высказывание, недостаточно развернуто. Студент не приступил к выполнению задания, либо задание не соответствует заявленной теме, либо длительность высказывания меньше 1,5 минут, либо высказывание содержит значительные по объему элементы заученного текста.