English aural-oral skills assessment policy and practices in Bangladesh Secondary Schools

Ranjit Podder :
(From previous issue)
The other five participants believed that there was very little scope to go beyond the curriculum as it was centrally designed and controlled. Wadud further elaborated by saying that there should be some guidelines and exemplars in the curriculum about how to assess the listening and speaking skills in schools. He emphasised, “An exemplar should be designed where teachers will find guidelines and examples of how to assess students’ listening and speaking skills”.
All the remaining five participating teachers favoured restructuring the present curriculum to allot some marks for listening and speaking so that both teachers and students would be interested as well as feel some pressure to practise and assess them, .Ali emphasised, “If we are given an order from our higher authority to include listening and speaking in our school assessment system, we will be bound to practise and assess listening and speaking skills of students”.
“First of all, we need to allot some marks for listening and speaking. Listening and speaking are the two primary skills to learn a language effectively and it is imperative to include them in assessment system,” asserted Abonti. She expressed the need for some listening practice aids. “Although I conduct listening tests occasionally, I face some difficulties like an absence of standard CDs or cassettes and any player to use in testing students’ listening skill.”
Atanu and Abu spoke for allotting some marks for listening and speaking as well provision for those two skills assessment in schools and in the SSC examinations.
All the six teachers argued for the reformation of the English curriculum by redistributing
marks for all the four basic language skills. They also highlighted the necessity of listening CDs and speaking exemplars for use in teaching and assessment of aural-oral skills.
All the six participants stated that they had professional development training in teaching English, but in none of the training courses they underwent, had any sessions on listening and speaking skills assessment procedures. Four out of the six English teachers failed to talk confidently about how they could assess the listening and speaking skills. Atanu who taught in a village school hesitated while speaking about ways of listening and speaking skills assessment because he seemed to be unaware of the aural-oral skills assessment tools and techniques.
During the teaching of a listening lesson that I observed, Atanu read out a text elucidating and translating it into Bangla line by line and sometimes word by word. In answer to a question during our second interview, his response was, “1 have done it because it is our traditional system. But 1 think it is not right way. Besides, some students arc unable to understand the meaning of the topic. So at first’ I read and clarify.” This quotation indicated that Atanu needed rigorous training to understand the principles of how to develop students’ listening and speaking skills as well as how to assess them.
Wadud attached importance to the training and motivation of teachers and the value of speaking as a life skill. He believed that although money would be required to start listening assessment because of preparing CDs and buying CD players, speaking could be started free of cost if only teachers were proactive and motivated. He asserted, “To start speaking does not involve money. Only teachers’ motivation can improve the situation a lot. If we arc encouraged and trained, assessment of listening and speaking skills will not be a problem”. Abonti attached importance to the continuous professional development training opportunities for English teachers to ease the situation.
All the six teachers felt the need for training in listening and speaking skills assessment because all of them were keen to introduce listening and speaking assessment to school and the SSC examinations.
Another enabling factor was the fact that all the six participating teachers were aware of the importance of listening and speaking skills practice and assessment. Atanu who taught in a village school says, “I think students learn any language by listening from their parents, teachers, and from their friends. Through listening, they can learn any kinds of languages.” He further put emphasis on the practice and assessment of listening and speaking skills because of their importance in higher education as well as in the job market at home and abroad.
Wadud, one of the more experienced, skilled, and motivated teachers, emphasised that language learning was not completed until and unless one became skilled in the four macro skills of the target language. He stated that two more important skills, listening and speaking, were ignored in assessment system but language learning was not complete without them. He further emphasised that higher education all over the world was in English. In order to receive higher education at home and abroad and for getting jobs, students needed to be proficient in the four major language skills.
Abonti and Ali put emphasis on the practical use of English language in the classrooms as well as its assessment as students did not have much opportunity to practise English outside. They said that creating English speaking environment in schools was critical as there was little opportunity to practise it outside the classrooms.
Abu and Kamal believed that without practising the four language skills, students had to face some problems in real life interactions around the globe when they went for higher education and jobs. All the six participating teachers, therefore, emphasised the national and international importance of speaking English for economic, and life-opportunity reasons.
They asserted that listening and speaking should be practised properly because young people were better language learners. If listening and speaking were incorporated in the assessment system, those two skills would be practised and the students would not have to face so many language problems abroad as people usually found in higher education and job market at home and abroad.
The participating teachers said they faced many hurdles such as class-load, consecutive classes, short class-time, large-multilevel classes, absence or shortage of resources, lack of opportunities for continuous professional development, preparing tests, and examining scripts. Besides those, teachers commented that they had to be involved in non-academic work such as invigilating the recruitment examinations, preparing the national voter list, and being on the sports committee, Despite those barriers, they were found hardworking and optimistic about making positive changes in the area of listening and speaking skills development and assessment.
This was apparent in informal conversations after the last interview with each of them. All of them sought help so that they could start listening and speaking assessment in their schools, Ali stated in his interview that if teachers modelled speaking English, students would also begin to speak, He further added that as most guardians as well as family members were not able to speak English, schools could be the best places for English language practice. Abonti expressed her strong belief by saying that the English teaching-learning situation might start to change positively if teachers and students utilised the current 35/40 minutes class time, although this 35/40 minutes teaching time for English was not sufficient according to her, She illustrated, “I believe that if the students only use their 40 minutes English class time and the school time, they will be able to speak English within a short period of time,”
Kamal asserted that it vas possible to allot some marks for listening and speaking in his school in consultation with the head teacher. He said, “It may be also added 10 marks for listening, 10 marks for speaking. In this way exam system should be restructured.”
Wadud advocated for including listening and speaking assessment similar to practical activities in science subjects such as Physics, Chemistry, and Biology.
He reiterated that allotting 25% marks for each skill could bring better result. Until the electronic devices and other listening resources such as a standard CD and a guideline-exemplar could be prepared, the test administrator could do it orally.
All the six participating teachers were found resilient and optimistic about the positive changes in the field of English language teaching-learning and assessment. They were ready to do whatever was possible from their position. They believed that if listening and speaking practices and assessment were started, they themselves were ready to adapt and to act as agents contributing to desired changes.
After five years of study at secondary schools, students in Bangladesh sit for the SSC examinations and most students pass two 100-mark English papers, but their skills in real life oral-aural communication in English are not satisfactory (podder, 2(10). Concerned English language educationists reiterated the similar voice as in the curriculum and syllabus report (NCTB, 1996) that “until and unless a public examination is devised that tests English skills rather than students’ ability to memorise and copy without understanding, the aims and objectives of the curriculum and syllabus could never be successfully realised” (p. 152). However, the current assessment practices do not fulfil the stated expectations.
Although some educationists (Brown, 2004; Cheng & Curtis, 2004; Wall & Alderson, 1993) believe that assessment system in language curriculum plays an important role in dictating the classroom practices, Bangladesh secondary English curriculum has not yet included the assessment of the listening and speaking skills either in school examinations or in the SSC examinations. The whole secondary curriculum is getting a thorough overhaul and a new curriculum is coming from 2013. It is high time our curriculum started assessing oral-aural skills of students creating opportunities for students to practise English listening and speaking skills in schools.
What the curriculum planners can do is produce some standard CDs for aural-oral practices and assessment, Coming out of the traditional assessment system, the new English curriculum can keep provisions for self and peer assessments alongside teachers’ formal and informal assessment. Clear and well-organised test formats provided in curriculum documents should allow teachers as well as the students to get a clear idea about the types and the procedures of listening and speaking assessment and about the marks distribution for each skill and their sub-skills. Brown and Hudson (1998) supported a number of alternative assessment techniques which include classroom observation by teachers, student-portfolios, self-assessment and peer-assessment. According to Brown & Hudson, those alternative assessment practices have been proved to be effective by different language educators.
There are many barriers to implement an improved English curriculum. The apparent obstacles arc the lack of skilled and motivated English teachers; lack of provision for assessing listening and speaking skills neither in schools nor in the SSC examinations; absence of resources like standard listening CDs, CD players, and speaking exemplars; large multi-level classes; and so on. Although there are challenges, there are some encouraging factors too. For instance, some teachers are aware of the importance of aural-oral skills; they are hard working to develop their own as well as their students’ English language skills; and above all, the teachers are resilient and innovative.
However, the barriers on the way to developing students’ listening and speaking skills have been identified and now it is time to formulate English language teaching-and-use policy where there will be clear answers to questions such as the following. Why do we teach English compulsorily in schools? How can we develop students’ listening and speaking skills alongside reading and writing? Whether or not we should keep provision to assess students’ aural-oral skills in schools and in the SSC examinations; how much weight will we attach to listening and speaking skills practices and assessment in terms of marks allocation? What the criteria of the skills evaluation will be?
We hope that the government will formulate a policy about how English language will be taught and used in Bangladesh schools; specify what competencies we expect from our students at the end of the SSC examinations; and what will be the ways to achieve them. Alongside the policy, appropriate English teaching-learning resources that will help
achieve the goals goals; and steps for English teacher development through continuous achieve the goals ; and feedback may help implement the proposed restructured curriculum.
It is hoped that if the proposed restructured curriculum is property implemented by a set of well-trained and motivated teachers, our secondary school leavers will be able to face the growing challenges with their higher skills in English language.
(Concluded)