Diagnosing Young Learners’ English – the development of a national tool for Swedish schools

• The start of English instruction in Sweden varies between school year one and three. Grades are not awarded until the end of school year six, but teachers are obliged to monitor their pupils’ learning from the beginning and to discuss it continuously with each child. Furthermore, the progress of individual pupils is summarized and discussed at least once a term in developmental dialogues with the pupil and his/her guardians. The outcome of these dialogues is an individual development plan, including a written report. Thus, assessment is explicitly intended to have a formative as well as a summative function. In order to enhance this, and also to concretize the action oriented national syllabus for languages, a diagnostic tool of English for learners aged 7 to 12 is provided and offered to all schools. In our presentation we will discuss the development of this material, its structure and content, and its intended use. Examples of components to be focused on are models for self and peer assessment, oral tasks and benchmarks, profiled descriptions of results, and links to the European Language Portfolio. The collaborative nature of the development process is discussed, with particular attention paid to contributions by pupils and teachers.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Pedagogik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Pedagogy (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Språk och litteratur -- Studier av enskilda språk (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Languages and Literature -- Specific Languages (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Assessment

language

diagnostic tool

collaboration

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)