How to Test Speaking Skills in Japan

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Chapter 8: Random-Partner Conversation

for a required length of time 1 As a result, the washback effect from this format will be strong Students will quickly realize they’ll have to make the most of their practice time in other lessons in order to maximize their chances for success For you, this format is also easy to manage once you decide a few basic details The random pairing helps keep students on their toes and minimizes the amount of preparation they can do, as they won’t know who they’ll test with until the moment arrives The En glish they produce is therefore a closer snapshot of their overall abil ity It’s also a very flexible format You can conduct it during class, in your classroom, or in another location at another time (see Chapter 6 for ideas) In addition, you can vary the amount of scaffolding to easily increase or decrease the level of difficulty This makes it usable with a wide variety of students Issues to work around However, this format does have a few issues you’ll need to work around First, since you can only assess two or maybe three students at a time, it is not well suited for large classes Theoretically, in a 90 minute lesson, if you spend about 5~10 minutes per pair, you could get through about 18 to 36 students Realistically, however, you’re looking at around 12 to 15 pairs maximum since you’ll need time to get the class started, explain the directions, account for student movement, and give a bit of feedback As mentioned in Chapter 6, you’ll also need to take care on how random you want the pairing process to be It will be important to ensure that the ability levels are more or less the same within each paring Finally, to ensure that stu dents remain productive before and after their performance, you’ll need to prepare some sort of language practice task to keep everyone occupied Doing so is important because if everyone is busy with 1 Five minutes is a good place to start, but you can easily adjust this up or down as needed.