A brief summary of the Expectations, Criteria, Competency Levels

and Assessment Methodology used by William Boyd for Grade 6A-E

at Sarasa Witaed Romkloa Bilingual School in the second semester

2006.

Students in Grade 6 at Sarasas Witaed Romkloa Bilingual School have an English language competency level, which ranges between the following:

Competency Levels:

Pre Intermediate:

Students at Pre-intermediate level have a good basic ability to communicate and understand English, but they can make great improvement in all areas.

Ability: They can talk about many subjects and give their opinion on them. They can talk with confidence in the present, past and future simple tenses. They can perform tasks such as shopping, booking a hotel room, travel, and making conversation in English. Their grammar includes an understanding of adjectives, adverbs, comparatives, articles, possessives, and basic prepositions.

Equivalent to:

• IELTS score 3.5 - 4.5
• TOEFL iBT score 32
• TOEIC score 300 - 450 

Elementary:

Students at Elementary level can communicate in a very basic way, mainly in the present and past simple. Their vocabulary covers everyday useful subject areas.

Ability: By the end of Elementary level, they can make simple sentences and reply to questions on a range of personal and common subjects. They can talk about their likes and dislikes, family, and routines. They can order a meal or go shopping in English.

Equivalent to:

• IELTS score 3.0
• TOEFL iBT score 20
• TOEIC score 150 - 300 

Students have undergone a continuous assessment over the last five months using the following:

Criteria

Speaking

• Can students respond to group and individual questions effectively?
• Can students participate effectively in oral reading tasks as individuals and in groups?
• Can students make simple sentences and reply to questions on a range of personal and common subjects?
• Can students talk about a variety of subjects and express an opinion about them?
• Can students demonstrate correct pronunciation of short and long vowel sounds and vowel pairs within common words as individuals?

Reading

• Can students produce oral reading demonstrating fluency and timing? Individually and in groups
• Can students identify the main idea?
• Can students demonstrate an understanding of the sequence of events in a given dialogue?
• Can students follow simple written directions?

Writing

• Can students identify and use of simple, past, present and future tenses?
• Can students demonstrate an ability to use basic prepositions of time, space and movement?
• Can students write basic sentences correctly?
• Can students demonstrate legible handwriting?

Listening

• Can students follow simple already known directions given orally?
• Can students respond appropriately to others verbal questions?
• Can students identify differences in minimal pairs?

Assessment methodology:

The teacher listens to, and observes all output of the students as a group and individually. In addition to this, all written work is assessed individually on a regular basis.

All work is assessed against the above competency levels.

Expectations

The teacher expects students to demonstrate some use of the language at their relevant competency level as outlined above, on a daily basis.

• Students are required to respond to group and individual questions on the topic and in the context of the lesson being taught. The teacher listens to verbal output and reads written materials produced at this time.
• Students must read short stories out loud, individually and in groups. The teacher listens to individuals and the group as a whole.
• Students are required to read and answer questions orally, from reading exercises as a group or individually. The teacher allows students to complete the exercise without assistance whenever possible, but provides some prompting when necessary.
• Students are asked questions related to every day events, as a group and individually, at the beginning of each lesson. The teacher listens to replies, and then “leads the conversation” in order to assess the student’s conversational ability.
• Students demonstrate their ability to express an opinion on the topic being taught. The teacher asks simple ‘do you like…?’ and ‘what do you think?’ questions about the topic.
• Students are asked to complete all written work verbally before attempting writing exercises. The teacher ensures that students are focused on oral output. The teacher then has the students read and answer each problem verbally before allowing written output to be produced.
• Students are asked to place pictures in the same sequence as the reading exercise. The teacher observes individuals ability to do this.
• Students are given all instructions for the class in writing. The teacher observes students ability to follow these directions.

• Students are required to solve sentence structure problems involving the correct use of articles, prepositions, and tenses. The teacher assesses written work, as it is being produced and on a weekly basis.
• Students are required to produce pieces of extended writing, related to the structures and topic being taught. The teacher assesses this at a later time based on the above criteria.

Summary

Students are expected to demonstrate a continuous improvement in all areas of second language acquisition. This will be at a pace that is appropriate to their current competency level and individual learning ability and environment.

The teacher expects to be able to give the students the appropriate support, guidance and encouragement needed to help them achieve a self identifiable improvement in their second language skills.

Bill Boyd, is an English teacher currently living and teaching in Thailand. He owns and operates this website: http://eslpal.com