Abstract
This article builds on a study set within the Swedish educational system and focuses on lower secondary teachers’ use of national test results when awarding final grades of English as a foreign language (EFL). In Sweden, teachers are entrusted with the responsibility of assessing their own students’ competences as well as assigning grades. To support them, there are compulsory national tests to be used as important advisory tools; however, they are not exams in a strict decisive sense. After a brief contextualization and conceptualization regarding language education in Sweden, including the assessment, teachers’ somewhat contradictory perceptions and use of results from the national EFL test for 11–12-year-olds are described and discussed. Data emanate from large-scale teacher questionnaires conducted for three years (2013, 2016 and 2019), which are analyzed from quantitative as well as qualitative angles. Results indicate that a number of teachers struggle with factors related to the language construct as well as to the educational context and consequences at individual, pedagogical and structural levels. This is discussed from various angles, linked not least to the policy, curriculum and other frame factors. Furthermore, the need for further research in direct collaboration with teachers is emphasized.
Highlights
Since the publication of a revised curriculum for Swedish compulsory school in1980, the national syllabuses for foreign language education have been increasingly characterized by a communicative and functional approach (Canale and Swain 1980; Hymes 1972; Malmberg 2001)
The national assessment system (Section 1.3.2), which is intended to illustrate and measure the type and levels of competence required in the national curriculum, has been seen, at least implicitly, as a way to clarify and operationalize the syllabuses (Erickson and Åberg-Bengtsson 2012)
The current article focuses on English as a foreign language (EFL) in school Year 6, that is, for 11 to 12-year-old students,1 and reports on a study based on the compulsory national test for this age group
Summary
2011) have been increasingly characterized by a communicative and functional approach (Canale and Swain 1980; Hymes 1972; Malmberg 2001) De facto, this has meant that language use and confidence have become focused upon, rather than single elements of language, for example, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation, which are seen as important prerequisites rather than goals per se. A number of teachers seemed to make a consistently more severe interpretation of the proficiency levels required in the syllabus, not least regarding written production. This is manifested in their use of the national test results when awarding students’ final EFL grades in Year 6, and in their comments on the test
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