The ILR Oral Interview: Origins, Applications, Pitfalls, and Implications

Lowe, Pardee

doi:10.2307/3530138

Cited by 21 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…Put generally, the goal of language teaching is to enable language learners to take part in the "normal give-and-take of target language conversation" (Lowe, 1983, p. 238). Lowe's (1983) definition focuses on oral proficiency, which is also the focal point of ACTFL (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages)/ETS (English Language Testing Service) Proficiency Guidelines. ACTFL/ETS is a "proficiency-oriented curriculum" (Kramsch, 1986, p. 366) which is very influential in the United States and Great Britain respectively (van Lier, 1989).…”

Section: Theoretical Framework Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Employers’ Views on Importance of English Proficiency and Communication Skill for Employability in Malaysia

Ting

Marzuki

Chuah

et al. 2017

Indonesian J. Appl. Linguist

100

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Employability of graduates is a concern in many countries, including Malaysia, and the high unemployment rate among graduates is often attributed to their lack of English proficiency and communication skills. These two distinctive elements are often collated, and it is important to find out which is more important to employers. The study examined the employers' views on the importance of English proficiency and communication skill for graduates to be employed in the Malaysian private sector. The data were from semi-structured interviews conducted with 10 employers in the private sector who were in the position to recruit staff. The 21,433-word interview transcripts were analyzed. The results revealed that employers in the Malaysian private sector view language proficiency and communication skills as separate qualities. The employers are willing to consider employing candidates with average English proficiency if they have good communication skills, except for jobs which require more communication in English such as customer service and marketing. The results also revealed that good communication skills can increase employability and opportunities for career advancement. The findings highlight the communication skills that universities need to emphasize so that their graduates have the necessary skills to perform well in employment interviews and in their work.

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Section: Theoretical Framework Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Employers’ Views on Importance of English Proficiency and Communication Skill for Employability in Malaysia

Ting

Marzuki

Chuah

et al. 2017

Indonesian J. Appl. Linguist

100

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The level descriptions, however, have undergone very little empirical verification by either government or academic users of the Guidelines other than through the experience of the large number of OPI interviewers and raters who have used them for more than 30 years. Indeed, the skill level descriptions in the Guidelines and in the more recent ACTFL materials are based not on empirical research, but rather on what has been termed "the living tradition" (Lowe 1983). This lack of empirical verification of the proficiency level Judith E. LiskinGaspam (Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin) is Assistant Professor of Spanish at the University of Iowa, Iowa City. descriptions has contributed to the considerable controversy over the validity of the ACTFL Roticiency Guidelines as a yardstick for measuring functional language ability.…”

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confidence: 99%

Circumlocution, Communication Strategies, and The ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines: An Analysis of Student Discourse

Liskin–Gasparro

1996

Foreign Language Annals

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This study was designed to analyze the use of communication (i.e., lexical repair) strategies, particularly circumlocution, by speakers at the Intermediate High and Advanced levels of oral proficiency in Spanish. All of the instances of communication strategies (CSs) used in oral proficiency interviews by 17 Intermediate High speakers and 13 Advanced speakers were analyzed to discover what strategies were favored by speakers at each level. The analysis of learner discourse found that Advanced speakers, more than Intermediate High speakers, rely on a range of L2‐based strategies that included, but was not limited to, circumlocution. The analysis suggests that the statements in the ACTFL Guidelines about CS use be expanded to include strategies besides circumlocution that develop as learners cross the border between the Intermediate High and Advanced levels.

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“…1-1,000) (Alderson, 1991;Griffin, 1989); 5) to provide coherent internal links within an institution between pre-course testing, syllabus planning, materials organisation, progress assessment and certification (North, 1991;1993a); 6) to establish a framework of reference which can describe achievement in a complex educational system in terms meaningful to all the different partners involved (Trim, 1978;Brindley, 1986;Richterich and Schneider, 1992;Council of Europe, 1996); 7) to enable comparison between systems or populations using a common metric or yardstick (Lowe, 1983;Liskin-Gasparro, 1984;Bachman and Savignon, 1986;Carroll, and West, 1989).…”

Section: Functionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scaling descriptors for language proficiency scales

North¹,

Schneider

1998

Language Testing

131

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This paper reports results from a Swiss National Science Research Council project which aimed to develop a scale of language proficiency in the form of a 'descriptor bank'. Up until now, most scales of language proficiency have been produced by appeal to intuition and to those scales which already exist rather than to theories of linguistic description or of measurement. The intention in this project was to use an item-banking methodology to develop a flexible scale of stand-alone criterion statements with known difficulty values.The project took place in two rounds: the first for English (1994), the second for French, German and English (1995). In each year pools of descriptors were produced by analysing available proficiency scales. Through workshops with representative teachers, the descriptors were then refined into stand-alone criterion statements considered to be clear, useful and relevant to the sectors concerned. Selected descriptors presented on questionnaires were then used by participating teachers to assess the proficiency of learners in their classes. This data was used to scale the descriptors using the Rasch rating scale model. The difficulty estimates for the descriptors produced in relation to English in 1994 proved remarkably stable in relation to French, German and English in 1995.

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The ILR Oral Interview: Origins, Applications, Pitfalls, and Implications

Cited by 21 publications

References 0 publications

Employers’ Views on Importance of English Proficiency and Communication Skill for Employability in Malaysia

Employers’ Views on Importance of English Proficiency and Communication Skill for Employability in Malaysia

Circumlocution, Communication Strategies, and The ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines: An Analysis of Student Discourse

Scaling descriptors for language proficiency scales

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