Assessment in Language, Reading and Writing Difficulties and Remedial Teaching

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Assessing language as ability

Language assessment should check what children can do with language, not how much they have memorised. Questions on a lesson already taught often test memory; unseen passages, open-ended questions, and tasks such as writing a message or describing a picture test real ability. Assessment should cover all four skills and be continuous, because a single written examination cannot show listening and speaking. It should improve learning: assessment for learning (formative), assessment as learning (self-assessment and reflection) and assessment of learning (summative).

Assessing the four skills

Listening is assessed through following instructions, answering questions on a story read aloud, listen-and-draw tasks and dictation. Speaking is assessed by observing children during show-and-tell, role play, discussion and storytelling, with checklists or rubrics for fluency, pronunciation, vocabulary, content and confidence. Reading is assessed through reading aloud for fluency, running records (Marie Clay) of the errors a child makes while reading, retelling, comprehension questions at the literal, inferential and evaluative levels, and cloze tests, in which words are deleted from a passage at regular intervals (Wilson Taylor, 1953). Writing is assessed through portfolios of drafts and finished pieces, using rubrics for content, organisation, vocabulary and mechanics. Other tools are anecdotal records, rating scales, self-assessment and peer assessment.

CCE in language

Section 29(2)(h) of the RTE Act 2009 requires comprehensive and continuous evaluation (CCE) of the child's understanding of knowledge and ability to apply it. Continuous means assessment is part of everyday teaching, not only at the end of a term; comprehensive means it covers all aspects of learning, including oral skills, reading habits and attitudes, not only written answers. Formative assessment during learning gives feedback to improve it; summative assessment judges achievement at the end. NEP 2020 calls for a shift from rote-based summative testing to regular, formative, competency-based assessment and a holistic, 360-degree progress card that includes self-assessment and peer assessment.

Errors and mistakes

S. Pit Corder (1967) argued that learners' errors are significant because they reveal the system the learner is building. An error comes from a gap in knowledge and is systematic: the learner repeats it and cannot correct it even when it is pointed out. A mistake is a slip in performance, from tiredness or haste, which the learner can correct herself. Errors are interlingual when they come from the mother tongue, such as a Bengali speaker saying मेरा किताब for मेरी किताब because Bengali has no grammatical gender, and intralingual when they come from the new language itself, such as over-generalised forms like goed and childs. Error analysis tells the teacher what to teach next.

Diagnosing reading and writing difficulties

Diagnostic assessment looks for the specific cause of a difficulty. Signs of reading difficulty include slow, word-by-word reading, guessing words from the first letter, confusing similar letters such as b and d or घ and ध, losing the place, and poor recall of what was read. Miscue analysis, developed by Kenneth Goodman, studies the kinds of departures from the text a reader makes. Signs of writing difficulty include illegible handwriting, uneven spacing and size, frequent reversals and spelling far below the child's reading level. Dyslexia (difficulty in reading), dysgraphia (in writing) and developmental aphasia (in language) are among the specific learning disabilities listed in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016; they are not signs of low intelligence and need early identification and specialist support.

Remedial teaching

Remedial teaching follows diagnosis and targets the specific difficulty, usually in small groups or one to one; it is not repeating the same lesson louder and slower. It may include phonological awareness and phonics practice, multisensory techniques such as tracing letters in sand while saying the sound (the VAKT approach of visual, auditory, kinaesthetic and tactile learning, associated with Grace Fernald), graded readers, paired reading with a classmate, extra time and plenty of encouragement. The cycle is identify, diagnose, plan, teach and reassess. Children who have already mastered a skill get enrichment activities.

The language of a diverse classroom

Indian classrooms include children with different home languages and dialects, first-generation learners, migrant children and children with disabilities. William Labov showed that non-standard dialects are as logical and rule-governed as the standard one, so a child's speech is a difference, not a deficit. The teacher welcomes home languages, accepts answers in the home language in the early grades while building the school language, uses bilingual materials, forms mixed groups so that children help one another, and avoids labelling or comparing children. In CTET terms, the best response to a child who struggles is to find out why and adapt the teaching, not to blame the child or the family.

Key facts

Assess language as ability: unseen passages, open-ended questions and real tasks, not recall of a lesson already taught.
Listening: following instructions, questions on a story, dictation; speaking: observation with checklists and rubrics during role play and discussion.
Reading assessment: running records (Marie Clay), miscue analysis (Kenneth Goodman), cloze tests (Wilson Taylor, 1953), comprehension at three levels.
RTE Act 2009, Section 29(2)(h): comprehensive and continuous evaluation (CCE); NEP 2020: formative, competency-based assessment and a 360-degree progress card.
Error (Corder, 1967): systematic, from a gap in knowledge, not self-corrected; mistake: a performance slip the learner can correct herself.
Interlingual error: from the mother tongue (मेरा किताब from a Bengali speaker); intralingual error: from the new language (goed, childs).
Specific learning disabilities in the RPwD Act 2016 include dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, dyspraxia and developmental aphasia.
Remedial cycle: identify, diagnose, plan, teach, reassess; small groups, multisensory VAKT (Grace Fernald), graded readers, peer support.
Labov: non-standard dialects are logical and rule-governed; a dialect is a difference, not a deficit; build the school language on the home language.

Quick revision

Assess ability not memory: unseen passages, open tasks; all four skills; for, as and of learning; running records (Clay), miscue analysis (Goodman), cloze (Taylor 1953), rubrics, portfolios; RTE Section 29(2)(h): CCE; NEP 2020: 360-degree progress card; Corder 1967: error (systematic) vs mistake (slip); interlingual vs intralingual; dyslexia, dysgraphia (RPwD Act 2016); remedial: diagnose first, multisensory VAKT (Fernald); Labov: difference not deficit.

Practise this topic

All 8 lessons on Language Pedagogy (Language I and Language II)