[Bestplus] oops, disregard last message

[Iris Broudy]

I forgot to include my e-mail to Lynda.  So sorry.  Here it is, along with my last message to you. .


    Hi everybody,

    I've now done 10 practice tests, and some issues have come up for me in the scoring and administration of the test.  I just sent a message to Lynda Terrill, and I thought it might be useful to share these questions with all of you.  If you've had similar experiences or have any input, it would certainly be helpful for me.  I also can pass on Lynda's comments when I receive her response. 

    Take care.

    Iris Broudy
    Hampden County Sheriff's Dept.



    Hi Lynda,

    I spoke with you the other day about what seemed to be too high a score for my second practice test.  I've now done 10 tests, and overall the scores seem appropriate, although one more did seem a bit high.  So I'm looking at my use of the rubric.  One problem that keeps coming up:  If a student gives a brief answer--maybe just two sentences, but one sentence is complex, with a subordinate clause or imbedded clause, what should the score be?  A 3 requires a "string of sentences," correct?  Can a 2 be just one "well-formed" sentence,  so long as it's not just a S-V-O structure (with "if", "because" or the like) and provides detail beyond the minimum?  I keep looking at the rubric, but it's not always easy to make a call.  

    One other thing that has cropped up:  I encountered a student who likes to talk and tends to go off on tangents.  He seemed to understand the initial questions (the higher level questions) and would answer them, then would produce a lot more language, but off-topic.  Eventually I realized that I had to be more aggressive in cutting him off politely.  (The test lasted for 24 minutes.)  But what about the scoring?  If he goes off-topic, should that be a 1 on listening comprehension?  At the training it was clear that we should score language complexity on what we get, so even though he was talking about other (though related) topics, I gave him 3's where appropriate.  He spoke so much at times that a 4 could be considered, but because of lack of cohesion and organization, a 4 would not apply. 

    Yesterday I tested a young woman who was so concerned about forming perfect sentences (she's Dominican but reminds me of Japanese students I've had in the past!) that the testing process was very slow.  (24 minutes for SPL 6)  I told her in advance not to worry about grammar, just have a conversation with me, but it didn't make much difference.  Do you have any suggestions for how to handle such a situation?  I didn't want to cut her off when she was trying so hard to express her ideas with correct structures.  (If I saw that she was lacking the vocabulary she needed, then I would say, "That's okay," and go on.)  Should there be a concern about timing for the test, other than program limitations?  

    I can see how important this practice phase is in the TOT process.  I expect such questions will come up when I'm giving trainings, and I'd like to be comfortable answering as much as possible. 

    I'm working on getting e-mail at work, but for now I have to communicate from home, which means I can't get any responses until evening.  If you want to get back to me on Monday, you could use the e-mail address of our education manager, Andree Duval, who will pass your message on to me.  Her address is:
    andree.duval at sdh.state.ma.us
  Thanks for your patience with my learning process.  

  Regards,

  Iris Broudy
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