How do learners feel?

I studied French at school, and I remember preparing for regular grammar and spelling tests that the teachers had. In this video, you’ll listen to teachers talking about the types of assessment that they did, when they were learning a language. OK, so, it was very, very time ago. I was required to translate, for example, the English passage into Indonesian text or vice versa. And then, for example, I had to rearrange the jumbled words into a good sentence, for example. Yeah, things like that.

At the time, I found it really boring. Because the teachers didn’t assess our listening or speaking abilities, so it was more on reading and writing. Oh long time ago. Well mainly for us, it was just like you be studying from January until June. That is the only time get assessed. And you find that many students would fail. Because there was no– like that kind of continuous assessment, or formal or informal assessment to see that really you– the teachers are actually– you’re on the same par with them, that they’re taking you along as the learning, OK.

So it was also I would say, a bit depressing, I would say, in the sense that you only had to fill in the missing word, you only had to paraphrase what was there, you only had to say it’s true or false. There was no what we have now, the [INAUDIBLE] of this day, where you come up with your own understanding of what is given to you, of a passage for instance, and show your creativity, and all that your point of views is.

Primary exams, speaking exams, interview for 2, 3 minutes. And also presentations– where we were given topics, and we prepared for it and then we present among others.

Maybe unfair, because those teachers who followed only one final examination paper, they disregarded the work we do through the terms. Maybe, just a student have a bad day and can’t do well on that specific day. So it’s not fair. That was very traditional, very … Now, it is out of date, because it emphasised on memorisation, though we were learning the language. But, it only assessed memorisation. Only assessed two of the four skills– like reading and writing– but both are from memorisation. Like we were asked to answer the questions, we were … which we were taught previously from reading comprehension. And we were asked to write essays from memorisation.

So actually, those assessments didn’t judge our writing capacity or reading comprehension, the reading skill. And the listening and speaking was never assessed, never practised, and never assessed in the classroom. So, that was very backdated. But, now as a teacher, I am trying to change the practice.

We’d like you think back to when you were learning a language. Perhaps, when you were at school, or perhaps when you studied a language later in life. What types of assessment did your teachers use? How did you feel about them? And how do you think your learners feel about being assessed?