Plurilingual Assessment

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What is plurilingual assessment? 🧠

Plurilingual assessment does not involve assessing language skills in one language only, but how language learners address linguistic diversity and flexibility using the languages in their repertoire and communication with people from different backgrounds. Below, we show a few resources and how to use them, step-by-step.

  1. First, to know more about plurilingual assessment and to see an example of how it can be done in a language program, please watch this video (you can start from the beginning but pay close attention to 15:07 minutes onwards).
  2. Second, after watching the video, look at 6 example language tasks/exams that assess students’ plurilingualism using specific CEFR descriptors in this document Assessing Plurilingualism – An Example from practice.

Pay close attention to how the tasks drew from CEFR descriptors for its design and/or implementation.

You may want to choose one or two tasks from this handout to imagine possibilities for the creation of plurilingual assessments in your language class.

  1. Review the discussion questions on p. 27 of the presentation slides. Considering the task(s) you chose from step 2 above, answer these discussion questions to further inform how you can or may want to adapt these tasks for your context.

How can you adapt them, in part or as a whole, in your classroom? Note down how you will do so, including key changes, if any, that you will make to have the sample task(s) fit your context.

If you need to know more information, you may want to do an extended exploration by doing the background reading to (re)activate your knowledge regarding plurilingual assessment, particularly for oral exams, prior to reviewing and adapting the sample tasks for your context.

To hear other teachers’ thoughts on the discussion questions on p. 27 of the slides, watch this discussion video.

  1. Further Reflection: you may want to reflect on your own context by answering these questions:

What are some key potential challenges (e.g., related to feasibility, appropriateness, policy, etc.) that may prevent you from using or adapting these sample plurilingual oral tasks/assessments in your classroom?

How might you be able to address such potential challenges?

Aside from high-stakes oral exams, what other plurilingual assessments can you design/adapt and implement in your classroom for low-stakes and/or formative assessments that align with CEFR descriptors?

Note: All of the resources above were taken from the webpage Assessing plurilingualism: An example from practice

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