Instructors' attitudes towards assessing speaking holistically and analytically

Abstract

The primary aim of this study is to find out language instructors’ attitudes towards holistic and analytic assessment of speaking. The secondary aim is to investigate whether the scores assigned by using holistic and analytic assessment tools differed or not. Finally, this study sets out to reveal whether the scores assigned by using holistic and analytic assessment tools differed or not according to instructors’ background. The research was conducted at the School of Foreign Languages, Erciyes University with twenty four language instructors between December 2014 and April 2015. An attitude questionnaire and holistic and analytic assessment tools were used to collect data. The findings showed that the instructors in this study had different attitudes towards holistic and analytic assessment of speaking, and their advantages and disadvantages for assessment. While instructors did not have a negative attitude towards analytic assessment of speaking, they displayed a more positive attitude towards holistic assessment. Also, as a whole, the speaking exam scores assigned by holistic and analytic assessment tools did not differ. Scores were found to differ only when instructors’ years of experience was considered for scores obtained by holistic assessment. For other variables examined, there scores did not statistically differ according to the background of the instructors. In the light of this study’s findings, it can be suggested that allowing instructors to choose between holistic and analytic assessment tools of their own preference may be considered for further educational purposes.