The Practice of Language Assessment

[First paragraph] Language teachers and applied linguists are constantly engaged with language testing and assessment. Whether informal or formal, assessment procedures are designed to collect evidence for decision making. In low-stakes classroom contexts the evidence is used to provide formative feedback to learners (Rea-Dickins, 2006), scaffold learning (Lantolf, 2009), evaluate the quality and pace of learning, inform pedagogy, and feed into curriculum design (Shepard, 2000; Hill, 2012). In high-stakes contexts identifiable ‘test events’ produce scores that are used to make life changing decisions about the future of learners (Kunnan, 2013). In research, tests are used to generate data that are used to address questions regarding second language acquisition (Chapelle, 1994).