TSL 3112: Language Assessment - TUTORIAL WEEK 1 –

Examine the contributing factors to the changing trends of language assessment.

The Ministry of Education aims to develop students who are operationally

proficient in Bahasa Malaysia and English language.

Compared to Bahasa Malaysia, Malaysian students’ performance in English

language is weaker. Only 28% of students achieve at least a credit

benchmarked to Cambridge 1119 in English language SPM.

Performance in English language also varies by ethnicity, all three major

ethnic groups fall significantly a short of the target 70% proficiency target.

Lower students’ performance in English language appears to be driven by low

proficiency among the English language teachers. When a sample of over

7500 English language teachers took CPT, a significant number did not meet

the minimum proficiency standard required for teaching English language.

There is also a mismatch between subjects that teachers were trained to

teach and the subjects they end up teaching.

Approximately, 30% of the English language teachers were not originally

trained to teach English, while approximately 3600 that were trained to teach

English language are teaching other subjects.

Source:

Education Blueprint. (2013). Ministry of Education: Kuala Lumpur.