The Washback Effect of TEFL University Entrance Exam on Academic Behavior of Students and Professors
By Maleeheh Mousavi, Payamenour University & Mehrdad Amiri, Iranian Architectural Center
Abstract
The present study was an attempt to investigate the washback effect of the Knowledge test of TEFL MA University Entrance Exam on students and professors. This section of TEFL MA UEE consists of three parts. They are related to the three areas of Linguistics, Testing, and Methodology. To this end, an observation checklist and two questionnaires, one for professors and the other one for the students based on the underlying theories of washback were developed. The questionnaires were answered by 32 professors and 210 students, in addition, 13 Linguistics, Testing, and Methodology classes were observed. Finally, to find the answers to research questions, the Chi -square test and frequency analysis were performed through SPSS. The result indicated that TEFl MA UEE has weak washback on students and professors academic behavior.
1. Introduction
One of the issues which has attracted the attention of not only testers in the general education, but also language testers is the “effect of the test on teachers, students, and their classroom behaviors” (Alderson& Wal,1993. Hughes,1989) which is called backwash. Scholars like Alderson, Wall, Watanabe, Davis and … have worked on this phenomenon and investigated it from different perspectives ‘psychologically’ and ‘educationally’ since 1990’s.
Wantannabe (nd) has also found that “backwash is not a monolithic phenomenon and different factors such as the stake of test and the use of the tests’ score mediates the effect of it.
It should be, moreover mentioned that the intensity of the backwash of the tests depends on the social and educational use of the tests’ score. Cheng (1998) clarifies this issue by suggesting that the intensity of the washback may be a function of how high or low the stakes of the test are. That is, if the test is a low stake one, it will have a weak washback, and in case of being a high stake test, it will have a strong washback. Luxia (2005) also states that there is a general consensus that high stake tests produce strong washback. Bachman and Palmer (1996) defined high-stake decisions as “those decisions that are likely to have a major impact on the lives of large numbers of individuals, or on large programs”. Since high stake tests are employed to make important decisions all over the world, researchers have conducted several researches in order to determine the backwash effect of these tests; Meanwhile, Studies on backwash and it’s consequences have recorded a poor score in Iran, a country with a centralized educational system in which almost all youngsters at various levels are highly influenced by the effects of high stake tests. The only available research carried out on high stake tests in Iran backs to 2005 by Nikoopour who has investigated the washback effect of State and Azad University English major test on Iranian EFL candidates and high school EFL teachers. Not only did he consider the washback effect of NDEMT, but also he took into account the content and the form of NDEMT. Nikoopour has finally reported some 7 positive and 15 negative washback of NDEMT. The significant negative washback effects reported could be taken into account by the Iranian Ministry of Education in order to revise the test and bring about positive washback, the very point which has been almost totally neglected by the authorities.
Hence, the washback effect of Azad University TEFL MA UEE was investigated as a step in this direction in the present study.
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