An Empirical Study on the Validity of English Spot Dictation Test
Dictation is a long-standing and widely used test in assessing listening abilities.Among its variations,spot dictation stands out due to its better practicality and higher scorer reliability.The present researcher conducted a validation study on this test format through two separate experiments engaging 166 first-year non-English-major participants from a prestigious 985 university in China.The statistical results show that the context of the spot dicta-tion-whether with relevant context,zero context,or irrelevant context-does not notably facilitate or interfere with overall test performance.Moreover,there was no significant high correlation observed between the scores obtained in the spot dictation and those from the multiple-choice comprehension test based on the same auditory material.This suggests that spot dictation predominantly assesses basic language micro skills rather than effectively measuring the comprehension of the basic content,a critical component in any listening assessment framework of the construct.Consequently,to achieve a more holistic and accurate measurement of the students'listening comprehension ability,educators are encouraged to combine the spot dictation test with a diverse array of listening tests targeting different levels of listening skills.By doing so,they will gain a more comprehensive and accurate insight into their students'listening abilities,enabling them to provide tailored guidance for their further improvement.
English listening testspot dictationcomprehension abilityvalidity
NETL
NSTL
万方数据
