Assessment that incorporates a GE focus includes two areas:

• Classroom assessment

• Assessment via standardized tests

In either area, applying GE principles means the emphasis is on assessing successful cross-cultural communication, which could mean success in completing some kind of task or project, or it could mean developing rapport or deepening a sense of harmony and camaraderie in a relationship. It also involves development of a working repertoire of strategies that people can use when needed to effectively participate in interactions with a range of people from around the world.

Classroom Assessment of Student Development as GE Users

Assessment is usually used for one of two purposes: to evaluate what students know or can do at a specific point in time (often for assigning grades), or to provide information that informs teachers and students about what and how well students appear to be learning and encourages further development.  Both types of evaluation can be valuable in a GE-focused classroom, and they do not have to be mutually exclusive. For example, an evaluative assessment can also be used to reinforce instructional goals and guide students’ reflection about what to focus on for their future development.

A simple form of assessment when students are doing a communicative task is, “Did they accomplish the task?” This idea comes from Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT). TBLT recommends that, along with this simple assessment, teachers also try to notice areas of target-language ability that the learner needs to improve. From a GE perspective, this would not focus so much on English language ability but on aspects of being an effective GE user. This simple form of assessment could be expanded into a student self-assessment/reflection tool, with questions such as:

• Did you accomplish the task?    Yes   No

• How cooperatively did you work with your partner?        1     2     3     4     5

   (1=not cooperatively at all, 5=very cooperatively)

• How cooperative was your partner?                                1     2     3     4     5

   (1=not cooperative at all, 5=very cooperative)

• Did you enjoy talking with your partner?                          1     2     3     4     5

   (1=not at all, 5=very much)

• Did you and your partner have any difficulties understanding each other?  If so, what strategies did you use to solve this problem?

• What did you learn from this task that could help you to get better at communicating via Englishes?

This kind of assessment focuses on students as users of Global Englishes and helps them to realize that, when they are in user mode, what matters is accomplishing their communicative goals and enhancing their relationships. Initially, students may be quite surprised that they are not being graded on the accuracy of their grammar or their use of recently introduced vocabulary, but over time, they may feel liberated by this form of grading their communication.

Along with being users, however, our students are also learners.  From time to time, the class may introduce them to new vocabulary or grammatical structures (based on the instructional variety chosen for the learning context) that can be useful in communication. In these cases, a more traditional quiz may be an appropriate form of assessment. However, in keeping with a GE focus, it’s important to avoid fixating on accuracy and native-speaker norms. This can be accomplished by making sure these quizzes are not weighted heavily, and that emphasis is placed on the value of the vocabulary and structures for helping students expand their ability to communicate. 

Another way of looking at GE-influenced assessment is to revisit the characteristics of effective GE users:

GE-Influenced Assessment in Standardized Tests

Standardized tests play an important role in many societies, especially when decision makers do not have time or resources to gather and analyze detailed information about a large number of candidates. The primary purpose of standardized tests is to separate test takers as much as possible, as part of the information decision makers use to make choices and judgments that can have high stakes in the lives of the test takers. In the case of English, these stakes are often so high that the tests have a dominating influence on English language teaching and curriculum. 

What is the current state of standardized testing of English? Prevalent in standardized tests of English throughout the world is a focus on knowledge of English. Test takers are required to demonstrate knowledge of and accuracy in usage of English vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation, and their scores on these tests are based on an “idealized native-speaker” norm.

From a GE perspective, there are two concerns with this. The first is the focus on knowledge of English. From a GE point of view, we think about Englishes being used across the globe for purposes of communicating ideas and developing and enhancing personal and professional relationships, so it makes more sense to test peopleʻs ability to use Englishes for communication in global contexts rather than testing the accuracy of their knowledge of the vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation of one specific variety of English. 

The second concern is that standardized tests reflect the ideology of Native-Speakerism. “Correct” answers involve usage that matches exceptional native-speaker usage of a specific norm. The speakers used in the “listening” sections are usually all native speakers.  Samples of written and spoken language are typically carefully written according to native speaker norms. Thus, test takers are judged against a well-educated, highly proficient native-speaker standard. The result is that these tests reinforce and promote the alleged superiority of native varieties and the othering of L2 users and their Englishes.  

Progress toward testing that focuses on GE aims is happening. Advocates of GE, along with some testing experts, have suggested that there is a clear need for standardized tests that assess the skills and strategies involved in effective and cooperative communication in global contexts. Testing experts have also begun exploring the kinds of changes that would need to be made to develop tests of GE, such as the kinds of communicative tasks that could be used in tests, criteria for evaluating effective GE use, and ways of incorporating a wide range of users and uses of Englishes.

As English teachers, and as users of Englishes, perhaps the main thing we can do is to advocate for standardized tests that better reflect GE principles and values. What we would be advocating for is a major shift in what standardized tests should be assessing, moving away from focusing on knowledge of English based on a native-speaker norm and focusing instead on people’s ability to effectively use Englishes in global contexts. Standardized tests should also be using speakers with a wide range of accents and Englishes, reflecting the reality of users of Englishes worldwide (this includes tests that focus on academic English*; after all, university professors and instructors come from all over the world). 

It may take time to convince the people involved in developing standardized tests, as well as the policy-makers who influence how those tests are used, but we believe it’s time very well spent.

*  Some tests at the local level (see Nishizawa, 2023) have used speakers with a variety of accents, including second-language accents. 

The ideas presented in this section came from and were influenced by the following sources: Brown (2014), Caprario (2024), Funada et al (2020), Galloway & Rose (2015), Girardo (2020), Harding (2019), Harding (2022), Harding & McNamara (2017), Hu (2021), Jenkins (2020), Kang et al (2024), McKay & Brown (2016), Nishizawa (2023), Norris, J.M. (2016), Rose et al (2020), Savski & Prabjandee (2022). If you are interested in reading more, you can find them on our References & Links page.