6 Assessing productive and interactive skills Personal refl ection

 Part 
II
There is one overall scale that covers all 12 grades and identifi es 
the behavioural ‘communicative skills’ identifi ed with each. For 
example, at the lowest level (Grade 1) these include ‘Give very short 
answers to simple questions and requests for information.’ At Grade 
12, among a much wider range of skills, the assessee will ‘initiate the 
discussion and actively seek ways in which to engage the examiner in 
a meaningful exchange of ideas and opinions’. However, assessees at 
both levels are rated against the same more ability-focused four-band 
scale. At Band B, for example, ‘the candidate’s contributions are 
generally effective, comprehensible, appropriate and adequately fulfi l 
the task’, but at D, contributions ‘are very limited, lack comprehen-
sibility and appropriacy and, although there is some attempt at the 
task, this is not fulfi lled, even with support’ (Trinity College, London, 
2010). 
In the metaphor of the high jump suggested by Pollitt (1991), the 
grade of the examination contributes to the interpretation of each 
score. The task ‘bar’ is set at a level appropriate to the target level of 
the test and the interpretation of the scale is adjusted accordingly. Just 
as it would mean something very different to say that an athlete has 
‘comfortably’ cleared the bar at 1.5 metres (not enough to win a school 
competition) or ‘comfortably’ cleared it at 2.5 metres (a new world 
record), so, because of the greater task diffi culty and increased 
expectations, a Band B at Grade 6 is not the same as a B at Grade 9, 
even though the wording of the rating scale is the same. 
Nested systems are popular in schools, where expectations may 
be lower when students are in their third year than when they are in 
their fi fth, but the same grading system operates across years. 
However, nested scales may convey a dispiriting message to learners 
who improve their language skills as they progress through the 
school, but fi nd that they drop from an A to a B or C grade. Such 
results are diffi cult to interpret for feedback purposes as they 
provide relatively little information on what exactly learners could 
do to improve.