DESIGNING COMPLEX LSP TASKS FOR ASSESSMENT PURPOSES

Abstract

When integrating task-based learning into LSP courses, assessment procedures have to reflect the communicative goals of such tasks. However, performances on authentic and complex tasks are often difficult to score, because they involve not only specific language ability but also field specific knowledge. Moreover, the emphasis of tasks on meaning suggests that the communicative outcome should be regarded as the main criterion of success. This paper focuses on task design and scoring. It is argued that tasks have to be adapted to assessment purposes. However, to avoid a misalignment between teaching/learning and assessment, they should comprise the main features of LSP tasks in the sense of task-based language learning.