The Impact of the CEFR on Teaching and Assessing Romanian as a Second/Foreign Language. Practice and Research

Abstract

This chapter is divided into two main parts. In the first part, we discuss some of the main criticism that the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment (CEFR) has received over the years, such as native speaker reference, relationship with Second Language Acquisition research or empirical validation of the CEFR levels and descriptors, as well as some suggestions for further development. In the second part of the chapter, we will describe the way the document has been used (or misused) in the Romanian National Educational System and the consequences that the approach adopted has had on the way languages are learned and taught in Romanian state schools. We will then assess the influence of the CEFR on learning, teaching and assessing Romanian, in areas such as curriculum development, designing teaching and testing material and teacher training. We will describe the process of adopting the framework and adapting it to three contexts: teaching Romanian as a foreign language in higher education, teaching Romanian as a second language to national minorities and teaching Romanian as a native language. We will finally show how the CEFR has been used in order to create appropriate instruments for building a coherent system in distinct context, with different purposes, but unified by the same basic principles.