Predominantly performance-based in nature, which can be defined as requiring students to use high-level thinking to perform, create, or produce something with transferable real-world application . Using familiar terms, this would be assessment of learning or a type of summative assessment, and not restricted to internal assessments in the classroom, but also external standardized tests.
Increasingly, language assessment has seen a shift in focus from mastery of grammatical concepts on a metalinguistic level, to the ability to use language in practical ways.
Designing assessments that faithfully emulate "real-world" situations is an ongoing challenge and point of contention in assessment design. Furthermore, the more traditional grammar questions are still considered necessary components to assessing language proficiency.
Further complicating factors include ensuring the aforementioned principles of validity, reliability, and competence vs. performance. In the context of ELL specifically (although the same would hold true of SLA in general), the matter of accounting for different language and cultural backgrounds presents another conundrum.
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