A Framework For Summative Evaluation On Listening And Speaking Courseware Of Experiencing English

Along with the guidance of the new National College English Syllabus and the College English Curriculum Requirements, online courseware development in China has blossomed in recent years. These courseware usually claim to create interactive learning environment and enable learners to enhance their language skills in listening, speaking, reading, writing and translating. But teachers and students often find it difficult to determine which courseware is better. The evaluation on online courseware has not got enough attention yet, let alone the presenting of an evaluation framework."Listening & Speaking"courseware for Experiencing English published by Higher Education Press is chosen because of its wide use at colleges and universities.Based on the literature review of CALL, SLA theory, and the recent development of software evaluation, the author puts forward an evaluation framework for online courseware. A group of college students who have learned with the courseware are chosen to make judgments answering the questionnaire designed according to their own learning experience.The purpose of the evaluation and the interview among the students through a questionnaire is to present the strengths and limitations of the courseware and provide suggestions to the improvement of the redesign of the software courseware. Also it is hoped that this paper will offer some useful suggestions to language teachers so that they may appropriately make use of language learning software courseware and guide their students to choose suitable courseware. Finally, it is expected that this paper will be able to supply some useful suggestions to software developing companies and courseware designers.