Washback Of Beijing NMET Open-ended Composition-A Study Of The Effect On Senior High School English Writing Instruction In Beijing

With its measurement-led system, testing impact is to be expected when a public language test is introduced or innovated. However, whether it hinders or promotes innovation needs to be examined empirically. In China, while the Ministry of Education conducts a nationwide NMET, Beijing has the privilege to design its own test paper. One of the prominent features of Beijing NMET is the Open-ended Composition that has been introduced since 2003 to emphasize promoting students' creative thinking. The purpose of this study is to investigate how senior high school English teachers in Beijing understand the impact of this innovated writing form and how they teach the Open-ended composition.A two-way method is employed in this research. The targets are 196 Beijing senior high school English teachers coming mainly from Xicheng, Fengtai and Yanqing District. The survey method (a quantitative method) along with group and individual interviews (a qualitative method) is used to collect data. Quantitative data is analyzed with the help of SPSS10.0 while qualitative data is interpreted by content analysis using a note-based technique and recording skill.The results of this study show that: (1) positive washback exists in the three steps of teaching writing: pre-class preparation, in-class teaching procedure and after-class writing assessment. While the effect of washback on after-class writing assessment do not appear distinct, the Open-ended Composition obviously affects teachers' pre-class preparation and in-class teaching procedure, which is believed to be associated with beneficial and positive washback; (2) the beneficial and positive washback reveals two crucial changes: one is a shift from the linguistic-based teaching toward the more communication-oriented teaching, and the other is that students' creative thinking is promoted when more attention is concentrated on the writing process; (3) teachers' insufficient understanding of the assessment criteria of the Open-ended Composition, students' English level, limited time for completing the writing task and pressure of the high-stakes test are the major factors impeding the positive washback.Based upon the findings, this study recommends that: (1) teachers should be provided with more extensive professional development opportunities; (2) teachers distribute more time in teaching writing, and the training process of students' writing be carried out throughout the academic periods in senior high schools; (3) that the Ministry of Education in China promulgate multiple schemes for senior high school graduates to enter universities so as to release teachers' pressure.