A Study On Language Assessment Literacy Of Middle School English Teachers In Chongqing Based On Structural Equation Modeling

Assessing the performance of students is one of the most imperative content of teachers' job,and language assessment literacy(henceforth,LAL)plays an essential role in the process of English teachers' professional development and students' learning.It was not until 2009 that LAL began to arouse scholars' research attention.However,in China,few studies have been done to investigate middle school English teachers' LAL and its related influencing factors.Therefore,this study aims to investigate the general condition of middle school English teachers' LAL in Chongqing and its relations with teachers' background information(education degree,teaching experience,English proficiency,school type,school location and class size),as well as the relations among LAL,LAL training experience and LAL attitude.A questionnaire survey was conducted in which 227 middle school English teachers in Chongqing were selected as subjects,followed by an interview protocol for underlying reasons.Software SPSS and AMOS were adopted for quantitative data analysis.Findings indicate that the general condition of middle school English teachers' LAL is underdeveloped,and significant differences are found on teaching experience and English proficiency.Additionally,LAL training experience has a positive effect on LAL while LAL attitude affects LAL negatively.LAL training experience and LAL attitude have a mutual effect,and LAL attitude can affect LAL positively via LAL training experience.This study enriches empirical researches on middle school English teachers in the field of LAL,and proposes some implications for promoting English teachers' LAL.In addition,an example of the application of structural equation modeling with the tool of AMOS is set in the applied linguistics research.