A Study Of The Washback Effect Of The Senior High School Entrance Oral English Testing On Junior High School English Teaching And Learning

Washback or backwash,also known as measurement-driven instruction,refers to the influence of testing on teaching and learning(Liu&Gu,2013).The influence of testing,positive and negative,is significant.If it is for a big test,the preparation for it can even dominate the entire teaching and learning activities(Hughes,1989).Therefore,HSEE has a huge impact on middle school teachers and students.The High School Entrance Examination(HSEE)is known for its broad scale and high standard,which serves as the tool for final assessment in middle school and high school student admission and also one of the key evaluation criteria for teaching quality of a certain school.However,the existed Washback effect studies mainly focus on tests like IELTS,TOFEL,CET-4,CET-6 and College Entrance Examination.Few of them concerned about the washback of High School Entrance Examination conducted.Therefore,the author initiates a study on the washback effects of Changsha HSEE Oral test Since 2015,an oral English test has been added to HSEE as a part of it in the form of "human-computer conversation".Students' performance is machine-graded.The grade will be included in students' overall quality evaluation score,which,of course,brings influence on middle school English education.This paper thus aims to discuss the following 3 questions:1.How does the washback of HSEE Oral Test affect teaching?2.How does it affect learning?3.Is it positive washback effect of negative washback effect?With this objective,the author conducted a survey on 15 English teachers and 261 students in Changsha Zhounan Experimental Middle School.An in-depth study was carried out on the washback of HSEE Oral Test via classroom observation,questionnaire and interview.The first chapter is an introduction to the background,meaning and structure of this paper.Chapter Two,the literature review,goes through previous studies on the washback effect.Chapter Three raises the question the paper aims to solve,identifies the subject of the study,and clarifies the tools used in the study and the process of it.The fourth chapter collects data through classroom observation,questionnaire and interview,and does an analysis on them.Chapter Five is an overall review and summary of the study.It is found that:1.There is washback of HSEE Oral Test on oral English teaching at middle school level.From the perspective of teaching,washback influences the teaching content,teaching methodology of teaches,teachers' attitude towards teaching.The degree and type of washback varies from teacher to teacher.From the perspective of students,washback influences the learning content,learning method,students' learning attitude.The degree and type of washback,too,varies from students to students.2.Washback is complex in that it has both positive impacts on teaching and learning,such as it attaches importance to oral English teaching and learning,and negative impact like exam-oriented education.Overall,the positive impact outweighs the negative one.Based on the study,this paper offers advices to HSEE Oral Test in Changsha from 2 perspectives.The first is from teaching and learning's perspective,which includes three aspects,teachers,schools and students.For teachers,traditional teaching methodology should be updated with new and scientific one;the teaching model should be revised.Teachers are expected to keep learning and enhance their own teaching proficiency.In addition,teachers should know how to utilize information technology and expand teaching from classroom only to a wider scale.For schools,schools should encourage teachers to start teaching research;open oral English course taught by native speakers.For students,they are supposed to put efforts in oral English learning;develop the ability of self-study and improve the way of oral English learning.The second perspective is from Oral Test.A certain proportional review is suggested to carry out after the Oral Test.Moreover,the Oral English evaluation system should be completed with formative assessment added to it,which helps to assessment students from a fair and objective view.