Investigating IELTS exit score gains in higher...

1

Investigating IELTS exit score

gains in higher education

Kieran O’Loughlin

Sophie Arkoudis

The study

Study of international students’ language proficiency development over the course of higher education

A large faculty of Economics and Commerce

Commissioned by IELTS Australia.

Australian International Education Conference 2009 www.aiec.idp.com

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Data collection (2006/7)

Institutional policy about English language

entry requirements

Staff interviews, disciplinary and TLU staff (6)

Pre and post official IELTS tests,

questionnaires and interviews with 30 UG

and 33 PG students from 11 countries

Theoretical Framing

Positioning theory

Rights and responsibilities within institutional

practices

Positioning and repositioning explores the

extent to which participants’ actions are

maintained and constrained by the

institutional practices of the university (Harré

et al, 2009).


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Types of positioning

First order positioning

Self-positioning

Other positioning

Repositioning

University positioning of

students (2006)

Minimum English Language entry requirements

set for entry so that:

If met then the students positioned as essentially

ready to successfully complete their higher education

studies without further English language study.

If students encountered English language difficulties

then there were support mechanisms.


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Staff positions

Three discipline specialist and three

academic support staff.

Other positioned ESL international

students as English learners still developing

their skills as opposed to “expert users” of

the language.

Other positioned students as responsible for

developing their English skills during their course,

both for study and future employment.

Staff positions

“… we certainly shouldn’t be thinking of ourselves as an English improvement service for international students.”

The disciplinary staff believed that:

students’ language development (both

academic and social) was primarily their own

responsibility.

the university provides adequate academic and

social support services for the students to access

if they are sufficiently motivated.


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Staff positions

The academic support staff self positioned

themselves as much more responsible for

developing students’ language skills but that

disciplinary specialists did not really support their

efforts in this domain:

“…it’s really left up to the students to find out on

their own, no-one strongly encourages them from

people who they see as being the leaders in the

disciplinary teaching.”

IELTS test

Four separate tests in Listening, Reading,

Writing and Speaking. In the Academic Module Reading

and Writing have more academic focus.

Results reported for each skill and overall

on scale from 0-9.

Listening, Reading and Overall scores reported in

increments of 0.5.

Writing and Speaking in increments of 1.0 (now in

increments of 0.5).


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Students: a) test scores

The greatest average improvement was in Listening and Reading, and the least average improvement was in Writing.

Improvements on Listening, Reading and Writing (but not Speaking) were significantly correlated.

Students with lower results in Listening, Reading and Writing tended to improve significantly more than students with higher results in those areas.

Undergraduate students improved more than postgraduate students.


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Students: b) case studies

Selected six case studies to investigate in further detail the statistical findings:

1. UG with strong overall gain (“Charmaine”)

2. PG with strong overall gain (“Carlos”)

3. UG with no overall gain (“Daisy”)

4. PG with no overall gain (“Truc”)

5. Student with overall gain, in particular more improvement in S than LRW (“Dian”)

6. Student with overall gain, in particular more improvement in LRW than S (“Ollie”)


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High Speaking

Improvement

Low Speaking

Improvement

Low LRW Improvement High LRW Improvement

Charmaine and Carlos

Daisy and Truc

Dian

Ollie

Charmaine - UG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 6.5 6.5 5.0 6.0 6.0

Test 2 8.0 7.5 7.0 8.0 7.5


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Charmaine’s positioning

Self positioned as having stronger academic skills than social skills at the start of her course

Also self positioned as a learner of English

Exercised high level of agency

Repositioned as stronger in social than academic skills by the end of her course

Carlos - PG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 5.5 7.5 7.0 7.0 7.0

Test 2 8.0 7.5 8.0 8.0 8.0


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Carlos’ positioning

Self positioned as developing both his social and academic language skills at the start of his course

Exercised high level of agency

Repositioned as developing speaking skills outside of university and LWR skills through University study during his course

Daisy - UG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 6.5 7.0 7.0 6.0 6.5

Test 2 7.5 7.0 5.0 6.0 6.5


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Daisy’s positioning

Self positioned as a learner of both academic

and social English at the start of her studies

Agency limited by her personality- not a risk

taker and opportunities to improve her English

were not readily available to her

Repositioned as passive acquirer of English

Truc - PG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 6.5 7.0 7.0 6.0 6.5

Test 2 7.5 7.0 5.0 6.0 6.5


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Truc’s positioning

Self positioned as having good ELP to cope

with her studies because of her Test 1 IELTS

results.

Also self positioned as a learner of social and

not academic language.

Repositioned as someone who used her

agency to seek social opportunities to develop

her ELP, but that these were limited and did not

lead to improvement.

Dian - PG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 8.0 6.0 6.0 6.0 6.5

Test 2 8.0 6.5 6.0 7.0 7.0


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Dian’s positioning

Self positioned as having strong ELP to begin his university study

Strong agency in developing spoken language

Weaker agency for developing academic language

Repositioned as having weak academic skills and strong social skills

Ollie - PG

L R W S Overall

Test 1 6.5 6.5 6.0 7.0 6.5

Test 2 9.0 7.5 7.0 7.0 7.5


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Ollie’s positioning

Self positioned as an academic language

learner at the start

Exercised strong agency in seeking assistance

from the teaching and learning unit

Limited agency for developing social language

Maintained positioning as an academic

language learner

Students’ overall positioning

All self positioned as language learners

But differences in the type of language

they chose to develop

Their ongoing positions were shaped by

both their choices, their agency and their

opportunities within and outside the

university


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Conclusions

The University other positions ESL international students as essentially ready to undertake tertiary studies

Unlike the University, staff and international students position all students as English language learners.

But there is little agreement about whose responsibility it is to develop their proficiency.

This illustrate the stalemate around comprehensive action on English development in higher education.

The students’ narratives demonstrate that ELP development is not predictable or linear

Students agency and opportunities for them to develop are variable

Conclusions

ELP development should be more closely aligned with curriculum teaching and learning

There appears to be a close connection between academic and social language development, which only the students appear to recognise

University needs to foster both curricula and co-curricula activities

Demonstrating improvement is important for employment and communication in the globalised world


Investigating IELTS exit score gains in higher...

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