Hi Doug,
I glad to see the CASLL listserv is producing some results.
I don't have a bibliography, Doug, but the first person I'd ask
would be Ed White (at a university in California last I heard), who used to
be the expert (wrote a book on the subject). Also CCC used to have a task
force on testing, which I once chaired. If it still exists, it would be a
good place to ask.
I believe some references (also now ancient) were attached to a
brief piece on testing I wrote for Inkshed, with the intention of provoking
some discussion (but I can't remember if it did). "Literacy Testing: Some
Provisional Principles." Inkshed 5.3 (1986): 2-3. See also: "The Politics
of Testing." Resources in Education ERIC ED #188 236 (March 1980).
>X-MailScanner-From: [log in to unmask]
>Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2004 14:40:29 -0700
>Reply-To: CASLL/Inkshed <[log in to unmask]>
>Sender: CASLL/Inkshed <[log in to unmask]>
>From: Doug Brent <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Literature on competence tests
>
>A bit of a plea for help here.
>
>I keep looking for literature that addresses the larger philosophical
>and pedagogical issues surrounding mass writing competence testing. I
>find that most of the literature seems to be written by people who more
>or less approve of competence testing and want to discuss how it can be
>improved or to share war stories. There seems to be a fairly large camp
>of sentiment that suggests that the entire enterprise of mass competence
>testing is flawed for a number of reasons,. the most common being that
>it fails to take account of what most of us believe about writing being
>centred in discourse communities, recursive, social, messy, and all
>those things that no "competence test" can by its nature measure. But
>as far as I can see (after searching ERIC, COMPILE, etc), most of this
>material is "anecdotal," ie. argued on listserves like CASLL but seldom
>shared in peer-reviewed papers. The people who have serious doubts
>about competence testing seem to keep it to themselves, working against
>these tests at home when they can but seldom writing seriously about
>their misgivings, perhaps because they aren't interested in writing
>about something they don't believe in.
>
>Or do they? It seems to me that there was a thread on CASLL a long
>while ago that was originated by the McGill crowd when they were trying
>to fend off competence testing. Anthony, I think it was, asked whether
>anyone had any literature on the subject that they could share. I don't
>remember if any emerged, though plenty of discussion ensued.
>
>Now I'd like to ask again. Does anyone have any references to published
>work on the larger issue of whether we should test (not just how we
>should test)? I'm particularly interested in the uneasy relationship
>between competence testing and WAC, a subject which (not
>co-incidentally) I want to address for my presentation at the CCCC
>Canadian Caucus. (OK, you're right, I'm trying to shore up my anecdotal
>resentation with a little more reference to published literature.)
>
>Thanks!
>
>Doug
>
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To leave the list, send a SIGNOFF CASLL command to
[log in to unmask] or, if you experience difficulties,
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For the list archives and information about the organization,
its newsletter, and the annual conference, go to
http://www.stu.ca/inkshed/
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