Assessing intercultural competence: a framework for systematic test development in foreign language education and beyond
- 1 March 2004
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Informa UK Limited in Intercultural Education
- Vol. 15 (1), 73-89
- https://doi.org/10.1080/1467598042000190004
Abstract
The importance of intercultural competence is being increasingly recognized by educators and employers alike. Both in the professional and educational domain, ways are being sought to assess whether or not people have actually acquired intercultural competence. In this paper, a framework is presented for the systematic development of assessment tools. The paper first addresses the question of why the assessment of intercultural competence is important. Secondly, basic definitions and foundations regarding intercultural competence are outlined, and the implications for the assessment of intercultural competence are discussed. Thirdly, a framework for the assessment of test quality is presented, and a number of criteria that affect the quality of tools for assessing intercultural competence are discussed. Finally, the framework is applied to two existing approaches to the assessment of intercultural competence commonly used in foreign language education.Keywords
This publication has 4 references indexed in Scilit:
- Autonomous Learning and the Acquisition of Intercultural Communicative Competence: Some Implications for Course DevelopmentLanguage, Culture and Curriculum, 2002
- TESOL and CultureTESOL Quarterly, 1999
- Alternatives in Assessment of Achievements, Learning Processes and Prior KnowledgePublished by Springer Science and Business Media LLC ,1996
- Assessing Culture Learning: Issues and SuggestionsThe Canadian Modern Language Review / La revue canadienne des langues vivantes, 1992