ASSESSING READING

Types (genres) of reading

1. Academic reading

Text reading that relates to the world of education. This type of reading usually consists of formal
readings such as; thesis, papers, headlines, dictionaries, newspapers, etc.

2. Job-related reading

Reading texts related to job-work. This type of reading is the type of reading used in the world of work.
For example, electronic mail, financial documents, agendas, announcements, etc.

3. Personal reading

Privacy-related reading texts. This type of reading is usually used for personal functions. For example,
reading in the form of literary works, personal documents, invitations to greeting cards, recipes, etc.

Microskills, macroskills, and strategies for reading

1. Microskills

The ability to recognize things that are more specific in reading, such as in terms of word structure,
tenses, basic words in a word.

2. Macroskills

Ability to understand reading in general, both about the purpose of reading or meaning.

3. Strategies for reading comprehension

In understanding a reading there are several strategies that can be applied, including; Heart reading and
scanning techniques.

Types of reading

1. PERCEPTIVE

In perceptive reading, types of reading tend to be short and involved attending to the components of
larger streches of discourse such as letters, words, punctuation, etc.

2. SELECTIVE

Selective reading is a type of reading that focuses on vocabulary and grammatical.

3. INTERACTIVE
In interactive reading, reading text focuses on main ideas and emphasizes aspects of meaning.

4. EXTENSIVE

In extensive reading, the text of the reading tends to be longer.

Designing assessment tasks

1. Perceptive reading

In assessing basic abilities can be done in various ways, including:

a. Reading aloud, the test takers are asked to read aloud, so the test-takers can understand the meaning
of reading through listening to what they read.

b. Written response, test takers are asked to rewrite what they understand from the reading they have
read.

c. Multiple choice, test takers are asked to answer multiple choice questions related to reading so that
the teacher can see the extent of test-taker understanding of the reading he has read.

d. Picture-cued items, in this type of text the test participants are shown an image then on the test
paper there are several words related to the picture. Then the test taker is given a question or
instruction related to the image.

2. Selective reading

There are several types of texts that can be used in assessing lexical and grammatical aspects of reading
ability including;

a. Multiple-choice (for form-focused criteria), the method most widely used in measuring vocabulary
and grammar knowledge is multiple choice. This multiple-choice type that can be used in selective
reading also varies; multiple-choice vocabulary / grammar task, contextualized multiple-choice
vocabulary / grammar task, Multiple-choice cloze vocabulary / grammar task.

b. Matching tasks, there are two examples of text forms that can be used, namely; vocabulary matching
task, this type of text is basically pairing words or phrases that have the same meaning. fi ll-in vocabulary
selected response task, enter or fill in the blank words in each number by selecting the appropriate word
from several words that have been prepared, but this is different with multiple choices because the
number of words prepared according to the number of numbers on the stem.

c. Editing tasks, or more commonly known as error identification. In editing the task, the test participant
must find the wrong word or phrase that is not in the stem, the answer is also in the form of choice with
an underscore on each choice.
d. Picture-cued tasks, some types of text that are commonly used include: multiple-choice picture-cued
response and labeling task diagrams.

e. Gap-filling tasks, or commonly called fill-in-the-blank. This type of text measures reading and writing
skills.

3. Interactive reading

There are several types of texts that can be applied in this type of text including;

a. Cloze task, in general there are two types of cloze text, namely; fix-ratio deletion and rational
deletion. Meanwhile, there are two variations of cloze text, which are; cloze-test procedure and cloze-
elide procedure.

b. Improptu reading plus comprehension question, the type of text whose type of reading is unknown
and not learned before except the techniques to answer it. Text like this is often found in TOEFL.

c. Short answer task, in this type of text students are given reading and then read the questions and
answer them in the form of one sentence or more.

d. Editing longer task, editing longer text sentences on each number are intertwined.

e. Scanning, a strategy that the reader uses to find specific information in a text.

f. Ordering tasks, in this type of text the test participants are asked to compile a randomly presented
paragraph into a coherent paragraph.

g. Information transfer; reading charts, maps, graphs, diagrams

In this type of text the test participants are required to convey the information presented in the form of
graphs, diagrams, maps, and lists into written language or delivered directly.