An Equal Challenge? Comparing TOEFL iBT™ Speaking Tasks with Academic Speaking Tasks

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the relationship between performances on the speaking component of the TOEFL iBT^TM with performances on academic oral assessment tasks. For the academic tasks, we recorded and transcribed the performances of five local and five high-achieving international undergraduate students on oral assessment tasks in core first-year subjects in three faculties, a total of thirty students. For the TOEFL speaking tasks, we transcribed the performances of six high scoring students from mixed language backgrounds on the two independent and four integrated speaking tasks of the TOEFL iBT^TM. On the basis of an analysis of the rhetorical moves characteristic of the two speaking contexts, we conclude that while the moves characteristic of the TOEFL tasks are largely represented in the academic tasks, there are also some differences across the two contexts. These findings both support and challenge the domain definition inference of the TOEFL iBT^TM validity argument.

Acknowledgments

This research was funded by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) under a Committee of Examiners and the Test of English as a Foreign Language research grant. ETS does not discount or endorse the methodology, results, implications, or opinions presented by the researchers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹ The additional non-native speaker data were used in another study comparing the performance of higher and lower proficiency international students.

² Although both native-speaker and international student data were used in the current study, differences between the two groups were not the focus of the analysis.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the TOEFL Committee of Examiners RFP 2011-25.