The ACTFL OPI & WPT for the Seal of Biliteracy®
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ACTFL OPI & WPT for the
Seal of Biliteracy Examinee Handbook - is appropriate for high school juniors and seniors (grades 11 & 12).
- targets the Novice Low to Advanced Mid proficiency range.
- is available each year, with ordering beginning in December. Please review this FAQ for details specific to this year’s testing season.
ACTFL and LTI are proud to support the Seal of Biliteracy by offering the ACTFL Oral Proficiency Interview (OPI®) and the ACTFL Writing Proficiency Test (WPT®) in 24 less commonly tested languages (Albanian, Amharic, Bangla, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Cantonese, Croatian, Dari, Gujarati, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Hindi, Malayalam, Pashto, Polish, Swahili, Tagalog, Tamil, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Vietnamese, and Yoruba).
The ACTFL OPI & WPT for the Seal of Biliteracy®:
The OPI for the Seal of Biliteracy® is a 20 to 25-minute one-on-one interview between a certified ACTFL tester and an examinee. It is interactive, continuously adapting to each test-taker and their speaking abilities. The speaker’s language ability is compared to the criteria outlined in the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines for Speaking, and then a proficiency rating is awarded.
The WPT for the Seal of Biliteracy® consists of a series of writing tasks that address the presentational and interpersonal modes of communication. It measures how well a person spontaneously writes in a language (without access to revisions and/or editing tools) by comparing his/her performance of specific writing tasks with the criteria stated in the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines for Writing. The internet-based WPT is taken online and is anticipated to take approximately 60 minutes to complete (though the system allows up to a maximum of 90 minutes for the test). There is also a booklet version of the WPT available for candidates who prefer to handwrite their responses; the booklet WPT has a duration of up to 60 minutes.
Only a select group of testers/raters have been selected to participate in the ACTFL OPI & WPT for the Seal of Biliteracy®; ACTFL has trained and certified 2-5 testers/raters for each of the 24 languages offered. As a result, all tests must be scheduled at least 10 business days in advance (and up to 14 business days in advance during peak testing times). Also, please allow up to three weeks for tests to be rated and scores made available.
If you are interested in increasing access to the Seal of Biliteracy by offering this assessment to your students, please email aapplhelp@languagetesting.com to have your Client Site account set up to order the test.
Test takers should consult their district office about specific test recommendations or requirements for the Seal of Biliteracy.
ACTFL assessments for the Seal of Biliteracy are also available in 11 additional languages offered through the AAPPL, plus Latin through the ALIRA.
Please review these documents to learn about the different options for delivering the bundle that are available.
