Performance versus Proficiency
As world language educators, we often talk about the distinction between performance and proficiency. Most of us can explain that the former is language that focuses on familiar contexts and has been practiced, whereas the latter is overarching, encompassing authentic tasks in a real-world context. A simple way of conceptualizing this distinction is that performance occurs in the classroom, but proficiency is real life.
Another key distinguishing feature of proficiency is that language can be acquired in any context. A learner could have acquired a language in their home, from living or traveling abroad, from attending class, or from watching YouTube videos. They could be children, teens, young adults, or mature adults, heritage or native speakers, and the language tested could be their maternal language (L1), a second language (L2), or even the fifth language they have acquired (L5).
If performance and proficiency are so different, then how can we assess proficiency like we test performance?
Assessing Performance
Performance assessment is an important part of language learning. Language learners need to practice tasks – to perform – and to receive a score for their performance, so that they can see where they are and set goals toward proficiency. Performance assessment measures what an individual is able to do within familiar task types, contexts, and content areas, using language that has been learned and rehearsed in an instructional or other structured setting.
Performance assessment is useful for indicating growth within formal educational contexts, but it does not provide comprehensive evidence of ability to use language outside of that context (that is, comprehensive evidence of proficiency). And proficiency development is a fundamental goal of language study. When an individual leaves a class or course, and brings their studied language into the world, what they take with them is proficiency.
Assessing Proficiency
So how do we assess proficiency? Proficiency assessment involves identifying the functions and tasks that an individual is able to accomplish. What a test taker Can Do, in familiar and unfamiliar contexts, sometimes with unexpected complications. This holds true if the test taker is in the classroom, in an open-air market, speaking with friends, or asking directions from a stranger.
The How of Assessing Proficiency
Commonly, educators may rate language production on a holistic rubric, but not in rating proficiency. The ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines 2024 (Guidelines) state explicitly that in order to assess proficiency, one must consider more than just one or two criteria like comprehensibility or number of words produced. Doing so can lead to instances in which an individual produces accurate, even beautiful, language that has been memorized, but does not even respond to the prompt. For example, if I ask a learner to write step-by-step directions how to make gazpacho, and they write a persuasive essay about the value of tea in China, then they have not addressed the task and they have not demonstrated proficiency, regardless of how accurate or elaborate their essay is.
So, what should be considered in assessing proficiency? Look to the Guidelines for guidance! The Guidelines emphasize that “an individual’s level of proficiency in each domain is defined by four criteria, represented by the acronym FACT” (p.24).
F – Functions
A – Accuracy
C – Context and Content
T – Text Type
In this way, The Guidelines show us what to value and how to score language production. Essentially, FACT is a rubric, fleshed out by the ACTFL Performance Descriptors for Learning Languages and organized by the ACTFL Proficiency scale.
For instructors who focus on grammatical accuracy, the Guidelines ensure that the A in FACT is one important criterion. But it also ensures that there are three other criteria that must be considered. Similarly, for those who focus singularly on the T in FACT, Text Type, they are nudged toward a deeper understanding of what it means to be proficient at a certain sub-level on the ACTFL Proficiency scale.
How to Apply the Rubric to Score Proficiency
An assessment of proficiency determines whether the individual provides evidence of all of the criteria for a particular level, even in unrehearsed communication on unfamiliar topics or within unfamiliar contexts. In order to receive a proficiency rating at a given level, an individual must demonstrate sustained ability to meet each of the FACT criteria for that level in all of the communication situations that pertain to that level, including situations that the individual has not encountered previously. The operative word is ALL.
ACTFL-certified raters of all ACTFL language proficiency assessments, from the gold standard ACTFL Oral Proficiency Interview® (OPI) and ACTFL Writing Proficiency Test® (WPT) to the ACTFL Assessment of Performance toward Proficiency in Languages® (AAPPL), score on all four FACT criteria.
As you instruct your learners, whether in middle school or college, keep the Guidelines at the forefront of your mind. Look at how you are assessing for proficiency. What matters is that the test you select assesses all four FACT criteria (which not all do!).
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