As we enter the highest testing season of the year, this three-part series is focused on tips for success with each of the components of the AAPPL. This month’s focus is the Interpersonal Listening and Speaking (ILS) component. The ILS portion of the AAPPL tests your ability to have a conversation with someone. Here are a few pro tips to help you prepare.
Student Tips for Success on the ILS
- Your chat partner will want to know about you, your school, and your community. They’ll start by saying something about themselves and then will definitely ask you to share something about you.
- Pay attention to what your chat partner says; they’ll give you a hint on how to respond. Use all the language you know and answer the question the best you can. Don’t just repeat what you hear.
- Say as much as you can on the topic, but don’t feel you have to fill all the recording time allotted. Showcase your speaking ability at its best!
- Pay attention to the recorder. Make sure the microphone button is red (recording) before you start speaking. Make sure you follow the steps on the microphone check at the beginning of the test to ensure your microphone is working properly.
- You can only replay the video once, so pay close attention.
- Your chat partner will ask you questions, and sometimes you will need to ask questions. Practice asking questions on different topics and answering them.
- Be familiar with general AAPPL topics (Form A & B topics are here; Form E topics are here).
- Practice, practice, practice! Think of preparing for the AAPPL like learning to play an instrument. Practice having conversations with your friends or others as you get ready for testing day.
- Check out the AAPPL demo online here. Use the demo to help you practice and become comfortable with the test’s flow.
- If you freeze or can’t think of what to say for a prompt, don’t worry! There will be additional prompts that will give you a chance to talk more. Do your best and show what you know.
Watch a short video with AAPPL Pro Tips: Interpersonal Listening & Speaking
Teacher Guidelines for the ILS
The Interpersonal Listening and Speaking component of the AAPPL tests your learners’ ability to have a conversation with someone. These tips can help you support your learners and prepare them for the test.
Give learners many opportunities to practice having conversations.
- AAPPL tasks explore a variety of topics that are familiar to learners, such as school, family, and community. Have them practice talking about familiar topics such as their schedule at school, a story that happened (using all timeframes, if they’re able to do so), their family or community, etc.
- Have them take the demo version of the ILS in their language (minding which form they will be taking) to practice speaking and to get more comfortable with the format of the test.
- Learners will be prompted by their video chat partner to answer and ask questions. Help them feel comfortable by giving them lots of opportunities to ask and answer questions with classmates or friends, in partner work or discussion groups, and in class.
Remind learners to pay attention to what the chat partner says and stay on topic.
- Speaking just to fill the time does not necessarily lead to a higher score. Proficiency is about what a person can do with the language, not just how much language they can produce. So, focus on responding to what the chat partner says to the best of your abilities.
- The chat partner may give a hint on how to respond, but learners should be careful not to just repeat what they’ve heard. Encourage them to use all the language they can and answer the question the best they can.
Help learners practice speaking at their target level.
- All AAPPL tasks target a specific major level of language proficiency (e.g., Novice, Intermediate, or Advanced) as described in the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines 2024 and the ACTFL Performance Descriptors for Language Learners. The performance tasks are designed to reflect the criteria for the level.
- For instance, the Novice level includes isolated words and lists, short familiar phrases, and commonly memorized phrases.
- Speakers at the Intermediate level can make simple requests for information, ask and respond to simple questions, and can communicate simple facts and ideas in a series of loosely connected sentences on topics of personal interest and social needs.
- Speakers at the Advanced level can use routine informal and some formal dialogue, including narratives, descriptions, and summaries of a factual nature. They can narrate and describe in all major time frames and can produce connected discourse of paragraph length and structure.
Explain to learners how the ILS is rated.
- When learners understand the rating criteria, it can help them practice speaking using targeted language that showcases what they are able to do.
- ACTFL-certified raters determine whether the responses within each topical area meet or do not meet the criteria for the level. If each set of responses is at the targeted level, the next step is to determine if it is a minimal or strong performance for the level. If the response is not at the targeted level, the rater determines whether there is some evidence of the criteria for the level or no evidence. The rater, therefore, has multiple opportunities to evaluate the learner’s ability across tasks and across topics at one level as well as to evaluate ability at the next higher level (see languagetesting.com/aappl-faqs).
- AAPPL tasks are designed to provide multiple opportunities within the same content area to demonstrate ability at the floor level (what the learner can do consistently at that level) as well as multiple opportunities to demonstrate performance at the ceiling level (what the learner cannot do at the next higher level). This means that students may feel that they simply could not do some of the tasks asked of them on the AAPPL, and that’s okay! That is expected when the learner has reached their “ceiling” and confirms the student is taking the correct form to target their current proficiency level.
Help learners know what to expect.
- The video chat partner will share some information and ask some questions. The video can be replayed once. Remind learners to pay close attention to what their chat partner says, so they can respond to the best of their ability.
- AAPPL topics are general and will likely be very similar to what you’ve been covering in class (Form A & B topics are here; Form E topics are here).
- Remind learners that if they freeze or can’t think of what to say for a prompt, there will be additional prompts that will give them a chance to show what they can do with the language.
Before taking the AAPPL ILS, teachers, proctors, and learners are encouraged to carefully confirm their recording quality using the AAPPL Demo and/or System Check.
- The use of noise-canceling headsets with microphones is encouraged.
- Learners should be spaced apart as much as possible to reduce interference from background noise.
Plan ahead for learners with special needs requiring test accommodations.
- It is recommended that accommodations requests be submitted 2 weeks prior to your targeted testing date. For learners with a documented need for testing accommodations on the ILS video viewing time can be altered, as well as 1.5x and 2x response time and subtitling.
Find more at https://www.actfl.org/assessments/k-12-assessments/aappl#tips
