Choose this link to go directly to the main page (requires password)

This resource is intended for people who have no specialized knowledge of language instruction and assessment. While it focuses mostly on assessment, it offers a brief introduction to general language pedagogy, since language assessment cannot be understood without at least a general understanding of how languages are taught and learned.

Depending on your time and interest, you can choose:

a "quick and dirty" overview that should take no more than 15 minutes (example: you are a school/ college/ university administrator who is having a brief meeting with some language teachers)

a "novice" overview that will need about an hour of reading (example: you are a parent who is serving on a parent-teacher committee for a school that is thinking about starting up a language program)

an "intermediate" survey that will take two or three hours (example: you are a teacher / professor who will be serving on a major committee with colleagues from several subject areas, or a reviewer of grant applications that involve awards of, say, $5000)

an "advanced" encounter that will take several multi-hour reading sessions (example: you are a parent who is serving on a hiring committee that is choosing a language program director, or a professor / administrator who is refereeing a dispute about promotion and tenure)

You can also select a link to the homepage of my graduate course in language assessment, to see what a initial professional-level exploration of the topic involves.

The main page of this resource is password-protected because it contains links to copyrighted materials. The resource is NOT intended for general distribution, even to students and colleagues, but rather to people to whom I might plausibly give, individually, single copies of just a few resources, as is customary in our field. I have uploaded this resource to my website, because that is how I organize and store my many professional resources. But I intend to use personal CD-ROMs as the chief way of circulating these materials. If you received a CD-ROM from me, I also included the password. If you have misplaced your password, or if by some chance you have happened upon this page on my website and want to explore the materials for legitimative professional reasons and with proper limitations on their circulation, you can email me (fischerw@pdx.edu) to request the password.