BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk// X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:"\;Can you read what I can read?: Case studies of German\, Jap anese and Urdu learners"\; - Karen Ashton (Faculty of Education) DTSTART:20070130T170000Z DTEND:20070130T180000Z UID:TALK6333@talks.cam.ac.uk CONTACT:Edith Esch DESCRIPTION:As part of a Department for Education and Skills initiative\, Cambridge Assessment is developing a new suite of language assessments (As set Languages) to be available at six stages of ability across a number of languages. These assessments are designed to be broadly comparable\, in t erms of functional level\, across languages at each stage. Until recently\ , functional comparability of language qualifications has not received muc h attention in the UK\, e.g. Coleman (1996\, p 7) argues that the label 'f oreign language to degree level is meaningless due to discrepancies across British universities. Researching cross-language comparability is\, howev er\, becoming increasingly important\, partially in response to Council of Europe initiatives\, e.g. the Common European Framework of Reference (CEF R)\, which argues for levels that have shared meanings (Council of Europe 2001\, p 5)\, and partially in response to concerns over existing UK quali fications\, e.g. there was an investigation into the comparability GCSE gr ades in Modern Foreign Languages\, 2005 (Halpin 2005).\n\nThis paper intro duces a learner-centred mixed-methods comparability study focused on begin ner to intermediate (A1 - B1) secondary school readers of German\, Japanes e or Urdu. Data from self-assessments and think-aloud protocols of student s working through assessment tasks are used to compare 1) the difficulty o f assessments\, and 2) the differing ability profiles (both in functional can do terms and in the strategies/skills needed) of learners of these lan guages". LOCATION:2S4\, Second Floor of the New Faculty Building\, Faculty of Edu cation\, 184\, Hills Road END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR