Week 12 Reflection: Technology in testing: the present and the future

There have been more tested delivered by computer since the 90s' like the Computer-based Test (CBT) TOFEL. One of the major drawback of CBT is that candidates have to be given chance to get familiar with the use of computer in the test setting and it will not be fair if candidates are not computer-literate ready for it.
Nevertheless, there are many advantages of CBT. Locations and time are not restricted provided candidates take CBT in designated centre with computers. Item setting, revision can be facilitated even done online when item setters and reviewers are not in the same place. Computer adaptive testing can be used to find out students' proficiency level in a way that computer can respond simultaneously to students' response and give appropriate level of items. Online DIALANG tool can even assess users' lanugage standard and allow them to opt for delayed feedback in a dozen of European languages.
It seems the use of CBT in Hong Kong lags behind counterparts in foreign countries and many stakeholders are quite skeptical about it. However, the prevailing trend of adopting CBT is on the wagon even in Hong Kong. Part of TSA marking has been done on screen.
Despite of the development of CBT, for high stake placement and public exams, to pay safe and ensure security, traditional paper and pencil format tests are more preferrable at this moment.
But for diagnotic purpose and self-learning, CBT platform with abundant item bank and instant feedback can help students brush up their language even outside classroom and enhance their motivation and learning autonomy. I hope more platform of this kind can be developed for students in Hong Kong.

Reflection Week 11: Learning Management Systems

This article points out some weaknesses of Learning Management Systems (LMS) including the limitation of interactive nature on learners, confusion among learners in early stage of using LMS, centrally controlled contents limiting learners' ecology, etc. However, LMS will benefit learners most in content-rich course. The author then suggests LMS to include fuctions like expansion to repond to learners, allowing sychronous collaboration, enabling connection between learners and content and allowing learners to explore in various areas of interest.
I agree with the author that no single tool can do all the best, especially LMS. The author stresses the importance of learning environment in a way that LMS can work comprementary with other tools like RSS, blogs, wikis, etc.
As such, I understand why we are encouraged to use so many CALL tools to assist in our learning in this course. Sticking to only one learning tool will only limit our connection with one type people in the field, while blogs and wikis can enable us to exhange our ideas with people in the field even overseas.