Informed by social justice? Fairness and inclusion in the Primary Teacher Education (PrimTEd) English language test item development

Abstract

Background: Historically, there has been an unevenness in South African language teaching at schools and in teacher education at universities, exacerbated by a lack of agreed course standards and gaps in what is offered in language courses on teacher education across universities. Objectives: This article argues that test design may contribute to greater equality – related to social justice – in education. Method: This article reports on aspects of test design that ensure fairness and give it relevance and cultural responsivity: the diversity of item writers; the development of culturally sensitive, realistic items based on language teaching and learning scenarios; the inclusion of a scaffolded free writing experience and varied question levels. Results: The authors describe how the test items bring notions of fairness to diversity of students and reflect the pedagogic realities of teaching English in a multilingual society. Conclusion: We argue that testing of the English language and literacies in initial teacher education has a social justice imperative, and that testing of these skills is necessary to interrupt a trajectory of teachers with limited language and pedagogic knowledge and skills entering the teaching profession, typically going into schools where standards most need to be improved. Contribution: The sociopolitical and intentional aspects of testing are an important value component linked to social justice. However, test item design notions of accuracy, fairness, validity, reliability and accessibility relate to internal validity within test design and have also been linked to social justice in testing, as much as they exist in types of test items and the overall test design. How these intentions and approaches might fulfil a social justice approach is the contribution of this article.