CEAPS Speaker - Tianyu Qin, “Teaching and Assessing L2 Pragmatics: A Computerized Dynamic Assessment Perspective”

Dynamic assessment (DA) breaks the traditional dichotomy between assessment and instruction by including mediation in assessment procedures (Poehner, 2008). The focus of DA is on how students learn and change with mediation rather than what they can do alone. Traditionally, DA requires the presence of a person as the mediator to guide another individual’s learning. Recently, scholars have begun conducting second language (L2) DA research in a computerized format (C-DA) in which preprogrammed mediation is integrated into online assessment procedures. This presentation reports on a project that applied the C-DA framework to assess L2 Chinese learners’ pragmatic competence, with a focus on comprehension of indirect speech acts. Following an overview of the theory and methods, the findings center around L2 Chinese learners’ unassisted and assisted performance. Implications of these findings were further discussed in relation to the link between learners’ emerging abilities revealed through C-DA and teaching pragmatics.