Educare (Jun 2015)
Bedömning på systemnivå - En komparativ studie av stegsystemet i språk i den svenska skolan och språknivåer i Europarådets Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR)
Abstract
In the early 1970’s, the Council of Europe commenced work that aimed at identifying levels of language learning in a transparent and generally applicable way. The project resulted in the definition of six cardinal levels of competence according to a descriptive model called the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. This made a strong and lasting impact and the CEFR concept is now being employed both in Europe and beyond as an important tool in the communication about goals and activities in language teaching and assessment. The highly influential work inspired the Swedish National Agency for Education (Skolverket) to transpose the curricular goals for languages into an approximate CEFR model encompassing 7 levels, or stages (steg), which would thereby, among other things, enable comparison of features of language education across cultural and national boundaries.This article describes a previously unpublished study that investigated the conceptual relationship between the 7 stages of language ability laid out in Swedish school curricula and the 6-level CEFR system (Oscarson 2002). Against the background of the increasingly strong interest in the latter system, the purpose of the article is to update and review the analytical procedure and the results of this study. A text analytics method for stepwise comparison of the systems was devised and used in the alignment. Areas of competence were matched for content, and descriptions of abilities in the Swedish curricula close in meaning to descriptors in the CEFR system were identified. Conclusions were drawn about the interrelationships that exist between the systems and points on the two scales. The results indicate where any given stage in a Swedish language curriculum is located on the CEFR scale. The general conditions for the work undertaken, as well as possible further research, are discussed.
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