1. RELATING NATIONAL EXTERNAL EXAMINATIONS IN SLOVENIA TO THE CEFR LEVELS
Suzana Bitenc Peharc
National Examinations Centre, Slovenia

2. JUSTIFICATION
confirm links between national examinations in foreign languages and the CEFR;
facilitate mobility of candidates;
facilitate comparability;
- raise awareness of good testing practice.
We adopted the methodology described in the Manual for relating language examinations to the CEFR
(Council of Europe, 2003).

3. PHASES OF THE LINKING PROCEDURE
Familiarisation
Specification
Standardisation
Validation

4. THE PANEL OF JUDGES
The project was carried out by teams of 9 to12 judges.
They were primarily language teachers in primary, secondary or higher education and participated at various stages of test development.
The judges had a good understanding of the test-taking population and had some experience in using the CEFR.
+ external language testing experts 4

5. FAMILIARISATION
This stage is important to make sure that the judges understand the content of the CEFR and its levels and descriptors.
4 familiarisation workshops:
- Initial training (workshop on the construct of CEFR, illustration of the process of linking)
- Training for the standardisation of reading and grammar and vocabulary (descriptors and CoE samples calibrated to the CEFR)
- Training for listening
- Training for speaking and writing (CoE samples) 5

6. SPECIFICATION
This stage represents a description of the content of the test in relation to the CEFR.
(estimation of level, comunicative activities tested,
aspect of comunicative language competence tested)
We used forms from the Manual.

7. STANDARDISATION
The stage represents a decision of cut-off scores. It is the most important point of the linking process.
Two standard setting methods were employed for the receptive skills:
Basket method (At what CEFR level can a test taker answer the following item correctly?)
Modified Angoff method (How many of the 100 borderline examinees would answer each item correctly?)
The average of the two methods was used to set the final cut score.

8. BENCHMARKING PROCEDURE
For writing and speaking we collected local samples of candidates‘ performances that were rated according to the existing criteria.
The judges were then asked to rate the samples using the CEFR assessment criteria grids (Manual, Tables C1, C2, C3 and C4).
We compared the ratings and decided upon the cut score. B1

9. VALIDATION We used different procedures to collect validity evidence:
we documented all steps of the process;
we collected feedback questionnaires from the judges;
we checked consistency and accuracy of the standard setting :
- the intra-judge consistency
- the inter-judge consistency
- decision consistency
- standard error of the cut off
- we used two standard setting methods to obtain information from two independent methods.

10. AND NOW? Relating examinations to the CEFR is an ongoing process.
maintain CEFR-related standards
comparability
raise awareness
strive for continious improvement