Abstract:

The goal of this research is to point out the negative influence of standardized testing in secondary English education in China. It has been acknowledged that most educators hold a negative attitude towards standardized testing. This paper will focus the drawbacks from teacher’s voice via literature review. Because of standardized testing, the quality of education is damaged, the pressure on teachers is huge and the educational inequality issue between urban and rural areas is becoming more serious. As one of the three main disciplines in China, English education is particular affected by standardized testing. English as a lingua franca is becoming more and more crucial in global stage, however, standardized testing of English discipline in China does not really improve students’ English learning. This paper highlights main harmful weaknesses of standardized tests from the perspective of educational quality, stress and inequality, illuminates the interactions of these drawbacks and calls for a more effective and equal evaluation system. Also, as the most important standardized test which is paid attention by the whole Chinese society, The National College Entrance Examination will be mentioned often in this paper as an instance. Finally, suggestions and advices about how to educate students’ English better on the condition of standardized testing are considered and proposed through insightful introspection and reflection in this paper.
In this paper, literature review plays an important role. A lot of secondary sources from different countries are collected, contributing to this topic in a theoretical and methodological way. The objects considered for this study are students and teachers from several secondary schools in non-English speaking countries, especially China. They indicates their own opinions. Some of them support English standardized tests, some of them consider it as a ‘killer’ of students’ learning quality. Both provide convincing argument. However, I take a stand against those who support English standardized tests and give amount of counter-arguments to refute them. The result is clear that standardized testing in English discipline is destructive for both teachers and students’ development, especially for rural students. The unequal issue is also exposed and becoming worse because of standardized testing of English.

Keywords:

Standardized testing, English education, Secondary education.