Category: Blog

On Score Concordance and all that Jazz

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Below are a couple of images from a recent presentation given by ETS’s Spiros Papageorgiou regarding the new TOEFL/IELTS comparability study.

It is interesting to note that an overall IELTS band score of 7 is comparable to a TOEFL score of 91.  But while that IELTS band score of 7 is linked to a CEFR level of C1, that TOEFL score of 91 is linked to a CEFR level of B2.

The same phenomenon can be observed at lower band levels, as is highlighted in the attached slide. This is referred to as “different CEFR interpretations.”

I had planned to write an article about how the new score concordance might affect cut scores in light of the fact that schools often use either their TOEFL or IELTS requirements as a sort of anchor against which other score requirements are adjusted.  But perhaps schools might choose to stick with CEFR interpretations (which haven’t changed) as the basis of their score requirements.

I’ve also included a second slide which reminded viewers that “a language test is not intended to measure abilities beyond language proficiency.”

 

 

Additional Details on TOEFL iBT 2026 Changes

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

A few days ago, ETS briefed New Oriental on the upcoming changes to the TOEFL iBT test.  Regular readers will know that New Oriental is one of the largest test prep firms in China and a longtime partner of ETS.

You can read QQ’s summary here, but a few things are worth mentioning here for the sake of emphasis.  According to New Oriental’s summary:

  1. As we already know, the reading section will be adaptive.  There will be two stages.  The first will be a calibration stage that is the same difficulty level for everyone.  The second will be an “easy” stage or a “hard” stage depending on the test taker’s performance in the first one.  The calibration stage in the reading section will contain multiple short passages rather than a single long reading passage like in the current iteration of the test.  Some of these shorter passages will resemble excerpts from textbooks like the passages currently on the test, but others will come from “sources like newspapers, magazines and websites.”  The second stage will contain the same question types as the first.
  2. The listening section will also be adaptive, with two stages. The listening section will continue to include academic lectures and teacher-student conversations.  On top of this, it will include “peer to peer conversations” focusing on scenarios such as group work.
  3. The speaking and writing sections will not be adaptive.  They will be scored by both humans and AI, as is currently the case.
  4. An e-mail writing task will be added to the writing section.  The academic discussion task will be retained.  It is not stated whether or not the integrated writing task will also be retained.
  5. A virtual interview question will be added to the speaking section.  This appears to be similar to the five-question interview currently included in the TOEFL Essentials Test (5 short questions on the same topic, 30 seconds to speak each time).  It is not stated whether or not the speaking questions currently on the TOEFL iBT will be removed or modified to make room for this.
  6. Starting January 21, score reports will include both the 1-120 traditional TOEFL score and a new 1-6 score linked to the CEFR.  It appears that both scores will be included on score reports for at least two years.
  7. The time it takes to complete the test will remain about the same (roughly two hours).

A few specific dates were mentioned by New Oriental:  practice tests will be available July 7 of this year and content changes will go live on January 21 of next year.

British Council Might Close Up Shop in 40-60 Countries

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

The Guardian is reporting that the British Council might have to close up shop in 40 to 60 countries in the near future.  The organization has been asked to draw up two sets of spending plans – one in which it receives no increase in funding from the British government, and another in which it receives 2% less than at present.  Both scenarios would result in a significant scaling back of operations.

This is quite sad.  The British Council is many things. To me, it is a testing firm which does good work and gives back to the communities it operates in.  More than other testing firms.

It has been argued that cuts to the funding of the British Council might have a negative impact on the UK’s soft power and national security.

I’m unsure of how this might affect the BC’s delivery of the IELTS test. Here in Seoul tests are delivered both at BC’s self-operated “headquarters” and at a test center located in a tutoring center. I suppose other countries are similar.

As has been discussed on the blog a few times, the financial situation of the British Council has been recently impacted by a couple of things: a large loan taken out during the pandemic and the sale of its lucrative IELTS operations in India to IDP Education.

Office Hours Recap

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Last week’s “Office Hours” were a big success.  The turnout was pretty good, and I didn’t have to do much talking.  The group included a nice mix of test prep folks, test takers and a few testing firm insiders.

As a group, we chatted about a few stimulating topics, including:

  1. What it means for a test to have a “multistage adaptive design” and how that might be implemented in the TOEFL reading and listening sections.  One participant seemed pretty sure that the TOEFL reading section could be enhanced with an IELTS style “table completion” task.  I’m not so certain about that will come to pass, even though I think it would be a pretty great change.
  2. How the promise of tasks that “better reflect how students use English in real academic settings like group discussions and project work” might reflect a desire to widen the “target domain” of the test.  The test already includes items centered on campus interactions, but they are mostly simulations of service encounters and meetings with professors.
  3. What’s going on in China.  A few test prep pros popped into the meeting and shared an update on the scene in that country.  This is always super valuable because even though China is the number one market for English tests, it is barely discussed on this particular platform.
  4. How nice it would be to have more speaking tasks on the test.  The TOEFL currently includes just 3 minutes and 45 seconds of oral production, which must be the least of all the major tests (and the minor ones, too).
  5. The sorts of test prep materials people favor nowadays.
  6. How tests could be more personalized for specific test takers.

I recommended a couple of articles in “Research for Practice Issues and Solutions in Computerized Multistage Testing” by Yan, von Davier and Weiss for anyone who wants to dive into the theories behind multistage testing before January.

I’ll do my best to host another chat early next month.  A few possible areas of focus come to mind:

  1. More TOEFL!
  2. IELTS:  What’s up?
  3. The Pearson English Express Test:  What is it?
  4. DET:  What’s changing?  What’s going on?

I might need some assistance with topics 2 through 4.  Do let me know if you are an expert and would like to take part, and help generate some conversation. I don’t record the meetings, so everyone is able to speak frankly and casually.

Tiny Little Update from Australian Home Office?

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

The Australian Home Office’s page for the language testing REOI has been revised.  Most everything has been removed and it now provides just a brief summary of the still-ongoing process.

As for the future, it now states:

“We may accept new English language tests that satisfy all REOI requirements as an outcome of the REOI process. These tests may replace those currently accepted. We may also prescribe them in Australian migration legislation by mid-2025.”

May accept… may replace… may prescribe…

I assume that the list of acceptable language tests will still be revised based on the results of the REOI process (and pretty soon), but the whole thing seems a bit more wishy-washy than it was a week ago.

If you are looking for the old documentation, you can probably find it via the Wayback Machine.

TOEFL Price Cut in Iran

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

The cost of taking the TOEFL test in Iran was lowered near the end of May.  The fee is now $220, down from $300.  Regular readers will remember me whinging about the cost increasing there back in January, so needless to say I’m happy about this price cut.

Due to frequent collapses in the value of the Iranian rial versus the USD, test fees can be extremely onerous for students in that country.  Here’s a short piece in “Science” from a couple of years ago which discusses this topic.

Interestingly, Iran has always been a big market for the TOEFL.  It has been in the top ten countries sending traffic to this website for many years.  Despite everything, the USA remains a top destination for Iranian scholars.  Looking at my traffic for the past month, I can see that I’ve gotten more visitors from Iran than other big markets like Vietnam, the Philippines, Mexico and Germany.

That said, teachers currently in Iran have told me that President Trump’s recent travel ban has Iranian students eying alternative destinations, including Canada and the UK.  That may depress TOEFL volumes in the country.

Historic IDP IELTS Volumes

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Shares of IDP Education Ltd remain in freefall, now trading at 3.59 a piece.  I think they are priced at just a few more cents than at the end of their first day of trading, back in November of 2015.

The Financial Review described the firm as a “dumpster fire” a few days ago, noting that former CEO Andrew Barkla “must be relieved he sold nearly everything that wasn’t nailed down when the company was in happier times.”

That may be an overstatement, but I chuckled.

I know that student placements are a bigger concern, but it could be worth looking at historic IELTS volumes:

  • FY 2016:  857,000
  • FY 2017:  909,800
  • FY 2018:  1,141,200 (IELTS on computer re-introduced)
  • FY 2019:  1,280,000
  • FY 2020:  1,095,000
  • FY 2021:  1,150,000
  • FY 2022:  1,900,000 (IDP took over BC’s India testing)
  • FY 2023:  1,930,000
  • FY 2024:  1,580,000
  • FY 2025:  1,264,000 to 1,295,600 (estimated)

Remember, of course, that the above numbers don’t include tests administered by the British Council.

iTEP Newsletter

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

iTEP International has just launched a quarterly newsletter.  You can read the newsletter and subscribe to keep on top of what the folks at iTEP are up to.  The iTEP is a test I hope to learn more about this year.  The team over there has been doing their thing for a couple of decades and have amassed a decent number of accepting institutions and partners over the years.  I even stumbled upon one of their test center partners in Seoul last year.

More on Duolingo Changes (July, 2025)

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Here’s a new video that summarizes all of the coming adjustments to the Duolingo English Test. It describes the “interactive speaking” question I wrote about on Monday and also notes that:

  1. A “listen and complete” task will be added to the beginning of the “interactive listening” task.
  2. The “Read aloud” and “listen then speak” tasks will be removed.
  3. Minimum speaking and writing times will be removed from some of the longer speaking and writing tasks. Test takers can move along whenever they feel they’ve completed the tasks.

UPDATE:  More complete descriptions have been added to the DET Help Center.

 

IDP Education Shares Tumble 48%. Plus: News on HOELT and IDP IELTS China

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

IDP Education’s share price plummeted 48% today after a disappointing update from the testing and student placement firm.  Shares are down 66% for the year, so far.  They are currently trading at $3.88, which is the lowest they’ve been since December of 2016

According to the update, in FY2025 student placement volumes are expected to decrease 28 to 30 percent compared to FY2024.  Testing volumes (IELTS) are expected to decrease 18 to 20 percent.

The update notes that IDP “has a focused roadmap of digital and AI enabled product development across Student Placement and Language Testing that will underpin long-term volume and revenue growth, margin expansion and shareholder returns.”

On a call with investors, a few noteworthy topics were raised.

Regarding China, IDP notes: “We continue to progress our entry of IDP IELTS into China, are confident in the long term business case, continue to work constructively with the Chinese government and will update the market as appropriate as we continue to work towards our full IELTS opening in China.”

When pushed for a date when testing might begin, IDP didn’t provide one. They noted that the government there has taken an “encouraging view” of IDP’s entry into the country, but that the regulatory process has “slowed.”

Regarding bright spots for IELTS, on-shore testing in Canada was identified (due to testing for PR) as well as increased domestic usage in Asia (probably Vietnam, though it was not specifically named).

Regarding the HOELT test, it was indicated that the IELTS partners will apply for the tender as a partnership (rather than, say, individually). It was also confirmed that the HOELT will only be for work and migration visas (not student visas). The current concession, though, has been extended for another 12 months.

Changes to the Duolingo English Test Speaking Section – July, 2025

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Starting in July, the Duolingo English Test will include a new speaking task that seems like an attempt to simulate a back-and-forth conversation.  In this task, test takers will receive a series of short questions on a given topic followed by a series of short questions on some other topic.  They must quickly respond to each question. 

Interested parties can demo the new task by taking the free practice test via the DET website. When I took the test, I received four questions about staying focused at work and four about family and growing up.   I was given six seconds to prepare each response and 35 seconds to speak each time, so quick thinking was mandatory.  I suppose this task is a good measure of one’s ability to produce spoken English fairly spontaneously. Note that a few people have reported getting just three questions about each topic.

I suppose there is a discussion to be had about how regular test revisions reduce the impact of cramming and test prep strategies on scores in general. Perhaps this will be a feature of more tests, as we move forward. I would love to see it as part of the HOELT, for one.

Below are a few screenshots from the practice test.  A new article from The Koala News references this task. The article includes a link to an information session you can sign up for to learn more.

TOEFL Chat Tomorrow!

Posted on by TOEFL Resources

Tomorrow (June 4) I’ll host an “office hours” chat on Zoom to talk about the upcoming changes to the TOEFL.  Just like we had when the Test was revised in 2023!  If you want to hang out with some people in the test prep space this is for you!  There have been 128 registrations so far.  If memory serves, about 25% of registrants show up for these sorts of things, so there should be enough people for a fun conversation.  You can sign up over here.

Just note that this isn’t a webinar or a presentation or anything like that.  It’s just an opportunity to chat about what’s going on in testing (particularly the “transformed” TOEFL iBT).  A few topics come to mind:

  1. What does it mean when a test is “adaptive” and how might this be added to a test which has not been adaptive for the past two decades?
  2. Might the speaking and writing sections of the TOEFL be adjusted?  The verbiage used to describe the changes suggests that they will not change, but the announcement isn’t exactly clear in this regard.
  3. What about Australia?  The last time the TOEFL was revised, the Home Office paused acceptance of the test for several months.
  4. Speaking of changes, this is the third major revision of the TOEFL iBT since 2019 (the fourth if you count TOEFL Essentials).  All of the changes have been attempts to increase its competitiveness in a challenging marketplace.  Will this be the one that does the trick?

I’m also interested in hearing about what sorts of materials people in the prep space are currently using, and how they might respond to a bigger than expected change to test content.

Anyway.  All are welcome – whether you are in the test prep space, student recruitment or work for a testing company.  I’ll even upgrade my Zoom plan just in case more people than expected show up.