Testing English Studies in India: Problems and Possibilities

Testing techniques evaluate not just the teaching/learning outcomes – they evaluate the whole spectrum of factors involved in delivering a discipline in the classroom. The motivations of teaching/learning a discipline are most concretely realised in the testing techniques and the testing outcomes. Any discipline that has not formulated well-researched testing techniques is doomed to fail because the quality testing is the prerequisite to create the strong motivation for learning the subject in its essence. In this paper an attempt is made to examine the various issues and problematics of testing practices of English studies in India. The vague and ambiguous policies, the quantity and quality of course content, the issues of infrastructure including the lack of competent teachers, the management of examination, the problematics of UGC NET and above all the quality of testing tools and many other issues are examined, and possible remedies are suggested to reorient not just the testing practices but the whole range of issues related with English studies.