Profile: Issues in Teachers' Professional Development

The Use of Case Studies for Teachers’ LAL

As we mentioned earlier, a few qualitative case studies have reported teachers’ LAL trajectories. Overall, these studies highlight the role of various factors in LAL development and enactment, including institutional and national policies such as standardized tests, testing-related tasks, and professional development scenarios (Gan & Lam, 2025; Yan et al., 2018). Notably, Cui et al. (2022) and Gan and Lam (2025) emphasize that teachers’ agency leads to improved LAL when they willingly participate in LAL courses.

Other case studies have shown that teachers’ engagement in collaborative work is conducive to LAL development. This development can occur as they discuss assessment practices and challenges, and through hands-on tasks in which they give and receive feedback from colleagues (Spiliotopoulos et al., 2024).

These case studies provide evidence that the three components of teachers’ LAL (i.e., knowledge, skills, and principles) have distinct trajectories shaped by external factors (e.g., a newly introduced language test) and personal decision-making. Additionally, the studies tend to remark on teachers’ knowledge of and skills in language assessment. This trend is warranted, as research highlights teachers’ need for a clear relationship between theory and practice in language assessment (Fulcher, 2012; Giraldo, 2024; Vogt & Tsagari, 2014). However, the principles component of teachers’ LAL remains under-researched and underexamined, as shown in other studies (Moraes & Furtoso, 2026; Moraes et al., 2025).

Participants

The participants in this study were five in-service Colombian English-language teachers. They came from different regions, educational institutions, and academic backgrounds. To protect the participants’ privacy and ensure that they would share their experiences and insights freely, each teacher chose a pseudonym.

Participants were selected through convenience sampling. Initially, 107 teachers were contacted via email, as they had previously participated in assessment courses led by Giraldo. Such prior participation could have a meaningful impact on our study, as the teachers had already gained theoretical insights into assessment and could share them to enrich the course. Of the 107 teachers, five submitted all the requested documents: a consent form, two assessment instruments, and documents related to their school’s language curriculum. These five participants were not selected through a maximum variation strategy; however, the five cases come from diverse contexts as described in the within-case analysis and findings section.

Data Collection Instruments and Validation

We collected data using three instruments to ensure a comprehensive diagnosis of the participants’ LAL. An online questionnaire was administered through Google Forms (see Appendix A). It collected information such as teachers’ highest level of education, institution where they worked, education in assessment, and their teaching and assessment methodologies. Further, each participant shared either a syllabus or a language curriculum from their institution, as well as two assessment instruments (e.g., rubrics) that they had designed and implemented in their classrooms. These documents provided insights into the teachers’ pedagogical approaches to teaching and assessment, as well as the alignment of their practices with institutional policies. To analyze these documents, we used a document analysis grid (see Appendix B).

Afterward, we used a semi-structured interview protocol (in Spanish; see Appendix C) with teachers to gather their opinions on assessment, how language should be assessed, the purposes of assessment, and related topics. We also asked them about expectations for the LAL course. The interviews lasted between 30 and 50 minutes and provided information on the use of documents to guide assessment, institutional initiatives to promote LAL, evaluation practices related to assessment, and the strengths and weaknesses of assessment in the teachers’ institutions.

To enhance the validity of the data, we sent the questionnaire, interview protocol, and document analysis grid to two external professors for content expert review and to identify potential biases. They provided suggestions to improve the instruments’ overall design. Additionally, the research instruments were piloted with three teachers to facilitate further adjustment.

Data Analysis

After data collection, we created a spreadsheet to store the information from all instruments. Then we read all the data for each instrument separately to identify codes. Later, we met to discuss the main tendencies in each data collection method and developed themes, which were operationalized individually and then shared as a group; thus, we identified 16 categories. To assess inter-rater reliability, we used Fleiss’ Kappa because we were three raters observing 16 categories (Egbert & Baker, 2019). There was full agreement among the three raters in 11 categories, corresponding to an absolute agreement rate of 68.75%. For the categories we disagreed on, we discussed them thoroughly to reach a consensus.

In another stage, we consolidated major themes across instruments that emerged from the identification of underlying codes. Once again, to reach a consensus, we identified the themes separately and then discussed them as a group. In this stage, five overarching themes were drawn and condensed in the spreadsheet. The data were analyzed inductively, with information organized from the bottom up to identify codes and categories that were ultimately grouped into major themes (Creswell, 2013). Through this collaborative analysis, we identified three major themes, which we then used as baseline data to design the assessment course for the five teachers. In the findings section, we present each teacher’s case first, followed by cross-case findings.

Member Checking

We created a profile for each participant, including analyses and findings for their cases, as described in the next section. Then we contacted each teacher via email and shared their report with them. We did so to identify any misinformation or mistakes in their descriptions, to obtain feedback, and to answer any questions they might have. In sum, this stage was useful to portray teachers’ LAL accurately.

Sofia’s Case

At the time of the study, Sofia had been an English teacher for four years and was teaching at a state-funded institution that offers free vocational education. During her BA, Sofia took a language assessment course because of her interest in the topic. She was interested in our project because, as she stated, “In my everyday teaching, I often don’t put into practice what I learned.”

Sofia explained that she used an eclectic teaching approach: communicative language teaching and the presentation-practice-production technique. She has taught technical English, which can be considered English for specific purposes. In curriculum documents, we found no explicit evidence of approaches to language teaching in Sofia’s institution. This implies that Sofia is allowed to use the language approach that she considers appropriate.

Sofia’s institution provides teachers with a curriculum matrix outlining learning outcomes, vocabulary topics, and assessment criteria. We noticed that this document does not include assessment-related information, but does include grammar and vocabulary topics. According to this document, teachers can assess using “instruments and tasks, including checklists, questionnaires, rubrics, and roleplays.” In the interview, Sofia mentioned she could provide feedback on this document, particularly on sequencing and topics.

Sofia assessed her students’ skills through workshops, oral presentations, group work, class participation, online games, and roleplays. She mentioned that she believes language assessment is the use of “tools to know whether they are understanding you.” For her, language assessment should focus on communication rather than form, which she claimed was not reflected in her teaching context, which emphasized technical vocabulary.

Sofia believes her assessment skills include designing rubrics or checklists, providing clear feedback, and modifying her assessments based on results. This suggests that she is free to administer and adjust her assessments as she considers suitable. Sofia also reported that, unfortunately, her institution does not offer instruction in language teaching, let alone assessment; thus, she studies autonomously or through participation in projects. We interpret the lack of LAL education as an area for improvement at Sofia’s institution, especially given her willingness to invest in her LAL.

Sofia shared two assessment instruments: a reading comprehension test and a student self-assessment checklist. The test focused on developing learner awareness of vocabulary in context, which may evidence an alignment with communicative principles. The checklist, on the other hand, allowed students to monitor their progress through various linguistic descriptors, such as the appropriate use of grammar rules. Both instruments were well-structured, provided clear instructions for students, and, given their focus on linguistic knowledge, aligned with institutional guidelines.

In conclusion, Sofia’s LAL is shaped by two aspects: institutional policies emphasizing linguistic aspects and her assessment beliefs. This influence can be reflected in her instruments, which assess grammar and vocabulary, and in some of her assessment practices, which she described as communicative. Furthermore, our analysis of Sofia’s case led us to identify that although her assessment instruments align with institutional documents, she adjusts her assessment practices. As implications for the course, we believe Sofia’s case can be useful for exploring connections among teaching, learning, and assessment, as well as for addressing vocabulary and grammar in communicative tests.

Maleja’s Case

Maleja has been teaching English for 10 years. At the time of this study, she taught general English at a high school in a rural area in Colombia, using a communicative approach and gamification. Maleja holds an MA in English Language Teaching, and during her studies, she took a course called Language Testing and Evaluation, which focused on “rubrics to assess learners’ performance in different skills.” She agreed to be in our study because she wanted to be informed about trends in language education. In the interview, she stated that she wanted to learn “new ways to grade [and] assess students . . . and [how to create] effective rubrics and [implement] feedback strategies.”

In the institutional documents Maleja provided, we found that the core construct to be assessed was communicative competence, with an explicit mention of grammar and vocabulary. Communicative competence was described in language learning standards for each grade level, which Maleja used to plan assessments. The purposes of assessment, as stated in the documents, were to evaluate students’ progress and to support test preparation. Regarding the latter, she explicitly includes test tasks that resemble those used in Colombia’s national tests.

Maleja believes that language assessment is a process for checking learners’ ability to use language in context, for example, through role-plays and games. For this process, she emphasized that summative and formative assessments should occur. Regarding her assessment skills, Maleja stated that she is good at using technology in class and designing practical assessments for students’ grammar use. She also highlighted: “I don’t pass to other topics . . . until I don’t feel like they got it; I don’t continue with another thing.”

Maleja shared two assessment instruments: a reading and grammar test that resembled the national test and a rubric to assess language and research skills among 11th graders (the highest grade in Colombian high schools). The 20 items in the reading and grammar test were multiple-choice questions, 13 of which were isolated grammar items, two about understanding signs, and five about literal ideas in a dialogue. The rubric included language-based criteria such as fluency, intonation, and pronunciation, as well as research-based criteria such as the connection between results and conclusions in an oral report.

Upon analysis, we found that the rubric aligned with the curriculum Maleja used for teaching and assessment, specifically regarding learners’ ability to orally explain a given problem and its solution. The reading test, on the other hand, may not align with the syllabus because it assessed literal meaning about everyday events, whereas the relevant syllabus unit read that students should develop the ability to “recognize cause-and-effect relationships in texts about academic topics.” We also note that the task in the rubric was for realistic language use, that is, to give a research report; additionally, the instrument clearly delineated what was to be measured in the report.

To sum up, Maleja’s assessment approach integrates three aspects: the school curriculum, her considerations for assessment design and use, and what is ultimately assessed. Although she has studied language assessment, she wishes to advance her LAL, which we think might be possible by addressing topics such as the design of communicative grammar tests and by connecting reading tests to their corresponding learning objectives in a syllabus.

Prudente’s Case

Prudente has been a professor of English for six years at a private university in a major Colombian city. She taught various subjects in a language education program—such as literature, English writing, and assessment—using a project-based learning approach. Prudente noted that this approach enabled her to implement “accurate and reliable formative and summative assessment.” The documents that she used to plan her courses were the course syllabus and the Common European Framework of Reference; however, the syllabus does not specify how students are graded. In the questionnaire, she reported having taken two assessment courses in her undergraduate degree, one in general assessment and one in language assessment.

Prudente seeks to improve her assessments by ensuring they are fair, ethical, reliable, and transparent. Prudente expresses that she might benefit from studying the design of multiple-choice items and test layout. Additionally, she believes that traditional and alternative assessments of English should collect both summative and formative evidence. Such evidence must then be used to identify students’ language-learning processes, including their strengths and areas for improvement. She also believes that “formative assessment is essential.” She asserts that there must be harmony between traditional and alternative methods. This is evident when she reports that sometimes she does not “get authentic information from alternative assessments.”

Based on the interview and questionnaire, we conclude that Prudente’s LAL centers on assessing her students’ communicative skills and is influenced by her practices and principles. As her institutional document does not specify grading criteria for tasks, this may imply that Prudente can be autonomous in her grading, responding to students’ needs. As she stated, she seeks to assess in a fair, ethical, reliable, and transparent manner. Therefore, we think her case can reflect how teachers’ beliefs impact their assessment practices and the design of context-specific assessment tasks.

Johnny Rotten’s Case

Johnny Rotten is an English language teacher with 25 years of experience at a public high school in a small town. He took a course in assessment as part of his undergraduate degree, though he reported not remembering much information from it. Additionally, he completed an assessment course during his MA studies. He indicated that he wanted to be part of this study because he is highly interested in assessment and wants to improve his assessment skills and practices.

For designing and teaching his classes, Johnny implements task-based instruction and the official documents provided by the Colombian Ministry of Education (e.g., the English suggested curriculum and the textbook English, please!). In addition, he uses the guidelines given by the Risaralda Bilingüe Program.¹ For his English for general purposes classes, he considers his students’ contexts and interests when planning, teaching, and assessing. He reported that this is also mentioned in the institutional documents.

After revising the document, we noticed that Johnny’s curriculum includes a suggested assessment for learning that proposes rubrics, quizzes, and instruments for peer and self-assessment. However, the document does not clearly specify the types of assessment, the percentages, or the purpose. In the interview, Johnny explained that although he can make changes to the document, the institution does not provide any assessment instruments, so teachers must design their own.

In the interview, Johnny identifies some strengths and weaknesses related to assessment. For example, he mentioned that at his school, teachers meet regularly to report on students who are successful and unsuccessful, but they never discuss students’ learning process or assessment methods to help students improve. He also revealed that the institution does not provide instruction in assessment but offers materials such as books, headphones, and other items. He is most concerned with the results in standardized tests such as Pruebas Saber.²

Finally, the assessment instruments he shared included a quiz and a makeup test. Both instruments provided simple instructions in English and did not include an example to guide the students’ answers. These instruments tended to focus more on vocabulary, grammar, and reading comprehension.

In summary, Johnny conceives of language assessment as a process that needs to be continually revised to address the challenges faced by students, teachers, and institutions. Through this revision, as Johnny argued, teachers can identify areas of improvement and focus on processes rather than on results. While he uses task-based instruction and aligns his teaching with official documents, this teaching approach should be better reflected in the assessment instruments we examined. Johnny’s case highlights the importance of addressing the connection between teaching, learning, and assessment, as well as the need to design tasks with a communicative approach to language testing.

Teacher C’s Case

Teacher C is an English language teacher with nine years of experience, working at a high school. His knowledge of assessment comes from a course he took in his MA in English Language Teaching. His main interest in this research project is to update his assessment and professional knowledge. In his teaching context, he teaches English by incorporating business-related content, as the school emphasizes entrepreneurship.

He reports that he employs an eclectic approach focused on meaningful learning. In the institutional documents we analyzed, we did not find any direct reference to specific language-teaching methodologies. However, we inferred that Teacher C’s language teaching is guided by communicative competence and by the standards outlined in Booklet 22 of the Ministry of Education, which emphasize listening, reading, speaking, and writing skills.

Regarding language assessment, the English syllabus provides no information about theoretical or methodological references to assessment. However, it uses a holistic approach for all students, addressing aspects beyond language, such as punctuality. The document also outlines that the main purpose of assessment is to observe and collect evidence of progress, using a qualitative grading scale: superior, high, basic, and low. Nevertheless, it does not specify types of assessment, assessment tasks, or percentages. Teacher C added that at his school, assessment serves administrative purposes, evaluating not only language skills but also factors such as attendance and participation. He mentioned that he can provide feedback on this institutional document.

Teacher C conceives assessment as measuring the impact of teaching on students’ understanding of class content. In the interview, he stated that he aims to align assessments with the course plan and integrate the four language skills. His goal is to create assessments that reflect course objectives integrated with real-life language use. He also noted that the institution does not provide instruction on assessment but does offer it in teaching and curriculum.

He indicated that his main skill is creating a flexible and comfortable assessment environment. He does so to prevent anxiety, ensuring that students’ performance reflects their language skills rather than unrelated factors. He feels he does not have enough time to properly assess his students and identifies this as an area for improvement in his assessment practices. Further, he acknowledged the need to prioritize and adjust his assessments to better suit his students’ needs.

He shared a writing task, which aligned with the English curriculum. He also shared an exam with Spanish instructions that assessed listening, reading, and writing. Both instruments reflected Teacher C’s intention to assess language through communicative activities.

To conclude, Teacher C perceives assessment as a tool to gauge the impact of teaching, focusing on students’ understanding of content, and aligning assessments with course objectives and real-world language use. Finally, his strengths lie in creating a supportive classroom environment, but there is room to refine his assessment methods to better suit his students’ context and skills.

The Communicative Approach as a Backbone for Teaching and Assessment

After analyzing data from the four data collection methods, it became apparent that the communicative approach permeated teachers’ assessment practices in different ways and was operationalized through methodologies such as task-based instruction. Such an approach was most prominent in curriculum documents and the teachers’ reported practices. Firstly, we found that communicative competence was the main goal for teaching and assessment. For example, the following excerpt comes from the syllabus provided by Johnny Rotten, where communicative competence is mentioned as a goal for teaching and assessment: “Promote communicative competence and sub-competences: sociolinguistic, pragmatic, and linguistic. . . . The syllabus has tasks as a central component, which are integrated with communicative competence and relevant learning standards in the English language.”

The communicative approach was also evident in teachers’ views of language use through communicative tasks. In the interview, Teacher C reported that he believes assessment should address language “as close as possible so students can use it in real-life situations.” In the questionnaire, Maleja and Prudente reported using rubrics to assess communicative skills through oral presentations.

Content Validity in Teachers’ Approach to Language Assessment

Another assessment pillar we found in the data was content validity, which refers to the extent to which assessments cover relevant curriculum content. We found evidence of content validity, as teachers aligned their assessments with their lessons and the curriculum, specifically the syllabi for the courses they taught. For example, Sofia, in the interview, reported the following about test design: “I take into consideration those assessment criteria listed in the [curriculum] matrix, so that [students] meet those criteria and that they are effectively putting what we study into practice.”

Our analysis of assessments also provided evidence of content validity. In a progress test of listening skills, grammar, and vocabulary in context, Teacher C aligned the test items with the learning objective: “To recognize vocabulary related to greetings and answering basic personal information questions.” His assessment instrument included these two items:

Listening. Listen to four people introducing themselves and write down the expressions they use to greet.

a. ____________

b. ____________

c. ____________

d. ____________

Writing. Answer.

What is your name?

What is your last name?

How are you in this moment?

Salient Challenges of Construct Irrelevance in Language Assessment

After our data analysis, we found evidence of construct irrelevance (i.e., assessing something unrelated to language ability) in participants’ approaches to assessment in various ways. These issues were evident in the inclusion of factors that may unintentionally introduce bias or measure skills beyond language constructs. The issues were salient in institutional documents such as the English curriculum, syllabi, and assessment instruments designed by the participants. For instance, Teacher C’s and Prudente’s English curriculum clearly state that there should be specific elements that teachers must assess in their language classes and that do not have to do with the language itself, as indicated in the following excerpts from the two institutional documents:

Assessment criteria: Collaboration and solidarity, sense of belonging, purpose, punctuality, aesthetics. The student shows aesthetics and organization in the presentation of work, activities, and the guide notebook. (Teacher C, English curricular plan)

Assessment criteria: Students’ attitude: Responsibility, creativity, and initiative; autonomy and interaction with members of the specific educational community. (Prudente, English syllabus)

Construct irrelevance was also evident in the assessment instruments designed by the teachers. For example, some assessment tasks incorporated content or skills that were not directly related to language, such as requiring knowledge of specific terminology from other areas in a general English class. For example, Teacher C included this in his writing rubric: “Your text is aesthetic and well-presented.” Similarly, Maleja includes volume in a rubric to assess speaking skills: “Volume: The intensity which the student instills in their voice during the presentation.” This can be problematic, as someone with a low voice can speak the language well, or vice versa.

The data analysis revealed significant issues of construct irrelevance in language assessment practices. The inclusion of extraneous factors, such as punctuality, aesthetics, and attitude, may detract from the primary goal of assessing language proficiency. Institutional documents, including curricula and syllabi, established assessment criteria unrelated to linguistic ability.

To conclude, based on LAL’s three components and the data analysis and cross-case findings, we drew three conclusions. The cases provide evidence of knowledge of the communicative approach in language planning (curriculum), teaching, and assessment. Most importantly, such knowledge was reported through what can be considered the skills side of LAL (e.g., the use of communicative criteria in rubrics). Furthermore, LAL skills were evident in teachers’ use of assessment instruments clearly aligned with the learning objectives of a given course. Finally, the presence of construct irrelevance in the teachers’ LAL may pose threats to LAL principles (e.g., ethics and fairness). To illustrate, if teachers have to grade responsibility and creativity in an English language class, this may introduce a lack of ethics (e.g., having to grade something outside of language skills) or biases (a problem of fairness) by overgrading or downgrading students’ language level based on irrelevant knowledge or skills (e.g., punctuality and aesthetics).