An International Framework and a Local Standardised Test: A Former Item Writer’s Autoethnography

Authors

Xuan Minh Ngo, International Education and Lifelong Learning Institute University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Fife, United KingdomFollow

Abstract

A recent trend dominating education worldwide is the enactment of external accountability frameworks and standards-based assessment. Likewise, in language education, international standards like the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) have been increasingly used for local standardised test development and alignment. However, there has been little research into the application of the CEFR in item writing, the activity of creating new items and associated materials, in local standardised testing contexts. To bridge this gap, this autoethnography shares my firsthand experience of writing items for a locally-developed, CEFR-aligned standardised English test in Vietnam. By combining evocative and analytic autoethnography, I aim to achieve two goals. My first goal is to offer insight from the perspective of an item writer into a prevalent but not unproblematic practice of borrowing international standards to develop local high-stakes tests. My second goal is to demonstrate, through vignettes, the advantages of autoethnography over other methodological approaches in investigating research contexts in which access to suitable participants is particularly challenging.

Keywords

autoethnography, CEFR, standardised testing, item writing, standards-based assessment, EFL, Vietnam

Author Bio(s)

Xuan Minh Ngo (ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0252-3513) is an Associate Lecturer in International Education and TESOL at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, UK. Minh is interested in using qualitative approaches to explore the intersection of language assessment, language policy, and teacher education. His works have been published in System, Language Teaching Research, English Today, Asian Englishes, Asian EFL Journal, Journal of World Languages, and recent Routledge, Springer, and Cambridge edited collections. Minh also serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal of AsiaTEFL. Please direct correspondence to xmn1@st-andrews.ac.uk

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the editors and reviewers of The Qualitative Report for their constructive feedback on earlier versions of this paper.

Publication Date

3-25-2025

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

DOI

10.46743/2160-3715/2025.6991

Recommended APA Citation

Ngo, X. M. (2025). An international framework and a local standardised test: A former item writer’s autoethnography. The Qualitative Report, 30(3), 3288-3305. https://doi.org/10.46743/2160-3715/2025.6991

ORCID ID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0252-3513

ResearcherID

KUD-4113-2024