A Comparative Analysis Of Reading Tests In IELTS And NETEM

Reading ability has always been regarded as one of the most important abilities in language testing and reading comprehension part makes up a great proportion in many different language tests. Therefore, designing a good reading test which is of high validity and reliability is of great importance.IELTS(International English Language Testing System)(Academic) is an international language testing system, which aims to test whether candidates have the ability to further their undergraduate or postgraduate study in countries where English is the teaching language. National Entrance Test of English for MA/MS(NETEM) is one of the most influential tests in China. It is one of the compulsory entrance tests for those who want to further their postgraduate study, which intends to evaluate whether test takers reach the English requirements set in the syllabus for prospective postgraduates.Considering the importance of reading comprehension testing, IELTS and NETEM as well as such little research on these issues, the author of this paper makes a comparative analysis of the reading comprehension part between IELTS and NETEM, has found out their respective characteristics and put forward corresponding feasible suggestions. The materials of this research are chosen from four tests in Cambridge Books for Cambridge Exams Book8, which is newly published, and four papers of NETEM from the year2008to the year2011. The theory of this study is based on Bachman’s framework of test method facets, but with some modifications, the author puts forward a more practical framework, making a comparison of the characteristics of the reading comprehension part in IELTS and NETEM from five aspects:the setting, the test rubrics, the input, the expected response and the relationship of input and response. And the main findings are as follows:(1)The characteristics of testing setting, test rubrics as well as the relationship between input and response in the reading comprehension part are similar in both IELTS NETEM;(2) In terms of the characteristics of the input, topics and genres in IELTS reading tests are more various than those in NETEM. Besides, the sentence length, sentence types tend to be more reasonable in IELTS while reading comprehension part in NETEM tend to be more difficult grammatically and syntactically;(3) In terms of the response, question items in IELTS tend to be more diverse, including multiple choice questions, matching, true or false questions and summery, etc. while there is only multiple choice question type in NETEM. In addition, IELTS reading tests assess both candidates’intensive reading ability and extensive reading ability while NETEM tends to merely test candidates’intensive reading ability. By further analyzing the comparative results, the author gives some practical suggestions and implications.