American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages 2012 Summer ACTFL OPI Assessment Workshops at the Middlebury Language Schools ACTFLis pleased to announce the first ever bi-coastal summer OPI Assessment workshop, to be held at Middlebury College's Language Schools, in both Vermont and on the Mills College West Coast Language Schools site (Oakland, California). The four-day OPI Assessment Workshop is an intensive introduction to the techniques of administering and rating the Oral Proficiency Interview. The rating scale and techniques for eliciting a ratable sample are highlighted in daily plenary sessions and then reinforced in language-specific break-out sessions. Participants have the opportunity to observe demonstration interviews and, under a trainer's supervision, conduct their own practice interviews with volunteer candidates. The group critiques and discusses both these practice interviews and their ratings. Following the workshop, participants may apply to become ACTFL OPI Testers. MIDDLEBURY VERMONT CAMPUS - JULY 19-22, 2012: Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish MIDDLEBURY AT MILLS COLLEGE CALIFORNIA CAMPUS — JULY 5-9, 2012: Arabic, Japanese, Spanish The benefits to faculty of participation in the ACTFL OPI workshop are many. ACTFL OPI Assessment Training provides a valuable foundation for teachers in second language assessment, curriculum design, and instruction. Participation in the OPI Assessment Workshop helps teachers to understand the key principles of teaching and testing for proficiency. By learning about the assessment method most widely Used today in the U.S. for measuring speaking proficiency in a language, teachers are better prepared to determine the speaking abilities of their students, to design their own assessment tools, and to determine if students have reached specific benchmark levels as determined by individual districts or states. OPI Assessment Training is also the first step toward becoming an ACTEL certified tester. Certification as an ACTFL tester is recognition of an educator's ability to reliably administer and rate the ACTFL OPI. ACTFL certified testers conduct OPIs within their own academic institutions for internal purposes such as placement, graduation requirement, research, and program evaluation, and with the ACTFL Testing Office for external purposes. Certified ACTFL testers are a critical resource for academic programs throughout the US. Middlebury College summer faculty will receive a significant discount on registration fees. Please visit www.actfl.org after February 15, 2012, for more information. ‘American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) Phone: (914) 963-8830 ext. 225 Fax: (914) 963-1275 www.actflorg