Teachers for an Inclusive School

2.4 Quantitative and Qualitative Methods for Evaluating and Assessing Intercultural Competence

Perry and Southwell (2011), while discussing the objectives of measuring intercultural competence, affirm that evaluation and assessment can be used to understand the level of a “person’s intercultural competence and then highlight which dimensions should be further developed” (p. 460) and “the effectiveness of intercultural learning experience”.

Deardorff in her work (2015) suggests seven myths regarding evaluation in general and the evaluation of intercultural competence in particular:

1. Pre- and post-testing is sufficient for the evaluation of intercultural competence;
2. It is correct to collect data and then think about how to use it;
3. There is a method better than others to evaluate intercultural competence;
4. It is better to plan the educational program first, and then think about how to evaluate it;
5. Only one person can evaluate;
6. It is necessary to be in agreement with standardized international instruments of evaluation;
7. Evaluating learning results is the same as evaluating the educational program.

Continuing with her suggestions, the author provides guidelines on how to realize a correct evaluation plan for intercultural competence. Teachers need to have a clear understanding of the reason why there is the necessity to evaluate intercultural competence. They must have a clear definition of learning objectives in order to align evaluation methods and instruments with them. Teachers have to start their educational program with an evaluation plan and engage others in the planning, realization and evaluation of the evaluation process. A correct evaluation program for intercultural competence needs explicit, transparent and clear criteria and must be able to withstand regular revision of the evaluation plan.

From the work of Perry and Southwell (2011) it is possible to list different quantitative and qualitative methods and instruments for the assessment and evaluation of intercultural competence (Table 1).

Quantitative approach	Qualitative approach
IDI (Hammer, Bennett & Wiseman, 2003)	Observation
ISS (Chen and Starosta, 2000)	Interviews
DMIS (Bennet, 1993)	Portfolio
CCAI (Kelley and Meyers, 1995)	Written reflections
BASIC (Koester and Olebe, 1988)

Online Resources

• Laura B. Perry & Leonie Southwell (2011), Developing intercultural understanding and skills: models and approaches, in: Intercultural Education 22, pp. 453-466
• Darla K Deardorff (2015), Demystifying outcomes assessment for international educators: A practical approach, Virginia: Stylus Publishing
• Chen, G.-M. & W.J. Starosta (2000). The Development and Validation of the Intercultural Sensitivity Scale. Human Communication 3: 1-15.A paper reporting on a study that developed and assessed the reliability and validity of the Intercultural Sensitivity Scale
• Hammer, M.R, Bennett, M.J. & Wiseman, R. (2003). Measuring intercultural sensitivity: The intercultural development inventory. International Journal of Intercultural Relations 27: 421-443.A paper that reports on a measure of five main dimensions of the Intercultural Development Inventory.
• The Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity. Summary by Milton J. Bennett
• Davies, S.L. & Finney, S.J. (2003). ‘Examining the Psychometric Properties of the Cross-Cultural Adaptability Inventory’. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, IL (April, 2003).A paper reporting on a study that examined CCAI to better understand the psychometric properties of this instrument through data collected from a group of university students.
• Griffith, R.L., Wolfeld, L., Armon, B.K., Rios, J. & Liu, O.-L. (2016). ‘Assessing Intercultural Competence in Higher Education: Existing Research and Future Directions’A research report aiming to identify current conceptualizations of ICC, review existing assessments and their validity evidence, propose a new framework for a next-generation ICC assessment, and discuss key assessment considerations.
• ldikó Lázár, Martina Huber-Kriegler, Denise Lussier, Gabriela S. Matei and Christiane Peck (eds), Developing and assessing intercultural communicative competence - A guide for language teachers and teacher educators This is a collective volume published under the auspices of the European Centre for Modern Languages (ECML) of the Council of Europe. The ECML promotes innovative approaches in language education and plays a significant role in disseminating good practice and assisting in its implementation in member states. The volume contains guidelines for the teaching of intercultural communicative competence, starting from its theoretical background and focusing especially on its assessment.
• Sinicrope, C., Norris, J. & Watanabe, Y. (2007). ‘Understanding and assessing intercultural competence: a summary of theory, research and practice (Technical report for the foreign language program evaluation project)’.This report summarizes theory and research on intercultural competence, paying particular attention to existing approaches and tools for its assessment. It also reviews examples of the assessment of intercultural competence in the specific contexts of general education and college foreign language and study abroad programs.