A placement test (PT) should be administered to many test-takers simultaneously, simply, and in a short period of time. Additionally, its results should have high reliability. However, conventional speaking tests do not satisfy these conditions. To address this, we have developed STAR, Speaking Test of Active Reaction, along with two evaluation tools: a rubric and audio samples. Using these, five evaluators graded the performance of 32 test-takers. We found a high intraclass correlation coefficient and that the raters gave results consistent with one another. Time spent on evaluation was short— fewer than two minutes per test-taker. Therefore, we conclude that as a speaking test for PT, STAR has the necessary qualities of reliability, validity, and usefulness.
