ESOL Tests and Testing

Before getting into the little things of this book, l would like to begin this review with a real anecdote that happened to me not too long ago. Some months ago, while I was in my office, a colleague came in and asked me a couple of questions about language testing, and I must recognize that after 30 minutes of explanations and exemplification, he thanked me for my help and left me unconvinced and wondering. Two days after, later I received this book and went to talk to him and I asked him to read the first chapter. Two days later, he came back to me and said: "Jesús, this is what I needed to know, why didn't you tell me in the beginning?" I wonder how many ESOL, TESOL, and TEFL teachers feel the same way as my colleague. In ESOL Tests and Testing, Stoynoff and Chapelle assume the point of view of those ESOL practitioners somehow engaged in language testing (not few times, accidentally) who need to gain "access to principles, methods, and the language of language assessment" (p. V).