Assessing English in South America
This chapter presents a brief state-of-the-art description of English language teaching and assessment in South America, placing special focus on Brazil and Argentina. There is reference to developments in Uruguay, Chile, and Colombia. The chapter focuses on the status of the English language in the official education network—taking into consideration the goals and approaches at each of the levels of the educational systems—as well as on assessment practices in public and private schools. There are great challenges for the democratization of quality English teaching, and the role of assessment is vital in this process. In order to overcome the challenges identified, there is a need to raise teachers’ awareness of the role and power of assessment in general practices and to implement measures in order to increase the level of proficiency among teachers and the quality of their education. 
 
 
Keywords: 
 
Assessment evaluation; 
Assessment methods; 
ESL/EFL; 
South America
Teacher Socialization of EFL Teachers at Public School Levels in Central Mexico
This study aimed at exploring the processes of teacher socialization and identity formation of nine English as a foreign language teachers at public schools in central Mexico. These teachers began their careers in the National English Program in Basic Education. Qualitative research and narrative inquiry were used as a basis for this research. The data revealed that the teachers’ socialization was somewhat informal in that little was required from them to gain entrance into the program. Once teaching, the participants dealt with challenges in their teaching contexts and the program. From these challenges, the teachers were able to make decisions concerning their future as teachers, forming and imagining their identity.
The concept of ‘World English’ and its implications for ELT
World English (WE) belongs to everybody who speaks it, but it is nobody’s mother tongue. Although today ever more people accept the idea that there is such a thing as WE, very few of them seem to have realized that the full implications of admitting it are much more far reaching than they had hitherto imagined. It may be that some of these implications will nowhere be felt so strongly in the foreseeable future as in the sphere of language teaching. At present, we are at best in a position to make some wild guesses concerning the kind of changes in store for us, and I would suggest that ELT is poised to undergo some dramatic changes as native varieties of English give way to WE as the most coveted passport to world citizenship.