A Study on the Impact of Using Portfolio Assessment on English Reading Comprehension Ability of the First – Year English Major Students at Ha Nam Teachers’ Training College

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES *************************** TRẦN THỊ PHƯƠNG THẢO A STUDY ON THE IMPA

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

***************************

TRẦN THỊ PHƯƠNG THẢO

A STUDY ON THE IMPACT OF USING PORTFOLIO

ASSESSMENT ON ENGLISH READING COMPREHENSION ABILITY OF THE FIRST - YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS

AT HA NAM TEACHERS’ TRAINING COLLEGE

NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ ẢNH HƯỞNG CỦA VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHƯƠNG PHÁP ĐÁNH GIÁ TUYỂN TẬP BÀI LÀM ĐỐI VỚI KHẢ NĂNG ĐỌC HIỂU TIẾNG ANH CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGÀNH TIẾNG ANH NĂM THỨ NHẤT

TRƯỜNG CAO ĐẲNG SƯ PHẠM HÀ NAM

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Hanoi, 2014

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

***************************

TRẦN THỊ PHƯƠNG THẢO

A STUDY ON THE IMPACT OF USING PORTFOLIO

ASSESSMENT ON ENGLISH READING COMPREHENSION ABILITY OF THE FIRST - YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS

AT HA NAM TEACHERS’ TRAINING COLLEGE

NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ ẢNH HƯỞNG CỦA VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHƯƠNG PHÁP ĐÁNH GIÁ TUYỂN TẬP BÀI LÀM ĐỐI VỚI KHẢ NĂNG ĐỌC HIỂU TIẾNG ANH CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGÀNH TIẾNG ANH NĂM THỨ NHẤT

TRƯỜNG CAO ĐẲNG SƯ PHẠM HÀ NAM

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: Dr Trần Thị Tuyết

Hanoi, 2014

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DECLARATION

I hereby certify that the thesis entitled “A study on the impact of using portfolio assessment on English reading comprehension ability of the first year English major students at Ha Nam Teachers’ Training College” is the result of my own research for the Degree of Master of Arts at University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, and that this thesis has not been submitted for any other degrees

Signature:

Trần Thị Phương Thảo

Date: October 25th, 2014

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The study could not have been fulfilled without the help, encouragement and support of a number of people

First and foremost, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Ms Tran Thi Tuyet for her never – ending support and valuable guidance during this process I have appreciated her continual encouragement, challenging questions and constructive advice, without which this thesis would not have been completed

Second, I would like to take the chance to express my great attitude to our teachers

at the Faculty of Postgraduate Studies of Vietnam National University, University

of Languages and International Studies for providing is with the precious knowledge from their practical and helpful lectures

Besides, I greatly appreciate my colleagues and the participants in my research because of their generosity in giving me time and suggestion

My gratitude also goes to the authors of the books and articles listed in the sources of the references

Finally, I wish to thank my family, without whose love and support this study could hardly become a reality

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ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of portfolio assessment on English reading comprehension ability of English major students at Ha Nam Teachers’ Training College Participants consisted of 30 first year English major students The portfolio assessment was integrated into classroom activities to explore to what extent the student’s English reading comprehension ability may be enhanced Both quantitative and qualitative procedures were used for data collection and analysis Data were obtained through four channels: a questionnaire with students, an interview with teacher, students’ portfolios and classroom observation The results indicated that most of students and the teacher were in favour of portfolio assessment of reading and its procedures boosted students’ reading comprehension and raised their self – assessment and learner autonomy as well If portfolio assessment is planned carefully, it will become a powerful tool for assessing and enhancing students’ learning

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LISTS OF TABLES NAME OF TABLES

Table 1: Differences between traditional assessment and alternative assessment Table 2: Design of portfolio assessment

Table 3: Week plan for portfolio assessment classroom procedures

Table 4: Portfolio rating scale

Table 5: Suggested questions for students’ reflections

Table 6: Material evaluation checklist

Table 7: The impact of teacher’s immediate feedback and group discussion Table 8: Students’ views on their self – assessment skills

Table 9: The role of portfolio as a learning and assessment tool

Table 10: The role of portfolio assessment in promoting learner autonomy

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration ………

Acknowledge………

Abstract………

List of tables……….……

Table of content………

i ii iii iv v PART A: INTRODUCTION………

1 Rationale………

2 Objectives, research questions, and scope of the study………

3 Methods of the study………

4 Structure of the study………

1 2 2 2 3 PART B: DEVELOPMENT………

Chapter 1: Literature review………

1.1 Definition of reading comprehension………

1.2 Reasons for assessing students’ reading comprehension………

1.3 Assessment approaches………

1.4 Portfolio assessment……… ……

1.4.1 Definition of portfolio……… …

1.4.2 Types of portfolio……… …

1.4.3 Portfolio assessment……… …

1.4.4 Research on portfolio assessment………

1.4.5 Reasons for using portfolio assessment………

1.4.6 Stages of portfolio assessment implementation………

4 4 4 4 5 8 9 9 10 11 12 13 Chapter 2: Methodology………

2.1 Sampling………

2.1.1 Students………

2.1.2 Teachers………

2.1.3 Teaching reading to first year English major students………

2.1.4 Applying portfolio assessment in HTTC context………

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16

16

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17

18

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2.2 Research questions………

2.3 Data collection……….……….………

2.3.1 Instruments………

2.3.2 Research procedures………

2.3.3 Data analysis………

21 21 21 23 24 Chapter 3: Findings and discussion………

3.1 Data analysis results………

3.1.1 Data collected from classroom observation ………

3.1.2 Data collected from students’ reflections and final feedback……

3.1.3 Data collected from students’ questionnaire………

3.1.3.1 The impact of teacher’s intermediate feedback and group discussion………

3.1.3.2 Students’ views on their self – assessment skills………

3.1.3.3 The role of portfolio as a learning and assessment tool… 3.1.3.4 The role of portfolio assessment in promoting learner autonomy………

3.1.4 Data collected from teacher’s interview………

3.2 Discussion of findings………

3.2.1 Students’ perception on portfolio assessment………

3.2.2 The impact of using portfolio assessment on students’ reading comprehension ability………

3.2.3 The possibility of applying portfolio assessment in reading courses in HTTC………

25 25 25 25 30 31 31 32 32 33 34 34 34 36 PART C: CONCLUSION………… ………

1 Summary of the study………

2 Limitations and suggestions for further studies………

38 38 39 REFERENCES………

APPENDICES Appendix 1: Design of portfolio assessment………

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Appendix 2: A week plan for classroom portfolio procedures………

Appendix 3: Portfolio rating scale………

Appendix 4: Suggested questions for students’ reflections………

Appendix 5: Material evaluation checklist………

Appendix 6: Questionnaire for students (English version)………

Appendix 7: Questionnaire for students (Vietnamese version)………

Appendix 8: Teacher’s interview………

Appendix 9: Students’ reflections………

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IV

VI VII VIII

X XII XIII

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PART A: INTRODUCTION This part presents rationale of the study, objectives of the study, research questions, scope of the study, methods of the study and structure of the study

1 Rationale

Assessment is an integral part of any educational process promising beneficial backwash effects on the syllabus, materials and teaching (Tomlinson, 2005) Along with the recent developments in science, society and educational measurements, instructional and assessment practices become “holistic, student centered, performance based, process oriented, integrated and multidimensional” (Gottlieb,

1995, p.12) This is accounted for by the concerns to the traditional assessments, which typically fail to assess higher order cognitive skills and other skills essential for functioning in school (Haney & Madaus, 1989) In addition, the traditional methods such as tests are seen as particularly irrelevant to learning process (Moya

& O’Malley, 1994) and “as dark clouds hanging over learner’s heads, upsetting them with thunderous anxiety” (Brown, 1994, p.373) Therefore, researchers have sought alternative forms of student assessment that are able to solve the above problems One of the most effective types of alternative assessments is portfolio assessment

Portfolios have proved useful in providing effective feedback to both teachers and learners, enhancing responsibility towards learning and bringing positive attitudes (Yang, 2003; De Fina, 1992) Moreover, they can be used to facilitate the learning process, encourage learner autonomy and raise learners’ awareness about learning strategies (Moore, 1994; Banfi, 2003; Yang, 2003)

In spite of the significance of portfolio assessment in instruction and learning, little research has been done concerning the use of portfolios with college students in an EFL environment Additionally, this method has not been applied in evaluating the reading skills of the first - year English major students at Ha Nam Teachers’ Training College (HTTC), where the author works

For the above-mentioned reasons, the researcher would like to carry out the

following research: “A study on the impact of using portfolio assessment on English

2.2 Research Questions

Based on the objectives of the study, this study sought to answer the following three major questions:

(1) What do students think about portfolio assessment?

(2) To what extent does portfolio assessment enhance student’s reading comprehension ability?

(3) To what extent is it feasible to apply portfolio assessment in reading courses in HTTC?

2.3 Scope of the Study

As the title suggests, the study was carried out on a group of 30 first - year English majors at HTTC to examine the effectiveness of applying portfolio as a tool

of assessment Finally, due to time constraints, my research targeted only at the impact of portfolio assessment on students’ reading comprehension ability

3 Methods of the Study

The study involved both qualitative and quantitative method In order to achieve the above aims, the techniques employed to support this investigation included student portfolios, a questionnaire for students, an interview to teacher and classroom observation

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4 Structure of the Study

The thesis was organized into three parts

Part A: is the introduction which provides an overview of the study, including the

rationale, the objectives, the methods and the structure of the study

Part B, the development, is the main part with three chapters Chapter 1

conceptualizes the issues and theories of reading comprehension, reasons for reading comprehension, assessment approaches and portfolio assessment The main focus of chapter 2 is methodology, which deals with the actual procedures of the study, including instruments for data collection and analysis Chapter 3 presents the findings and discussions from the study

The last part of the study summarizes main points discussed in the thesis and mentions to limitation and suggestions for further studies

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PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter outlines and reviews literature and theories underlying this study which discusses (1) reading comprehension, (2) reasons for assessing reading comprehension, (3) assessment approaches and (4) portfolio assessment

1.1 Definition of Reading Comprehension

Reading comprehension plays an important role in teaching and learning reading a foreign language Payne (1992, p.35) defines “reading comprehension as a process

of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written language” With the same view, Grellet (1999, p.3) considers that reading comprehension is “understanding a written text meaning extracting the required information from it as efficiently as possible”

Meanwhile, both Lee and Vanpatten (1995) and Anderson and Pearson (1984) agree that comprehension is the process of relating new or incoming information to information already stored in memory Readers can connect the new information on the printed page with their existing knowledge when they critically evaluate the ideas conveyed in the text

Although the above opinions are not exactly the same, there is a common point that reading comprehension is a process in which the readers try to recognize the graphic form and understand the relation between the writing and the meaning

1.2 Reasons for Assessing Students’ Reading Comprehension

Students’ reading comprehension is often assessed for some following reasons Both Cross and Paris (1987) and Grabe (2009) agree that one of purpose for reading comprehension assessment is sorting It is used to predict learners’ academic success and determine if students are appropriately prepared for further learning and educational advancement

Another reason for assessing students’ reading performance, according to Race (1995) and Grabe (2009), is that it provides immediate feedback that is useful to both students and teachers Students themselves need feedback to help them

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promote the improvement of reading ability, find out how their learning is going Meanwhile, teachers need feedback on students’ learning progress, so that they can adjust and develop their teaching

Pressley and Afflcerbach (2005) emphasize the importance of assessment to how students deal with the new information It helps them know how to connect the new text with their experience and know how to interpret, evaluate, synthesize and consider alternative interpretations of what they have read

1.3 Assessment Approaches

Assessment is one of the crucial components of the instruction People within the educational community as policymakers, educators, students, parents, administrators have different ideas regarding the implementation of assessment strategies (Dietel, Herman & Knuth, 1991)

There are two general assessment approaches from which teachers can choose (Lauvas, Haynes & Raahemins, 2000) The first type, traditional assessment, refers

to assessment that “attempts to measure an individual’s achievement or aptitude through standardized and classroom achievement tests with most closed – ended items such as true/false, multiple choice and fill – in – the blanks” (Belle, 1999, p.6) It involves students selecting a response from the given lists and usually occurs after learning has taken place In this study, the term traditional assessment is used interchangeably with standardized tests The second type, alternative assessment, a non – traditional assessment, is anything that does not include multiple - choice tests and other forms of classroom evaluation usually seen in classroom (Libman, 2000) It requires students to create a response to an open – ended problem or task (Ryan & Miyasaka, 1995) Portfolio, performance, self – evaluations, exhibitions, cooperative learning, journals and stimulations are types of alternative assessment (Libman, 2000)

Bachman (1990), an advocate of traditional assessments, asserts “language tests can

be valuable sources of information about the effectiveness of learning and teaching” (p.3) Heaton (1988) shares the same point of view that “language testing is a form

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of measurement It is so closely related to teaching that we cannot work in testing without being constantly concerned with teaching” (p.5) Another reason for teachers, schools and assessment organization to utilize multiple - choice tests is that they are fast, easy and economical to score Besides, they are scored objectively, which may give the test appearance of being fairer than subjectively scored tests (Bailey, 1998, p.130) Herman, Aschbacher and Winters (1992, p.3) present usefulness of testing as

“For administrators and school planners, test results provide information about program effectiveness and identify areas of curricular strength and weakness….For teachers, testing provides important diagnostic information for instructional groupings, for identifying instructional needs and prescribing appropriate instruction, for determining mastery, and for assessing the effectiveness of particular instructional units or approaches For parents and students, testing information is a gauge of individual progress, which helps them understand and build on individual strengths and weaknesses”

However, they also emphasize that testing fulfills its promise only if it can represent significant outcomes for students and the important goals for classroom instruction This raises questions whether test scores represent significant learning outcomes and whether improvements in test score performance actually represent improvements in learning (Cannell, 1987; Linn et al 1991; Shepard, 1989) The answers to these questions expose some limitations of tests According to Bailey (1998) and Smaldino et al (2000), tests often focus on measuring learner’s ability

of memorization and recall, which is low level of cognition skills Besides, tests examine students’ ability at a particular time but not over time Test items are blamed for their irrelevance to classroom activities as well as the real world The final product is the core concern but not the progression of learners

Alternative assessments, on the other hand, assess higher – order thinking skills because learners have opportunity to demonstrate what they learned Furthermore, this type of assessment tools focuses on the growth and performance of students over at time If a learner fails to perform a given task at a particular time, s/he still

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has chance to demonstrate his/her ability at a different time and situation In addition, alternative assessments provide learners opportunities to practice authentic activities they might encounter in real life As this type of assessment evaluates the learning process over time and in context, teachers have chance to measure the strengths and weaknesses of students as well as get further insights into students’ knowledge and skills Alternative assessments also intend to motivate students to take more responsibility for their own learning (Hargreaves et.al, 2002; Law and Ecke, 1995; Simonson et al., 2000) However, teachers meet some difficulties when implementing this kind of assessment It might be harder to score and quite time consuming to evaluate the learners’ performance (Simonson et al., 2000) Rentz (1997) shares the same idea that alternative assessments take more time to grade than traditional ones While multiple – choice test is machine scorable, the alternative relies on human judgment

The table below summarizes the differences between traditional assessment and alternative assessment

Traditional Assessment Alternative Assessment

 assumes knowledge has a single

consensual meaning

 believes that learning is passive

 measures student’s ability at one

time

 separates process from product

(final products are all that is

evaluated)

 focuses on mastering bits of

information (associated with

lower level thinking skills)

 assumes the purpose of

assessment is to document and

monitor student learning

 believes cognitive, affective, and

 assumes knowledge has multiple meanings

 treats learning as an active process

 measures student’s ability over time

 emphasizes process and product

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conative abilities are separate

(students’ thoughts are not

considered, how students carry

out tasks is not considered)

 views assessment as objective,

value-free, and neutral

 embraces hierarchical model of

power and control (students do

not participate in

decision-making)

 perceives learning as an

individual enterprise

 provides no feedback to learners

 may cause student’s stress and

 provides useful feedback to learners

 reduces test anxiety

(Table 1: The differences between alternative assessment and portfolio assessment) (Sources: Anderson & Bailey, 1998; Brown, 1994; Slater, Samson & Ryan, 1995)

Due to the drawbacks of traditional forms of assessment, alternative assessment started being used as a means of educational reforms (Dietel, Herman & Knuth, 1991) The reforms in education require learning as an active process and assessment procedures to be congruent with instruction and learning (Baume, 2001; Biggs, 1999; Davies & Wavering, 1999; Wiggins, 1990)

1.4 Portfolio Assessment

Popular belief in alternative assessment procedures suggests that the use of student portfolio can help students successfully organize and integrate newly acquired knowledge Many language researchers have applied portfolios as a tool of assessment in a variety of classroom learning environments due to a need for more equitable and authentic assessment that goes beyond traditional testing (Stiggins, 1997) EFL teachers have also used portfolios to evaluate and enhance student’s learning As the use of portfolios may encourage students to take more initiative and control of learning and to reflect on their learning, portfolio can be a useful tool for

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fostering learner autonomy (Graves & Sunstein, 1992; McNamara & Debra, 1998) Portfolio has thus become a popular trend of assessment in recent years (Yang, 2003)

1.4.1 Definition of Portfolio

There is no “right” way to define portfolio (O’Malley & Pierce, 1992)

Arter and Spandel (1992, p.210) define portfolio as a purposeful collection of student work that tells the story of the student’s efforts, progress and achievement According to Paulson, Paulson and Mayer (1991, p.60)

“Portfolio is a purposeful collection of student’s work that exhibits the student’s efforts, progress and achievement in one or more areas The collection must include student participation in selecting contents, the criteria for selection, the criteria for judging merit and evidence of student self- reflection”

Simon and Forgette – Giroux (2000, p.36) define as “portfolio is a cumulative and onging collection of entries that are selected and commented on by the student, the teacher and/or peers, to assess the student’s progress in the development of a competency.”

De Fina (1992, p.13) states that portfolios are systematic, purposeful, and meaningful collections of students’ working in one or more subject areas

All above definitions share two common points Firstly, portfolio is a collection or selection of samples of student work Secondly, these samples are selected purposely in a way that they can reveal students’ learning progress over a period of time

1.4.2 Types of Portfolio

There are different ways to categorize portfolios such as:

Haladyna (1997) classifies portfolios into five types that are ideal, showcase,

documentation, evaluation and class portfolio The ideal portfolio, which contains

students’ all works, is not given to students a grade but they have to self – assess

their own portfolio The showcase portfolio only includes the students’ best works

It, therefore, is not suitable to be assessed and graded The documentation portfolio

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involves a collection of work over time showing students’ growth and

improvement This portfolio contains quality and quantity data The evaluation

portfolio includes a standardized collection of student’s work and could be

determined by the teacher or, in some cases by the student This type is suitable for

grading students The class portfolio contains students’ grade, teacher’s view and

knowledge about students in classroom

Charlotte and Leslye (1997) catergozie portfolios into three major types: working

portfolio, display portfolio and assessment portfolio The working portfolio is an

intentional collection containing both work in progress and finished sample of

work Its major purpose is to keep the students’ work The display portfolio is

sometimes referred to as the showcase or best works portfolio Its purpose is to

showcase the students’ highest achievement The assessment portfolio documents a

student’s learning over time, based on curriculum objectives

Venn (2000) groups portfolios into two types: product portfolio and process

portfolio The product portfolio is used to document accomplishment while the

process portfolio documents the stages of learning and provides a progressive

record of student’s growth In general, teachers prefer to use process portfolios because they are ideal for documenting the stages that students go through as they learn and progress (Venn, 2000, p 533)

To sum it up, different types of portfolio serve different purposes Based on the aim

of the instruction, teacher can select a proper type and apply it This study examined the progress students’ reading comprehension ability when using portfolio as an assessment tool; therefore, the kind of portfolio used in this research is process portfolio (Venn, 2000), or assessment portfolio (Charlotte & Leslye, 1997) or documentation portfolio (Haladyn, 1997)

1.4.3 Portfolio Assessment

According to Schrier and Hammadou (1994), portfolio assessment is particularly applicable to foreign language assessment It was introduced into the mainstream

& Desai, 1991) It is indicated that portfolio assessment can provide students with the ability to accumulate required knowledge and skills for the subject or task and bring them learning improvement (Fischer & King, 1995; Tierney, Carter, & Desai, 1991)

Sharing the same ideas with Tierney, Carter and Desai (1991), Glazer and Brown (1998) claim that keeping portfolio teaches learners to be responsible for monitoring their own learning process, progress and success When students are involved and responsible for collecting and answering classroom needs, they learn to be independent and autonomous learners (Fischer & King, 1995)

1.4.4 Research on Portfolio Assessment

In the study “Portfolio Assessment to Enhance Student Learning”, Sarker and Hu (2006) obtained feedback from 22 undergraduate students in relation to the fairness and acceptance of portfolio assessment as a tool 68% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that use of a portfolio was an accurate reflection of their ability, 72% agreed or strongly agreed that it was a fair assessment of their understanding

of subject, and 77% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed to accept portfolio as part of the overall assessment of the unit These findings indicated that most students consider portfolio assessment as a positive form of assessment

Charvade et al (2012) and Chi (2006), who examined the impact of portfolio assessment on learners’ reading comprehension ability, found the same results They both highlighted the positive effect of portfolio assessment on improving the learners' language ability

Breault (2004) and Zou (2002) found out that portfolio assessment is a better measure of performance than traditional assessment, it is more objective and it

1.4.5 Reasons for Using Portfolio Assessment

In a number of theoretical and empirical studies in education, portfolio assessment has been proved one of the effective assessment forms Some researchers have referred to the significant advantages when adopting a portfolio approach

First, portfolio assessment provides both teachers and learners prompt feedback that can enhance not only learning but also teaching process (Bailey, 1998; De Fina, 1992; Yang, 2003) Thanks to the immediate comments of teacher, students could realize their strengths and weaknesses Meanwhile, an invaluable insight into student learning and performance from reading the student’s refection may help teacher adjust the instructional and assessing practice to match individual student Second, portfolio assessment is considered as a reliable assessment tool to assess real student’s ability It provides teacher relatively truthful information about students which is collected from different sources such as teachers, student’s friends and students themselves (Brigin & Baki, 2007; Kemp & Toperoff, 1998) In addition, it becomes more reliable when students are evaluated at various points of time (Kemp & Toperoff, 1998) If a student does not perform a given task well at a particular time, s/he has chance to demonstrate her/ his ability in another time Third, portfolio assessment actively involves students in their own learning and assessment (De Fina, 1992; Alabdelwahab, 2002) In fact, that having to take responsibility for the quality and usefulness of his/her own work and being given empowerment to prove his/her own achievement engages students in learning actively

Finally, portfolio assessment enhances the learner autonomy (Barton & Collin, 1997; Kemp & Toperoff, 1998; Kose, 2006; Littlejohn, 1985; Tierney, Carter , & Desai, 1991) When doing portfolios, students are involved in decision making

Another drawback of using portfolio is that it requires teacher a lot of time and effort to score students’ works, assess students’ performance and give feedback to students over time (Racer, 1995; Schaaf, 2005; Stecher, 1998) Schaaf (2005) explains that assessing portfolios involves complex interactions among teachers’ competences, the portfolio, the standard used raters’ characteristics and raters’ interpretations Therefore, scoring students’ portfolios is more time – consuming than scoring a traditional test

Despite of taking time and effort on this work, a lot of teachers agree that portfolio

is a worthwhile burden with tangible results in instruction and student motivation (Koretz et al., 1994; Stecher, 1998)

A discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of applying portfolio assessment

in language classrooms helps us have an insight into the use of this ongoing assessment It is obvious that if planned, managed and conducted in an appropriate way, portfolio assessment can bring the best outcomes to both teachers and students

1.4.6 Stages of Portfolio Assessment Implementation

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Reviewing the literature, different frameworks of portfolio assessment are proposed for developing and implementing portfolio assessment programs in language classrooms

Johnson, Mins – Cox, and Doyle – Nichols (2010) suggest six stages in implementing portfolio assessment They are

Stage 1: identifying teaching goals to assess through portfolio The first step is to

establish the teaching goals which state clearly what teacher hopes to achieve in teaching Those goals will serve as the guide to how teacher assesses students' work

Stage 2: introducing the idea of portfolio assessment to the class Some examples

are needed to illustrate this idea

Stage 3: specifying the content of the portfolio What to put in the portfolio and how

it will be assessed is explained to students in detail Teacher also gets students acquainted with the rating scale before performing the task

Stage 4: giving clear and detailed guidelines for portfolio presentation Teacher

sets clear and detailed guidelines on how portfolios will be presented and explains the need for clear and attractive presentation

Stage 5: informing key school officials, parent and other stakeholders As an

assessor, teacher needs to notify his/her department, dean or principal because it will serve a precaution in case the students complain about his/her assessment method

Stage 6: developing the portfolio: in this stage, students do their tasks, gather

information and search substantial information about the subject Also, students and teacher must have to support each other as they go on to the development of the portfolio

While the above framework focuses on the what to do, Delett, Barnhardt and Kevorkian (2001) provide a procedure which focuses more on the how to do It is composed of seven steps with the detailed description of its implementation

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Step 1: setting assessment purpose The purposes guide the portfolio process and

help students and teacher make purposeful decisions about what to include in the portfolio and how to assess it

Step 2: determining portfolio outcomes The outcomes provide focus on the

portfolio by describing what knowledge or skills learners should be able to demonstrate

Step 3: matching classroom tasks to outcomes The generation of product will serve

as entries to the portfolio

Step 4: determining organization of the portfolio It helps:

 the portfolio be organized systematically so that the audience can understand why individual pieces were chosen and evaluate the portfolio as a whole

 schedule time for students to select and organize entries throughout the semester

 show student progress towards an outcome, not necessarily to master the outcome

Step 5: establishing criteria for assessment The criteria which are set up based on

outcomes must be clear and meaningful Rating scale is also built up

Step 6: monitoring portfolio process Teacher monitors instruction and assessment

continually to make sure that students are working towards outcomes and they are producing enough for the portfolio The adjustment may be made if things are not working as planned

Step 7: evaluating the portfolio process Teacher determines whether the portfolio

serves the assessment goals and whether the evaluation is accurate and consistent Reasons for failure as well as reason for success should be determined and noted for next time

Both two frameworks through time have proved their effectiveness In this study, their most applicable points were combined to make portfolio a useful assessment tool The process of assessing with the detailed explanation of the model would be discussed in the next chapter

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CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY This chapter recites the methodology conducted in the study, including sampling and data collection

As a result, they were almost beginners in reading comprehension when entering the college

After a semester studying at this college, their language skills regarding listening, speaking, reading and writing had improved a little bit In term of reading skills, the students, after the first semester, had been accustomed to basic reading skills like reading for main ideas, reading for specific information, recognizing the reading structure and summazing and had chances to practice on these skills

2.1.2 Teachers

There are ten English teaching staff members at HTTC Two of them have 15 years

of teaching English experience; six others have been teaching English for over eight years; the other two have taught English for nearly four years Eight out of ten teachers had MA degree All of them have a strong sense of responsibilities and are enthusiastic and helpful both at work and in daily life

In this study, the researcher invited a teacher of English who was assigned to teach reading skills in the second semester and her class, the first- year English major class, to take part in the portfolio project The teacher had been teaching English for eight years and she was willing to apply the new teaching method

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In this project, the teacher was in charge of reading lessons at class and monitored the student - teacher conferences Meanwhile the researcher observed the whole portfolio project and worked with the teacher in planning portfolio assessment procedures, assessing students’ portfolios, designing the questionnaire for students

An interview to the teacher was done by the researcher at the end of the semester

2.1.3 Teaching Reading to First Year Students

At the time of conducting the research, the students had just finished the first semester and were entering the second semester The teaching of reading to the first year students at the second semester had to meet basic requirements defined in the syllabus One major objective of reading program for the students was that after the

15 – week semester, their level of proficiency was at PET (Preliminary English Test) PET is one of five 'Main Suite' examinations offered by Cambridge ESOL The level of PET is described as low-intermediate and is at B1 in the Common European Framework of Reference

In the reading syllabus for first year students, students had a weekly 90 - minute lesson in 15 weeks This means that they would have about 22.5 hours of reading in class, which is not sufficient for students to reach the targeted level of PET To enhance their reading proficiency as well as their reading comprehension ability, students need to do a lot of extensive reading besides classroom activities Therefore, it required a supplementary program to facilitate and motivate student’s reading

The main course book for first year English major students at HTTC is Interaction

1 Its objective is to build and develop reading skills for learners The course book

is divided into two sections; the first half is for the first semester and the second for the second semester

Section one consists of the first five units which introduce basic reading skills such

as Recognizing topic, Reading for main ideas, Recognizing tittles and paragraph

topics, Recognizing reading structure, Understanding explicitly stated information

and Summarizing In this section, the reading texts are familiar topics such as

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student life, food, nature, family, traveling Its objective is to help students to practice the reading skills they have learned and provides them with plenty of useful information in order to enhance student’s linguistic competence and background knowledge

Section two includes five units, from unit 5 to 10 The objective of this section is to deepen students’ reading skills already acquired in the first semester In addition, two more advanced reading skills are introduced and practiced They are understanding vocabulary from context and making inferences The language of reading texts in this section is more complicated The comprehension questions after each text not only check students’ understanding of the text but also provide them with background knowledge about the world and complex language structures and vocabulary

Among the reading skills which are targeted at in the Interaction 1 course book, five skills were sorted out as targeted skills in this paper They are:

- Finding main ideas

- Reading for specific information

- Understanding vocabulary from context

- Summarizing

- Making inferences

Five skills were chosen as main skills in the course for three reasons First, they are among the most common reading skills Second, from the researcher’s experience, these skills, especially understanding vocabulary from context and making inference are perceived as difficult to students The last reason is that they are skills that readers “typically need to develop” (Alderson, 2000, p.1)

2.1.4 Applying Portfolio Assessment in HTTC Context

The researcher met the teacher who was in charge of teaching reading skills to the first year students of English in the second semester and introduced the idea of portfolio assessment to her After her approval for taking part in the study, the teacher was consulted to see how the portfolio assessment could be implemented as

Step 1: Planning portfolio assessment

This is the initial and crucial step because it affects the success of the portfolio project There were four sub – steps in planning portfolio assessment: setting assessment purpose, specifying the content of the portfolio, establishing criteria for assessment and planning classroom procedures

The first sub - step was setting assessment purpose (See Appendix 1) This project

was designed to help students develop five targeted reading skills, which were reading for main ideas, reading for specific information, summazing, understanding vocabulary from context and making inferences Besides, the self – assessment skills, self – study and active learning of students were encouraged Through finding materials, the ability of material searching skills was expected to develop as well

The second step was determining the portfolio content (See Appendix 1) In this

step, what to put in the portfolio and how to organize the information were decided The portfolio contents included five portfolio entries of targeted reading skills in the second semester Normally, each portfolio entry had to contain (1) one sample of student’s work, (2) two samples of their friends’ work (reading exercises) and (3) two types of assessment: student’s reflection and teacher’s assessment A students’ final feedback indicating their reactions towards the whole portfolio project and advantages and disadvantages of portfolio assessment was attached with five portfolio entries before being submitted to the teacher

The next step is establishing criteria for assessment (See Appendix 1) by which

students’ portfolios would be assessed In this project, there were two types of

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assessment used to evaluate each portfolio entry: student’s reflection and teacher’s assessment with the help of portfolio rating scale (See Appendix 2)

The last step was planning classroom procedures (See Appendix 3) Portfolios were

integrated in classroom activities during the semester Each 90 - minute reading lesson was divided into two sections The first section was the presentation of all the targeted skills stated in Interaction 1, the reading course book of the first year English majors at HTTC The second section was for portfolios First, students were required to collect one reading exercise related to the targeted skill of the week After collecting the right type of reading exercise, they did it at home Next, they shared their exercise with two friends and discussed their performances The discussion would serve as input information for their reflections at home The students wrote their reflection freely about their learning experience in the week based on some suggested questions In the following week, there was a conference between the students and the teacher about the work they did and then students handed in all the materials on one entry to the teacher for assessment

Step 2: Introducing portfolio assessment to the students

Two weeks before the second semester, the teacher and the researcher had a meeting with students to discuss about the ideas of portfolio assessment, its purposes, its requirements, the how of assessment and classroom procedures A number of samples and handouts including all necessary components in portfolio design were delivered A portfolio sample with core items in an entry such as reading exercises, reflection and teacher’s assessment was given to the students To help students in evaluating the collected readings, a material evaluation checklist was also provided (See Appendix 5) To help students in writing reflection, some guided questions were suggested (See Appendix 4)

Step 3: Implementing portfolio assessment

After everything had been ready, the researcher implemented the portfolio project according to the portfolio design The students did the tasks they were assigned and submitted their portfolio entry as in the plan The teacher and the researcher

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monitored the process of portfolio completion and gave continuous assessment in conferences with students and in students’ works to make sure that students went in the right direction

Step 4: Evaluating the portfolio process

In the final step of the portfolio assessment procedures, the students were asked to exhibit their portfolio with a showcase of their work in the fifteenth week of the project It was the right time for the teacher and the researcher to review the whole portfolio process and evaluate its success The reasons for failure and success were aware of for the future improvement

(1) What do students think about portfolio assessment?

(2) To what extent does portfolio assessment enhance student’s reading comprehension ability?

(3) To what extent is it feasible to apply portfolio assessment in reading courses in HTTC?

2.3 Data Collection

2.3.1 Instruments

The present study attempted to find out the impact of using portfolio as a tool of assessment on students’ reading comprehension In order to obtain the data, students’ reflections, questionnaire for students, interview to teacher and classroom observation were the main devices in this study

Classroom Observation

According to Reed and Bergemann (2005, p.22), observation is “the act or practice

of paying attention to people, events, and/or the environment” In addition, it helps observer to watch people do and listen to what they say without asking them about

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their views, feelings or attitudes (Robson, 1993, p.191) Therefore, the researcher decided to use it as a means to explore the students’ attitudes towards using portfolio as an assessment tool The data collected from observing students’ activities and attitudes in class helped the researcher investigate if what they did in practice was congruent with what they said

Students’ Reflections

As part of the portfolio procedures, students’ reflections had to be submitted after every two weeks for teacher’s assessment These reflections provided the teacher and the researcher with valuable source of information to judge students’ progress and brought students chances to self – assess

The reflections were written in free style Each reflection should reflect their thought about the following features:

 the reading skill to be acquired in the week

 the exercise they have collected

 their performance on the exercises collected by their friends

 the reading strategies used to do the type of exercise in the week

 the challenges they met when doing the task

Questionnaire for Students

A questionnaire was conducted to investigate students’ perceptions of impact of portfolio assessment on their reading comprehension ability:

The questionnaire consists of two parts: part A for personal information and part B for content information It was designed based on the features of portfolio assessment suggested by Barton and Collin (1997), De Fina (1992), Kemp and Toperoff (1998), portfolio assessment framework of Delett, Barhardt and Kevorkkian (2001) and classroom observation The questionnaire was designed to explore the students’ detailed views about using portfolio as a means of assessment

to reading comprehension ability Specifically, the 21 questionnaire items was designed to investigate (1) the impact of teacher’s immediate feedback and group discussion, (2) students’ views on their self – assessment skills, (3) the role of

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portfolio as a learning and assessment tool, and (4) the role of portfolio assessment

in promoting the learner autonomy (See Appendix 6) The rating of questionnaire based on a four – point scales ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree To avoid student’s misunderstanding, the Vietnamese version was delivered to students (See Appendix 7)

Interview to Teacher

The interview included two sections Section 1 asked for personal information of the interviewee The second one contained 7 questions asking about the type of assessment procedure she followed in her class; the reliability of the assessment used; her knowledge on portfolio assessment before the project; the benefits and difficulties she met when using this assessment method; the way she overcame the difficulties and her future plan towards portfolio assessment The transcript of the interview was in Appendix 8

2.3.2 Research Procedures

The research was carried out in the second semester of school year 2013 – 2014 At the very beginning of the second semester, the researcher had a meeting with the teacher in charge of teaching reading skills to the first year English major students

in the second semester to talk about the portfolio assessment Then, thirty students

in her class were selected participants in this study

First, the portfolio assessment procedures were implemented in 15 weeks The portfolio assessment plan, its objectives, contents, classroom procedure, home activities and methods of assessment were explained clearly to the students in the first week From week 2 to 14, the portfolio assessment project was carried out During the project, the students’ portfolio entries were collected, read and analyzed

by both the teacher and the researcher Relevant information about students’ opinions towards the program in their reflections helped the teacher be aware of the effectiveness of her instruction and identify students’ progress as well as difficulties they met in the course Students’ portfolios were evaluated and graded by the teacher and the researcher based on the Portfolio rating scale

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Second, a questionnaire was delivered to students in the last week of the semester to find out the students’ views towards effectiveness of portfolio assessment on students’ reading comprehension ability

Third, a teacher interview was made at the end of the 15 weeks to explore the teacher’s opinions of portfolio assessment It was recorded and then transcribed The classroom observation was made during the semester to get further information

on students’ attitudes towards portfolio assessment

Students’ reflections and final feedback:

As a part of portfolio assessment project, the reflections served as valuable source

of information for the researcher to evaluate students’ progress and benefits they gained from this portfolio project The students’ final feedback provided the researcher with a deeper insight into students’ attitudes towards the use of portfolio

as a learning and assessment tool

The data from the reflections and feedbacks was analyzed qualitatively to seek the answers to the research questions

Teacher interview:

The interview to the teacher was conducted at the end of the semester to get her opinions on the implemetation of porfolio assessment, advantages as well as disadavantages she encountered and her future plan The analyzed data supplied more information for the second and third research questions

Classroom observation:

During the classroom activities and the conferences, the researcher observed and

noted down the students’ reactions and attitudes when doing portfolios The data was used to examine if it matched with the findings from the portfolios and questionnaires’ analysis

3.1.1 Data Collected from Classroom Observation

The observation was conducted in the classroom activities and conferences with the teacher during the 15 weeks

Some frustration was exhibited by several students at the beginning of the semester However, these worries gradually faded as they became familiar with the task and began to understand and follow the criteria checklists

In general, students’ interest and participation in classroom was growing when they worked with their peers In the first lessons, some students hesitated in discussing with their friends This situation gradually changed after they were encouraged by

the teacher and their friends More questions about learning strategies such as “How

can I find the key words?”, “How did you infer?”, “Why did you choose this answer?” and so on were addressed freely to the teacher in discussions All of the

students were eager to show their portfolio in the last week of the semester

However, there were few weak and shy students who were not involved in class activities as actively as the others

In short, the data from observation revealed the favorable attitudes of students towards the use of portfolio assessment The data was also a source to design the students’ questionnaire and the teacher’s interview

3.1.2 Data Collected from Students’ Reflections and Final Feedback in Portfolios

The reflections in the portfolios provided the researcher a deeper insight towards the portfolio use as an assessment tool Both the negative and positive sides of portfolio assessment were mentioned Except some critical attitudes, most of the students

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perceived their progress in learning of reading skills It was noticed that their learning became more active and autonomous when they could manage to examine their improvement and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses

As stated at the beginning of the portfolio assessment project, the primary purpose

of portfolio project was to develop student’s reading skills in order to enhance their reading comprehension ability The students’ reflections quoted below revealed the beneficial impact of portfolio program on enhancing the reading skills

In the first two weeks, reading for main ideas was the targeted reading skill Students made some incisive comments on the ways they acquired this skill such as

“I know that I need to use skimming skill I read the paragraph at once, underlined

some key words and then read the first and last sentence carefully because the main idea could be two sentences” This student realized that “this strategy is quite useful

to find the main idea” Other student expressed her difficulties in doing this type of

exercise “Maybe I did not know how to catch key words” Later she could do it with the help of her classmates “my friends showed me how to find key words, I could

find the main idea correctly” These reflections were quite typical reflections among

students

For the exercise on reading for specific information, although most students reflected that reading for specific information was easier than finding the main ideas, some had difficulties when doing it One student had problem in finding the

unstated information “There are still some questions which I cannot find the

information until I discussed with my friends They showed me how to find unstated information.” The other disclosed her tip when doing this type of exercise “I realize that I don’t need to read every word and read too carefully Now I know how to find the specific information quickly by reading the heading and sub – headings to locate the needed information”

Summarizing is seen as a difficult reading skill However, a number of students showed a good result when doing this type of exercise One student prided her

result “I answered 8 out of 10 correct” Other identified her weakness “After group