A study on learners attitudes towards the application of formative assessment to teaching english writing at vietnam usa society english center m a 60 14 10

Students’ responses to the application of formative assessment in teaching English writing via three indicators feedback through grading, self-assessment and peer assessment ……….... 64 T

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY –HOCHIMINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES & HUMANITIES

FACULTY OF ENGLISH LINGUISTICS & LITERATURE

A STUDY ON LEARNERS’ ATTITUDES

TOWARDS THE APPLICATION OF FORMATIVE

ASSESSMENT TO TEACHING ENGLISH

WRITING AT VIETNAM USA SOCIETY

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to express my special thanks to the people who have helped me

to complete this study

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Dr Le Hoang Dung, my supervisor, for his practical guidance, insightful comments, valuable assistance and empathy from the beginning to the completion of the thesis If it had not been for his support both mentally and emotionally, I would not have finished the thesis

I would like to thank all my devoted instructors of the Master course in TESOL 2012 at Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences and Humanities They gave me informative, interesting lectures and academic advice that helped

me form a more scientific approach to my career and pursue my professional development

I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all my friends of this Master course, TESOL 2012, for their useful advice, support, encouragement and willingness to share their resources and experience

Another special thanks goes to my colleagues and especially students at Vietnam USA Society Language Center, Phan Xich Long campus, who were willing to cooperate in the writing course and data collection for the study Without their support, this study would not have been possible

Last but not least, my heartfelt gratitude goes to my family, especially my parents for their support and encouragement throughout the course and the completion of this study Their endless love, constant care and enormous sacrifice have always been a great source of encouragement for me to move ahead in my life

STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY

I hereby certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled:

A STUDY ON LEARNERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE APPLICATION OF FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT TO TEACHING ENGLISH WRITING AT VIETNAM USA SOCIETY ENGLISH CENTER

In terms of the statement of the requirements for the Thesis in Master’s

Program issued by the Higher Degree Committee

This thesis has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma in

other institution

Ho Chi Minh City, January 2015

TRAN NGUYEN BAO HUONG

RETENTION OF USE

I hereby state that I, Tran Nguyen Bao Huong, being the candidate for the degree of Master in TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s Thesis deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited

in the library should be accessible for the purpose of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the library for the care, loan or reproduction of theses

Ho Chi Minh City, January 2015

TRAN NGUYEN BAO HUONG

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Pages

Acknowledgments ……… i

Statement of originality ……… ii

Retention of use ……… iii

Table of contents ……… iv

List of tables ……… viii

List of figures ……… ix

Abstract ……… x

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ……… 1

1.1 Background to the study ……… 1

1.2 Hypothesis formulating ……… 4

1.3 Aims of the study ……… 4

1.4 Research questions ……… 5

1.5 Significance of the study ……… 5

1.6 The organization of the study ……… 6

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ……… 7

2.1 Assessment in teaching and learning ……… 7

2.2 Formative assessment ……… 9

2.2.1 Definition of formative assessment ……… 9

2.2.2 Summative assessment vs Formative assessment ……… 12

2.2.3 Formative assessment and some changes in the roles of teacher and students ………

14

2.2.3.1 Teacher ……… 14

2.2.3.2 Students ……… 15

2.2.4 The application of formative assessment in classroom ………… 15

2.2.4.1 Feedback through grading ……… 17

2.2.4.2 Self-assessment ……… 20

2.2.4.3 Peer assessment ……… 21

2.3 Formative assessment and teaching L2 writing ……… 22

2.3.1 Some issues regarding to assessing a written work ……… 22

2.3.1.1 Teachers’ responses to a written work ……… 22

2.3.1.1.1 The product approach ……… 23

2.3.1.1.2 The process approach ……… 24

2.3.1.2 Assessing a written work ……… 25

2.3.2 The application of formative assessment into teaching L2 writing 26 2.4 Some drawbacks of the application of formative assessment in teaching L2 ………

30 2.5 Synthesis of literature review ……… 31

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ……… 34

3.1 Research design ……… 34

3.2 Research site ……… 34

3.3 Participants ……… 35

3.4 Course book ……… 36

3.5 Research instruments ……… 36

3.5.1 Preliminary survey ……… 37

3.5.2 Experimental course ……… 37

3.5.3 Questionnaire ……… 38

3.5.4 Interview ……… 40

3.5.5 Teaching diary ……… 41

3.6 Procedure of data collection ……… 41

3.7 Procedure of data analysis ……… 44

CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ……… 46

4.1 Analysis of data ……… 46

4.1.1 Preliminary survey ……… 46

4.1.2 Analysis of students’ responses after the experimental course … 54 4.1.2.1 Feedback through grading ……… 54

4.1.2.2 Self-assessment ……… 56

4.1.2.3 Peer assessment ……… 59

4.1.2.4 General opinions about this course ……… 61

4.1.2.5 Hypothesis testing ……… 62

4.1.3 Analysis of students’ interview ……… 65

4.1.3.1 Students’ general opinions about this course ……… 65

4.1.3.2 Students’ responses to the application of formative assessment in teaching English writing via three indicators (feedback through grading, self-assessment and peer assessment) ………

67 4.1.4 Analysis of teaching diary ……… 69

4.1.4.1 Strengths ……… 69

4.1.4.2 Weaknesses ……… 71

4.2 Discussion of results ……… 71

4.3 Major findings ……… 75

4.3.1 Research question 1 ……… 75

4.3.2 Research question 2 ……… 76

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ……… 79

5.1 Summary ……… 79

5.2 Pedagogical implications ……… 80

5.2.1 A supportive classroom culture ……… 81

5.2.2 Peer and self- assessment in class ……… 81

5.2.2.1 Peer assessment ……… 81

5.2.2.2 Self- assessment ……… 83

5.2.2.3 Feedback through grading ……… 84

5.3 Suggestions ……… 85

5.3.1 Suggestions for the administrations of the center ……… 86

5.3.2 Suggestions for VUS teachers ……… 86

5.4 Limitations of the study ……… 90

5.5 Recommendation for further study ……… 90

REFERENCES ……… 92

APPENDICES ……… 97

Appendix A: Student preliminary survey ……… 98

Appendix B: Questionnaire to students ……… 102

Appendix C: Interview questions to students ……… 106

Appendix D: Teaching diary (form) ……… 107

Appendix E: Transcription of students’ responses in interviews ………… 108

Appendix F: Teaching diary ……… 116

LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.1 : Comparison between formative assessment and

summative assessment (adapted from McMillan, 2007)

13

Table 2.2 : Formative assessment techniques in teaching writing 30 Table 3.1 : Background of the participants ……… 36 Table 3.2 : Content of five units in experimental course ………… 38 Table 3.3 : Summary of implied purposes from the questionnaire 39 Table 4.1 : Students’ perception towards learning each language

the previous classes ………

52

Table 4.6 : Students’ opinions on giving feedback through grading 55 Table 4.7 : Students’ opinions on self- assessment ……… 57 Table 4.8 : Students’ opinions on peer assessment …… 59 Table 4.9 : Students’ opinions on the whole experimental course… 62 Table 4.10: Independent Samples t-Test: Whether gender affected

the attitudes towards this application or not ………

64

Table 4.11: Interview result of students’ opinions on this writing

course ………

66

Table 4.12: Interview results of Students’ attitudes towards the

application of formative assessment in teaching English writing ………

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1: Learning, Teaching and Assessment Cycle ………… 17 Figure 2.2: The formative instructional process ……… 18 Figure 2.3: Model of formative assessment and feedback (Nicol

and Macfarlane-Dick, 2004) ………

19

Figure 2.4: Conceptual framework of the study ……… 32 Figure 3.4: Data collection procedure ……… 43 Figure 4.1: Students like learning English writing skill ………… 47

ABSTRACT

Formative assessment has been proved to be an effective tool in language teaching Researches have claimed its positive effects in improving learners’ using language, especially writing skill Stemming from these strengths, this research aimed to investigate the attitudes students’ attitudes towards the application of formative assessment in teaching writing in the context of Vietnam USA Society Language Center (VUS) Eighteen participants of a VUS class (11-14 years old) took part in an experimental five-session-writing course using a wide range of formative assessment activities, among

of which were giving feedback through grading, self-assessment and peer assessment A preliminary survey, questionnaires, interviews and teaching diary were employed as research tools to explore the students’ attitudes towards this application Data analysis showed the positive attitudes of students in this course and some noticeable improvement in students’ motivation towards learning writing skill Nevertheless, a few shortcomings still existed and thus suggestions for future course were also recorded

Key words: attitudes, formative assessment, feedback through grading,

self-assessment, peer assessment

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter offers an overview about (1) background to the study, (2) the hypothesis, (3) the research purposes, (4) research questions, (5) the significance of the study and (6) the organization of the study

1.1 Background to the study

English has been a dominant language in global communication, and considered as a world language Especially, for the goals of industrialization and modernization of Vietnam in this world integration era, we are supposed to

be good at all language skills, namely listening, speaking, reading and writing Therefore, the needs of learning English have been increasing more than ever before Indeed, in our country English has been the compulsory subject in almost every educational institution from lower secondary schools to universities Moreover, hundreds of language centers are blooming at every corner to meet this strong need of learners Students are taught all language skills in most curricula since each skill has its own significance in communication

As for writing skill, it is necessary for all students because “being able to write is a vital skill for ‘speakers’ of a foreign language as much as for everyone using their own first language” (Harmer, 2007a, p.3) Teaching second language writing, as a result, has become an essential responsibility of educators nowadays since writing offers learners various benefits on both practical and pedagogical grounds The real value of learning writing has been emphasized by Wingard (1992) via two basic aspects of the learning and teaching written English, i.e writing as a channel and writing as a goal While writing as a channel helps students reinforce the grammatical structures, idioms

and vocabulary that our students have been learning, writing as a goal requires students to communicate with other people in writing That’s why writing as a channel has exercises which are introduced to consolidate language already presented and practiced orally On the other hand, writing as a channel tasks helps students develop their communication skills via filling out forms, writing letters, taking notes, writing telephones messages, etc These two aspects are sometimes inseparable, and a written task could contribute to both of them All

in all, nobody can deny the vital role of acquiring writing skill in learning a language As a result, in the field of TESOL researches, teaching and learning writing skill have been always received much attention of educators from over the world

Besides research of techniques and approaches to teach writing skill, there are a lot of researches of assessing writing papers which are worth being paid attention In the last years, educational research has provided ample support for the assertion that everyday practice of assessment in classroom is full of problems and shortcomings First, “giving of marks and the grading function are overemphasized while the giving of useful advice and the learning function are underemphasized”, which causes negative impact on low-achieving students (Black & Wiliam, 1998) Second, the managerial role of assessment is almost neglected by teachers who pay attention to the collection

of marks to fill in records more than the analysis of students’ work to discern learning needs (Black & Wiliam, 1998) In addition, “most of the available resources and most of the public and political attention were focused on external tests”, as a result, “summative assessment have been given some formal status” (Black & Wiliam, 1998) It can be seen that the practice of assessment which has been used so far could not help the learners much in figuring out their strengths as well as weakness in each writing assignments

Moreover, students’ learning needs, to some extent, may be ignored, which prevents students from appreciating the value of teacher’s assessment.

Theoretically, with an effort to improve learners’ enthusiasm for learning English and the way how to assess students’ written work more exactly, many researchers have found that formative assessment is really an interesting tool for teachers to integrate into their English classes It can help teachers “to gauge the effectiveness of their instructional practices, modify instructions as needed, and provide students with feedback on writing strengths and areas in need of further development” (Graham, Harris, & Hebert, 2011, p 5) Hence the application of formative assessment is expected to increase the interest of students and improve the quality of teaching second language writing (hereinafter called L2 writing) in the class

Through two years of teaching at VUS, I have found that there are still some negative issues regarding to assessing English writing skill Teachers who are in charge of general English class often give marks without detailed comments on the writing so that students cannot see what they have done well and what they have not As a result, no revision of writing papers is made although the writing papers have not satisfied the given criteria Gradually, students have formed a habit of caring marks rather than comments since they cannot get any benefits from teacher’s comments In other words, students have not recognized the importance of assessment in learning and often considered it

as teacher’s responsibility only In short, assessment of writing skill in the general English program at VUS is mainly summative assessment which serves for the accountability or ranking the students

Based on the theory and practical situation, formative assessment is considered to be suitable to apply in writing lessons at VUS to increase

students’ involvement in assessment process in learning English writing Thanks to that, their achievement in writing skill, to some extent, will be improved However, this study will only focus on the attitudes of learners (teenagers at the age of 11-15 years old) towards the application of formative assessment to teaching L2 writing in a proposed time since this kind of assessment is quite strange to students at VUS Then the advantages and disadvantages of this application, and some suggestions on how to incorporate formative assessment into teaching L2 writing to help increase students’ interest in learning writing in the context of VUS will be discussed later

1.2 Hypothesis formulating

Based on the practical problems addressed above, this study endeavors to draw on concepts from formative assessment to propose some possible solutions to this issue Due to the fact that summative assessment in the classes cannot figure out the full picture of students’ achievement as well as their progress in learning English writing, the scores they receive cannot help them

to recognize their strengths and weaknesses in the learning process Therefore,

in order to enhance the quality of assessment in teaching and learning writing at VUS, the researcher would like to apply formative assessment via its specific techniques in an English writing course Students after attending a writing course are hypothesized to have positive attitudes of students towards this application Additionally, the researcher could find some pros and cons of this application in the context of VUS after a course and then some suggestions will

be given to make this application more suitable at VUS

1.3 Aims of the study

The aims of this study are:

(i) To investigate VUS students’ attitudes towards the application of

formative assessment in teaching English writing;

(ii) To find out the advantages and disadvantages of this application in

writing lessons in the context of VUS;

Through the data collected and analyzed, the application of formative assessment in writing lessons will be modified and reinforced to be more suitable for this context Thanks to this, some suggestions on how to make good use of formative assessment in writing lessons in the context of VUS are

1.5 Significance of the study

The study reviews theoretical foundation for the use of formative assessment in writing lessons Moreover, the study results can highlight students’ attitudes towards the use of formative assessment in writing lessons, together with the positive and negative aspects of this application in the context

of VUS Finally, this research offers some suggestions on incorporating formative assessment more frequently and effectively in writing lessons to enhance students’ interest in learning this important language skill

1.6 The organization of the study

This thesis consists of five chapters Chapter 1 presents the rationale of the study, the research hypotheses, purposes and research questions Chapter 2 provides some theoretical background on formative assessment, the notion of assessment in teaching English writing and some principles in applying the framework in the experimental course Chapter 3 describes in details the design

of the study, research methodology, research instruments, participants, procedure of data collection and data analysis Chapter 4 reports the results of this study to see the students’ attitudes towards this application in teaching English writing The final chapter devotes for the discussion regarding related issues, pedagogical implications, limitations and suggestions for further research

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter aims to explain (1) the theoretical background of formative assessment and its implication in teaching English, (2) framework, principles in applying formative assessment in EFL classroom, (3) the rationale of incorporating formative assessment into teaching English writing and (4) how

to implement formative assessment into teaching English writing

2.1 Assessment in teaching and learning

Assessment in teaching and learning has become a favorite topic for analysis and been extensively studied in recent years In fact, as the nature of teaching and learning has changed a lot, the knowledge of assessment in teaching and learning has a great importance for helping students learn and improve teaching’s instruction (Shepard & Sheppard, 2000) Teachers need to consider not just what they are assessing and how they are doing it (particular which methods and approaches), but also why- their rationale for assessing on any particular occasion and in any context Different reasons (to motivate students, to encourage activity, to provide guidance and feedback for remediation, grading and selection) will impact on the choice of assessment instruments It is necessary to think about the agents who undertake the task and when is the best time to assess Brown (2004) believed that assessment needs to be integral to the learning process and used to rank students or to certify the end products of learning (Shepard & Sheppard, 2000) However, to ensure that assessment is part of the learning process, Brown (2004) argued that

it should be learner-centered assessment and should reflect a learner-centered curriculum Therefore, assessment methods and approaches need to be focused

on evidence of achievement rather than the ability to regurgitate information

The development of this belief has led to the hope that teachers should concentrate equally strongly on giving feedback and on making evaluative decisions about performance (Brown, 2004)

Furthermore, the assessment needs to focus as well on what is intended

to be learned (Brown, 2004) Assessment can become valid when assessors use evidence of achievement, clearly matched against the criteria (Brown & Glasner, 1999) The assessment criteria need to be clear, explicit, framed in language that is meaningful to staff and students and available well in advance

of the commencement of activities that will subsequently be assessed (Brown, 2004) From the perspective of assessment fairness in classrooms, students should be allowed to demonstrate their competence using the particular conditions that show them to best advantage (at least as one of the ways they are assessed) However, from the teaching perspective, students should not always rely on the format that is most comfortable Good instruction focuses on areas of weakness as well as strengths and ensures that students’ knowledge becomes increasingly flexible and robust across contexts of application (Shepard & Sheppard, 2000)

As a short conclusion of this issue, Black (2004, p.10) has propounded a concept, i.e “assessment for learning” to demonstrate his viewpoint on assessment in teaching and learning In his opinion, assessment for learning is any assessment for which the first priority in its design and practice is to serve the purpose of promoting students’ learning It thus differs from assessment designed primarily to serve the purposes of accountability, or of ranking, or of certifying competence An assessment activity can help learning if it provides information that teachers and their students can use as feedback in assessing themselves and one another and in modifying the teaching and learning activities in which they are engaged Such assessment becomes “formative

assessment” when the evidence is actually used to adapt the teaching work to meet learning needs.”

2.2 Formative assessment

The powerful effects of formative assessment on student learning have been recognized for years, dating back to the work of Black and Wiliam (1998) In fact, the importance of using formative assessment has a long and rich history in education In 1971, Benjamin Bloom described the benefits of offering students regular feedback on their learning progress through classroom formative assessment His work on formative assessment through the instructional strategies he labeled mastery learning It was Bloom who initiated

the phrase formative assessment and provided practical guidance for the use of

formative assessment in modern classroom (cited in Guskey, 2005)

It was claimed that formative assessment held the key to success in teaching (Berry, 2008) Different from other kinds of assessment “designed primarily to serve the purposes of accountability, or of ranking, or of certifying competence”, formative assessment is used to enhance students’ achievement via feedback in “assessing themselves and one another and in modifying the teaching and learning activities in which they are engaged” (Black, et al, 2002, p.10) As an illustration, a recent research has proved that frequent assessment feedback can help low-achieving students and students with learning disabilities enhance their learning (Black, & Wiliam, 1998) On the basis of the evidence currently available, it seems fair to suggest that formative assessment

is actually an effective teaching tool which “opens more opportunities for deep

learning” than summative assessment does (Berry, 2008)

2.2.1 Definition of formative assessment

This part is concerned with the issue of what formative assessment is In one article, Black, & Wiliam (1998) put forward the claim that formative assessment are all activities performed by teacher and his students in assessing themselves, which are as feedback to “modify teaching and learning activities”

in order to meet students’ needs Along similar lines, Cowie, & Bell (1999) defined formative assessment as the process used by teacher and students to recognize and respond to student learning for the purpose of improving that learning Furthermore, Kahl (2005) developed the claim that a formative assessment is a tool rather than simply as evaluation devices marking the end of instruction that teachers use to measure student grasp of specific topics and skills they are teaching It’s a ‘midstream’ tool to identify specific student misconceptions and mistakes while the material is being taught Besides, a closer look at the data indicates that formative assessment is generally characterized by five features (Black, & Wiliam, 1998):

(1) It is a process, not simply a specific test or other assessment;

(2) It is undertaken by teacher and students;

(3) It takes during instruction;

(4) It provides feedback to students;

(5) It provides instructional adjustments or correctives

Among definition of formative assessment, one of the most comprehensive descriptions of formative assessment has been introduced by Shepard (2006) She has presented a model of formative assessment as a tool for helping to guide student learning as well as to provide information that teachers can use to improve their own instructional practices Here are the key characteristics of formative assessment Formative assessment:

1 Requires students to take responsibility for their own learning

2 Communicates clear, specific learning goals

3 Focuses on goals that represent valuable educational outcomes with applicability and beyond the learning context

4 Identifies the student’s current knowledge/ skills and the necessary steps for reaching the desired goals

5 Requires development of plans for attaining the desired goals

6 Encourages students to self-monitor progress towards the learning goals

7 Provides example of learning goals including, when relevant, the specific grading criteria or rubrics that will be used to evaluate the students’ work

8 Provides frequent assessment, including peer and student assessment and assessment embedded within learning activities

self-9 Includes feedback that is non-evaluative, specific, timely, related to learning goals, and provides opportunities for the student to revise and improve work products and deepen understandings

10 Promotes metacognition and reflection by students on their work

Some characteristics of formative assessment have been listed above; however, among of them, there are two key features which are necessary to notice when applying formative assessment in class First, formative assessment requires students to identify their learning goals and monitor their progress towards the desired goals via self-assessment and peer assessment

Second, feedback has to be relevant to the learning goals and provides students with more opportunities to improve their work products or understanding Thus for a successful use of formative assessment, it should be expressed via three main indicators, i.e feedback through grading, self-assessment, and peer assessment The details of three indicators will be discussed in the following parts

2.2.2 Summative assessment vs Formative assessment

In this section, the discussion will point to the difference between summative assessment and formative assessment Arends and Kilcher (2010)

defined the difference as, “formative assessment involves collecting

information prior to or during instruction, that could be used by teachers to

make instructional decisions and in-flight adjustments Students can use this

information to adjust [their] learning strategies” while “summative assessment

involves collecting information after an instructional segment has occurred”

(p.132) In addition, Black and William (1998) saw formative assessment as

“activities undertaken by instructors, as well as by students in assessing themselves” prior to the summative assessment Looney (2011) also provided a similar distinction when she explained, “summative assessments of individual students may be used for promotion, certification or admission to higher levels

of education Formative assessment, by contrast, drew on information gathered

in the assessment process to identify learning needs and adjust teaching” (p.5)

In the same vain but more specific, Ewell (2002) saw formative assessment as being able to identify a “wide range of performance” whereas summative assessment simply identified how many students have achieved the target Here

is the table of comparison between summative assessment and formative assessment adapted from McMillan (2007)

Characteristic Formative Assessment

Summative Assessment

Purpose

Provide ongoing feedback to improve learning

Document student learning at the end of an instructional segment

Student Involvement Encouraged Discouraged

Student Motivation Intrinsic,

mastery-oriented

Extrinsic, oriented

performance-Teacher Role

To provide immediate, specific feedback and instructional correctives

To measure student learning and give grades

Assessment Techniques Informal Formal

Effect on Learning Strong, positive, and

long-lasting

Weak and fleeting

Table 2.1: Comparison between formative assessment and summative

assessment (adapted from McMillan, 2007)

However, there seems to be no compelling reason to argue that formative and summative assessments are mutually exclusive because formative assessment contributes to the necessary dialogue on how well students perform on the summative assessment, and summative assessment also can help in identifying gaps and trends in learning, which proves that they are

complementary approaches to provide a reliable indication of student achievement As a result, besides summative assessment, formative assessment

is also encouraged to incorporate into the assessment system in order to collect information of students’ achievement for the whole course, instead of the marks only Both of two kinds of assessment will provide teacher with completed pictures of students’ performance

2.2.3 Formative assessment and some changes in the roles of teacher and students

On the basis of the literature of formative assessment currently available,

it seems necessary to discuss about the “new” roles of both teacher and students

in classroom They are supposed to be “active, distinctive, yet complementary roles in enabling learning by consistently working to build and consolidate student understanding and skills during the course of a lesson” (Heritage, 2011, p.18)

2.2.3.1 Teacher

Further research in this area has shown the change in teacher’s roles when formative assessment is applied in the classroom Black, & Harrison (2004) proposed that “teacher interact more frequently and effectively with students on a day-to-day basic, promoting their learning” They explained more that the roles of teachers had shifted from traditional role of information provider and corrector to the other one who can support students’ learning by shaping their instructions in class so as to meet the learning needs of students The foregoing discussion implies that the teacher is like a facilitator and monitor in a formative assessment class, who can identify students’ needs and adjust their teaching to help students as well as help them to understand how well they are learning (Dettling, 2011)

2.2.3.2 Students

As Dettling (2011) contended that students in a formative assessment classroom play an active role in the process of learning They have to identify the learning goals and self- monitor their progress towards these goals Hence students are required to be more responsible for their learning than ever before

In class which summative assessment is employed, students are assessed via marks at the end of each course and most of them are less involved in assessment process, which prevents students from figuring out the progress during the course Moreover, the author also added “their role is not only to actively engage in their own learning but to support the learning of others as well” (p.12) With the application of formative assessment, students are encouraged to support each other via peer-assessment It will provide more opportunities for students to improve their understanding thanks to giving comments for their peers based on given criteria Additionally, a lot of techniques will be employed to help students identify their own learning target

so that they can steer it in the right direction and take responsibility for it (Black, & Harrison, 2004)

2.2.4 The application of formative assessment in classroom

The effectiveness of formative assessment depends much on teacher’s knowledge of formative assessment, therefore, based on some theory of formative assessment has just been explored, a framework of how to apply formative assessment in class will be suggested in this part

While observing classrooms, Bloom (1964) noted that teachers displayed little variation in their instructional practices As a result, some students learned excellently while some tended to learn very little due to their differences in their background or learning styles In other words, little variation in the

teaching resulted in great variation in student learning Therefore, to attain better results and reduce variation in student achievement, Bloom reasoned that teachers would have to increase variation in their teaching in order to better meet students’ individual learning needs

Elements of formative assessment will be reviewed as a basic foundation

to develop the implementation of formative assessment in class Heritage (2007) pointed out 4 main elements, they are:

(1) Identifying the “gap”

Figure 2.1: Learning, Teaching and Assessment Cycle

Based on the basic foundation of designing activities in a formative assessment classroom, some specific techniques have been suggested by Black,

P et al (2002) as follows:

2.2.4.1 Feedback through grading

If assessment is to be integral to learning, feedback must be at the heart

of the process Most researchers have identified “the primary goal of formative assessment as providing feedback to students and teachers about the targets for learning, where students are in relation to those targets, and what can be done

to fill in the gaps” (Andrale, 2010, p 90) It helps students to understand not only where they have gone wrong, but also what they need to do to improve They also need feedback when they have done well, to help them understand

what is good about their work and how they can build on it and develop further (Brown, 2004)

Teachers who use formative assessment provide students with frequent and specific feedback on their learning progress This feedback reinforces precisely what students were expected to learn and identifies what they learned well, and describes what needs to be learned better (Guskey, 2003) By reviewing the questions they answered incorrectly or the criteria they did not meet, student gained individualized information about their learning progress Consequently, the steps they take to remedy those problems might differ as well Besides, the correctives are typically matched to each item or set of prompts within the assessment so that students need work on only those concepts or skills not yet mastered For some students who perform well on the first assessment, there is no need for corrective work Bloom (1964) suggested that teachers should provide them with special extension activities to broaden their learning experiences Thanks to that, he believed that all students could be provided with a more appropriate quality of instruction rather than is possible under more traditional approaches to teaching Figure 2 illustrates this instruction sequence

Furthermore, by analyzing the items more frequently answered incorrectly or the criteria most frequently missed, teachers can gain highly specific information about the effectiveness of their original instruction They

Figure 1.2: The formative instructional process (Bloom, 1964)

know precisely what skills or concepts were taught well and which ones might

require a different approach In short, formative assessment not only helps

students improve their learning, it also helps teachers improve the quality of

their instruction strategies

As a summary of this part, this conceptual model of formative

assessment and feedback, suggested by Nicol and Macfarlane-Dick (2004),

synthesizes current thinking by key researchers into this topic (Sadler, 1983,

1989; Black and Wiliam, 1998; Yorke, 2003) A key feature in the model that

differentiates it from commonplace understandings of feedback is that the

students are assumed to occupy a central, and active role in all feedback

processes They are always actively involved in monitoring and regulating their

own performance both in terms of their goals and in terms of the strategies

being used to reach those goals

Figure 2.3: Model of formative assessment and feedback

(Nicol and Macfarlane-Dick, 2004)

Processes Internal to Student

l Beliefs

Student goals

Tactics &

Strategies

Learning Outcomes

Performance STUDENT

Monitoring gaps (Self-assessment)

2.2.4.2 Self-assessment

Although research has clearly indicated that feedback can enhance learning and achievement (Crook, 1988), most students get little informative feedback on their work (Black & Wiliam, 1998) due to the fact that few teachers have regularly responding to each student’s work Fortunately, researches also shown that students themselves can be useful sources of feedback via self-assessment (Andrade, Du, & Wang, 2008) Self-assessment is one of the key elements in formative assessment because it involves students in thinking about the quality of their own work, rather than relying on their teacher as the sole source of evaluative judgments Thus Boud (1995) argued that self-assessment "is a necessary skill for lifelong learning" (p.13)

Boud (1994) describes the “defining characteristics” of self-assessment

as “the involvement of students in identifying standards and/ or criteria to apply

to their work, and making judgments about the extent to which they have met these criteria and standards.” He adds that, “it normally involves drawing upon the criteria and judgment of others, but leaves decision- making in the hands of the student.” It is also a process of formative assessment in which students reflect on the quality of their work, judge the degree to which it reflects explicitly stated goals or criteria, and revise accordingly

According to Goodrich (1996), in order to make effective assessment happen, students need:

self-• Awareness of the value of self-assessment

• Access to clear criteria on which to base the assessment

• A specific task or performance to assess

• Models of self-assessment

• Direct instruction in and assistance with self-assessment

• Practice

• Cues regarding when it is appropriate to self-assess

• Opportunities to revise and improve the task or performance

2.2.4.3 Peer assessment

By extension, peer-assessment is the same, except that in this case students are explicitly involved in helping each other to identify the standards and criteria, and making judgments about each other's work in relation to those criteria Boud (1995) explains that peer-assessment is essentially subordinate to self-assessment because it is ultimately through self (not peer) assessment that individuals evaluate their actions/work and adjust future behavior/ ideas Feedback from peers can also be very powerful, both for the givers and receivers of feedback Peer assessment can be a collaborative process between students, although to achieve this, students must be clear what the learning goal and success criteria are, and teachers must teach students how they can help one another with their learning The act of giving feedback help students clarify their own understanding because when doing so they are required to internalize the criteria for quality work (Wiliam, 2006)

Peer assessment requires students to provide either feedback or grades (or both) to their peers on a product or a performance, based on the criteria of excellence for that product or event which students may have been involved in determining (Falchikov, 2007, p 132) This interaction between peer and self-assessment, referred to as “activating students as learning resources for one another”, has been shown to produce large learning gains (Slavin et al, 2003, cited in Wiliam, 2006)

Students “need to be trained how to interpret feedback, how to make connection between feedback and characteristics of their work, and how they can improve (Sadler, 1998, p 78) Students, then, must be taught and given time to practice self-assessment strategies, so they are meaningful Having access to a range of exemplars of different ways that good work might look like

is important for helping students to make decisions about the value of their own work In general, this is possible at all levels of education – that is, students at all levels can be engaged in this process Furthermore, it should be recognized that the ability to assess one's own work, or that of peers, is something which has to be developed over time It follows that peer and self-assessment should

be included at all levels to allow this development to occur in a deliberate and systematic manner

2.3 Formative assessment and teaching L2 writing

2.3.1 Some issues regarding to assessing a written work

2.3.1.1 Teachers’ responses to a written work

The way which teachers respond to students’ writing can be considered one of the most important facets because it helps students learn and improve their writing skills It means that if students receive suitable responses for their work, they can learn and make progress from what they have written Nevertheless, there has been an inconclusive debate about how to effectively response to students’ written work For the ways of approaching a written work, generally speaking there are two basic approaches of assessing writing skill: the product approach and the process approach The question of whether adopting the product approach or the process approach has caused much debate

in over the years According to Cohen (1990), teachers often treat students’ writing as a final product and make suggestions of correcting grammar and

spelling while students are more interested in comments on content and organization or in how communication is attempted In the last years, educational research has provided ample support for the assertion that only commenting without correction increased writing fluency and language proficiency (Semke, 1984) Moreover, in the results of a survey of student attitudes, most negative comments came from students who received some kinds of correction; the students who received comments on the content and no corrections commented most positively

2.3.1.1.1 The product approach

Normally, teachers often teach writing as a product and as a result, their critical attentions on what students have done (Murray, 1972) Compositions marked up with correcting errors in spelling, agreement, word order, verb endings, etc (Barnett, 1989) make students “shutter under a barrage of criticism” (Murray, 1972) In his paper, Chastain (1980) developed the claim that the teachers who are so strict of not allowing students to have errors in their writing even though they could do the same in a spoken message would make their students disappointed at the compositions full of mistakes Therefore, they are rarely involved in their writing anymore and refuse any teachers’ suggestions or corrections for the papers

There is an ample support to the Chastain’s statement that concentrating

on form and accuracy (grammar and spelling) too soon will destroy the mental activity necessary to generate and communicate ideas In fact, if teachers correct everything, students may have to deal with a lot of changes and they find hardly to absorb and incorporate (Barnett, 1989)

Therefore, there have been dissenters to the view that assessing a written work should be process-oriented approach

2.3.1.1.2 The process approach

The drawbacks of assessing writing skill via product approach have propounded the view that if each piece of writing is considered as one version

in a progression towards the expression of the student’s ideas, what the students can benefit from it At that time, writing is regarded as an expression of the mental process it entails and as a means of communication (Barnett, 1989) Generally speaking, it can be said that the writing process is how we translate ideas into written text It starts with an idea and the need to develop it, communicate it to an audience, and preserve it Every writer at every age and at every stage of development of proficiency goes through this process (Freeman, 1998) It indicated that the process of writing, according to each author, is divided into different stages

According to Rohman (1965), writing is a process of prewriting, writing and rewriting However, this process is not a linear one, yet complex Three stages interact and influence with each other constantly since the writer move their thoughts when they involve in the writing process Moreover, the amount

of time of a writer spends in each stage depends on each writer’s personality, work habits, maturity and the challenge (Murray, 1972)

Tomkins (2004) is in favor of Rohman, however, he split the writing process into smaller ones, i.e prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, publishing

He believed that the more students learn how to use this process efficiently, the more they can express themselves efficiently Consequently, for writing as a process approach, the teachers become a facilitator rather than a judge and students assume greater control over what they write, how they write it, and the evaluation of their own writing (Barnett, 1989)

It seems that the approach that focuses on the process of writing is considered to be more effective than the old-fashioned product approach for the fact that it can help students develop a more conscious, communicative and realistic approach to writing Moreover, teachers can involve students much more in the activity because most of the ideas used in the compositions come from the students themselves

2.3.1.2 Assessing a written work

While planning activities helps students develop their writing skills, assessing their written work helps teachers check the students’ progress and identify specific problems However, as discussed above, students prefer to be given comments on the content and no corrections from teachers than to be received some kinds of correction (Barnett, 1989) This has fostered debate on how to give an effective comment on written work Thus designing a specific and reliable correction system is very necessary because it serves as a foundation for teachers to give comments on written work As far as concerned, the judgment of student work is inevitably a subjective one on the teacher’s part To reduce teacher bias and increase the value of assessment, a clear set of criteria must be identified and then applied consistently to each student’s samples of writing Becker (2010) put forward the claim that a scoring rubric acts as a useful guide for evaluating the quality of students’ written responses

A rubric is usually a one or two page document which lists criteria and describes varying levels of quality, from excellent to poor, for a specific assignment (Goodrich, 1997) A good rubric describes the kinds of mistakes students tend to make, as well as the ways in which good work shines Therefore, it can give students valuable information about the task they are about to undertake, their learning targets as well as what counts as high quality work

There are two main types of scoring rubrics, i.e analytic scoring and holistic scoring According to Becker (2010), analytic scoring includes individual traits, or components, of written expression An analytic scoring rubric typically includes several writing components, such as accuracy, cohesion, content, organization, register, and appropriateness of language conventions, with each component being scored separately Analytic scoring allows the raters to focus on various aspects of an individual’s writing and score some traits higher than others On the other hand, Becker (2010) held the view that holistic scoring takes the entire written response into account to assign an overall score for the performance Holistic scoring generally places

an emphasis on what is done well and not on what is lacking or deficient

Because there are two types of scoring rubrics, when choosing scoring rubrics to measure L2 writing, the distinction between measuring proficiency and achievement is essential for deciding what should be included in the rubrics (Becker, 2010) Due to the characteristics of formative assessment, analytic rubric is preferred as it can point out the weak and strong points of students in each writing piece Thanks to that, they will know how to improve their writing skill based on the feedback from teacher as well as their peers

writing

Graham, Harris, & Hebert (2011, p.7) held the view that “formative assessment makes a difference in how well students convey thoughts and ideas through text Writing improves when students receive feedback about their written works, students evaluate their writing, and teachers monitor students’ progress.” As an illustration, Gillingham partnership Formative Assessment Project (2002) pointed out standardized test scores in reading and numeracy as

well as writing levels of students considerably enhanced via formative assessment Additionally, they also noted that such formative assessment will help teacher to measure the effectiveness of his/ her teaching in order to modify

it as needed

Graham, et al (2011) recommended some ways to use formative assessment to improve students’ writing:

• Provide feedback

• Teach students how to assess their own writing

• Monitor students’ writing progress

Moreover, they suggested some best techniques for assessing writing in the classroom as follows:

• Allow students to use the mode of writing in which they are most proficient when completing a writing assessment

• Minimize the extent to which presentation forms such as handwriting legibility or computer printing bias judgments of writing quality

• Mask the writer’s identify when scoring papers

• Randomly order students’ papers before scoring them

• Collect multiple samples of students’ writing

• Ensure that classroom writing assessment is reliably scored

Actually, these techniques are based on the features of formative assessment, yet adjusted to make it more suitable for teaching and learning writing Nevertheless, it also includes three key factors that are mentioned

above, i.e feedback through grading, self-assessment and peer assessment Thus within the scope of this study, these techniques will be incorporated during the teaching process to assess students’ writing skill via three stages (revising, editing and publishing) as follows:

- Setting achievement milestones for a task and reflecting back on progress and forward to the next stage

of action

- Increasing discussion and reflection about criteria and standards in class

- Workshops where students

in collaboration with teacher devise their own assessment criteria for a piece of work

- Writing down some “action

- Giving feedback on each other’s work (peer feedback)

in relation to defined criteria and standards

- Identifying their own “action points” in class based on the feedback they have just received

points” alongside the normal feedback they provide This would identify for students what they should do next time to improve their performance

- Providing students with exemplar assignments with attached feedback

- Asking students to find one

or two examples of feedback comments that they found useful and to explain how they helped

- Focusing on students with greatest difficulties

Editing

- Teacher should allow students appropriate period

of time to edit their papers

- Teacher target specific skills, such as capitalization or commas Working on just one or a couple skills prevents student from becoming overwhelmed

- Identifying the strengths and weaknesses in their own work

in relation to criteria or standards before submitting

to the teacher