Activity 1: Definition of Informal Assessment
In a general sense, informal assessment is the continuous, regular, on-going collection of data about the learner’s performance in the normal classroom environment and also work done outside the classroom. This data is collected through observation with the goal of providing the learner with performance feedback to be used for improvement. The term ‘informal’ can be misleading because it can lead us to believe that the assessment is not structured. However, this is not the case. Informal assessment must be based on criteria which is analytical and/or holistic in nature and not based on teacher impressions and/or intuitions. More specifically in terms of language learning, we must not only include linguistic factors involving the four skills as well as grammar and vocabulary in our informal assessment, but we must also include non-linguistic factors such as attitude, effort and participation. For each of the skills, we must define the criteria to be used in the assessment ensuring reliability and validity. Informal assessment goes hand-in-hand with formal assessment(s) and self-evaluation, with each one given a weighting to arrive at a final assessment of the learner.
Activity 2: Assessment Plan
Preamble
In an ideal world, the teacher would be able to decide how and when to assess the students. In this ideal world, I would base 85% of the mark on informal assessment and 15% on formal assessment. In informal assessment, I would include my observations of students in the classroom as well as student self-evaluations and peer evaluations with respect to both the linguistic and non-linguistic factors. For the formal assessment, I would test grammar and vocabulary as well as listening from the unit covered.
In reality in the institution where I work, I do not have complete liberty in deciding how and when to assess students. In fact 60% of the student’s grade is determined by formal assessment in the form of written tests given after every two units in the book. These tests have four parts: listening, writing, reading and grammar with each part given an equal weight in the scoring. Another 30% of the grade consists of oral assessment. At the same time as the written tests, oral tests are also given. However, I do have the liberty of basing some of this 30% on informal assessment throughout classroom sessions. The final 10% of the grade is called Teacher’s Choice and the teacher is free to determine what factors are used. Some examples of the factors used are participation, homework, attendance, and presentations.
Also, very often in reality the activities and topics chosen for the classroom are selected with the test in mind – the wash back effect as discussed by Harris & McCann (1998).
Therefore, my assessment plan for the unit is based partly on reality and partly on an ideal world; the former because at the end of the semester both the students and the institution where I work require a grade in numerical form and I do not have the liberty to determine how and when the students are assessed and the latter because my assessment plan differs from the reality of the assessment process where I work.
Assessment Plan
Unit 11: In Your Dreams
Soars, J. & Soars, L. (2005). American headway 4 student book. New York: Oxford University press.
The class meets for two hours three times per week. In addition, the students are required to spend two hours per week at the self-access centre. It is a high intermediate class – the last level of English at this institution. There are usually between 10 and 15 students in the class.
Learning Objectives:
· to be able to hypothesize about the past and present expressing regrets and wishes
· to be able to understand and use common word pairs joined with the conjunction and
· to be able to describe and (try to) interpret dreams
· to read for comprehension and be able to discuss things that people wonder about
· to listen for specific information
· to be able to complain and respond to complaints
· to be able to write a narration using linking words and expressions
Informal assessment: 85%
· Linguistic factors (70%)
o writing 15% group writing & individual writing
o reading 15% comprehension; summarizing to show understanding
o listening 20% specific details; summarizing to show understanding
o speaking 20% describe; hypothesize; complain
N.B. I have given more weight to listening and speaking because in my experience the majority of the students claim that they are more concerned with their listening and speaking than with their reading and writing.
· Non-linguistic factors (15%)
o attitude
o participation & cooperation in class work & group work
o use of English
Formal assessment: written test 15%
· grammar & vocabulary from unit
· listening for specific information
Activity 3: Instruments to Assess and Collect Data
I included seven different instruments for assessing and collecting data. They are:
1. Oral Assessment Scoring Guideline
2. Writing Assessment Scoring Guldeline
3. Non-Linguistic Factors Assessment
4. Group Participation Assessment Rubric
5. Reading Assessment
6. Listening Assessment
7. Summary of Data Collected
My Reflections on Unit 1: Informal Assessment
Every activity in every class is an opportunity for informal evaluation. But I need to be well-organized and prepared to take advantage of these opportunities, and have the instruments to do this. This unit has really strengthened my belief that informal assessment should comprise most if not all of the grade given to the student, if indeed a grade has to be given.
I also really believe that the students know best how they are progressing and that self-evaluation is a very valuable tool. And peer assessment especially for group work is invaluable.
Also timely feedback is vital to a student’s progress. Waiting till the end of the semester or the end of a course to tell the student where or what they need to work on is just too late to make a difference.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Unit 0: What is assessment?
Activity 1: Questions about the course
Activity 2: What is a portfolio?
My definition in 50 words or less: A portfolio is a package containing the work that has been done by a student during a course. It can be in any form and contain any information that the student and/or teacher consider relevant to demonstrate that learning that has occurred.
Rocio's definition: It is in fact a collection of things (pictures, samples, evidences of performance, etc). You can always go back and revise previous work. An important feature of a portfolio is the reflection pieces that should be included after you did something or produced something. It is a reflection of the process and the product Ss do. I think this is the most important element in a portfolio.
Activity 3: What do include in our portfolio for this course?
From Rocio:
Five features typify model portfolios that can be used as a systematic assessment tool in instructional planning and student evaluation. Each of these features has implications for ESL classrooms.
Comprehensiveness. The potential for determining the depth and breadth of a student's capabilities can be realized through comprehensive data collection and analysis. A comprehensive approach (a) uses both formal and informal assessment techniques; (b) focuses on both the processes and products of learning; (c) seeks to understand student language development in the linguistic, cognitive, metacognitive, and affective domains; (d) contains teacher, student, and objective input; and (e) stresses both academic and informal language development.
Although comprehensiveness is a critical component of a good portfolio procedure, a portfolio can too quickly become an aggregation of everything a student produces. A screening procedure needs to be established that will include only selected, high-priority information in the portfolio. The degree of comprehensiveness should be tempered by practical limitations of the evaluation environment such as teacher-student ratios and teacher workload. Setting realistic goals for portfolio assessment increases the probability of sustained teacher interest and use.
Predetermined and Systematic. A sound portfolio procedure is planned prior to implementation. The purpose of using a portfolio, the contents of the portfolio, data collection schedule, and student performance criteria are delineated as part of portfolio planning. Each entry in the portfolio has a purpose, and the purpose is clearly understood by all portfolio stakeholders.
Informative. The information in the portfolio must be meaningful to teachers, students, staff, and parents. It also must be usable for instruction and curriculum adaptation to student needs. A mechanism for timely feedback to the teachers and students and a system for evaluating the utility and adequacy of the documented information are characteristics of a model portfolio procedure. In ESL settings, a portfolio can be particularly useful to communicate specific examples of student work to students, to parents, and to other teachers.
Tailored. An exemplary portfolio procedure is tailored to the purpose for which it will be used, to classroom goals and objectives and to individual student assessment needs. Assessment instruments and procedures are adapted to match information needs, to reflect student characteristics, and to coincide with student linguistic and developmental capabilities. With ESL students, assessment procedures are designed to reveal information about student performance in all curriculum areas relevant to the students.
Authentic. A good portfolio procedure provides student information based on assessment tasks that reflect authentic activities used during classroom instruction. In ESL, authentic language may be assessed across several contexts: formal classroom activities, natural settings (such as the playground), and informal classroom settings (e.g., cooperative learning groups). An effective portfolio procedure will include assessment of authentic classroom-based language tasks, i.e., tasks that the student encounters naturally as part of instruction. Focusing on authentic language proficiency across sociolinguistic contexts and naturally occurring language tasks acknowledges the holistic and integrative nature of language development and focuses on communicative and functional language abilities rather than attainment of discrete, fragmented skills.
Activity 4: Definitions and Ideas about Assessment
Evaluation is the big picture. It gets fed by all the assessments that are done including, but not limited to, student assessments, teacher assessments and program assessments with everyone involved in the process participating with the goal of making improvements.
I like how Trussell (1998) defines assessment as “the gathering of evidence and documentation of the learning.” This process of collecting and organizing information about the students’ learning aids in evaluation. When we talk about assessment, there are a number of different types as seen in the readings. While we usually to think of testing as a synonym of assessment, in fact testing is just one part of assessment. We generally do testing, also called formal assessment, in a summative form after learning, for example at the end of a unit, as a kind of achievement test to see if the students have learned what we wanted them to learn. We usually give the students feedback from these tests as a grade either a number or letter.
The authors mention a number of drawbacks to relying solely on testing or formal assessment. For example the summative assessment often occurs at the end of the course when it’s too late for any kind of feedback to help the student succeed. Another example is the danger of the “wash back effect” as mentioned by Harris & McCann (1998) where the teaching choices are governed by what will be on the test rather than what should or need to be learned. Also most tests assess only those skills that are easy to measure which may not be what is the most important. This is not to say that we shouldn’t do testing but we need to balance it with other types of assessment.
Informal assessment is a continuous, everyday, ongoing activity where teachers monitor the students to be able to give them timely feedback about their performance and progress. I think this kind of formative assessment is important so that we can let the students know of problem areas early so then can to work on them before the end of the course.
In self-assessment the students themselves reflect on their progress or lack thereof, and identify any problem areas. I think that this kind of assessment is really valuable because I believe that the students know better than their teachers what they know and what they don’t know, what they have learned and what they haven’t learned, and what they can do and what they can’t do. So doing this type of assessment at regular intervals throughout the course gives students the opportunity to get help or to do whatever is necessary to ensure that learning occurs before the course is over! It also helps the students to become autonomous and responsible for their own learning but it can only be useful if the students really take it to heart and are honest in their self-assessments.
Teaching involves providing activities to help the students learn by working with the process on a day-to-day, class-by-class basis, not just to pass a test.
In summary in the classroom, we do the teaching. During and after the teaching, we do the assessments sometimes informally and sometimes formally in the form of testing. Using the assessments, we evaluate the students, the course, the teacher, the environment, etc., making judgments and decisions based on this information.
My Reflections on Unit O: What is assessment?
There are lots of different terms involved in evaluation and assessment, and it is very easy to confuse them. However having read the different authors,worked with the definitions, and discussed them with my classmates, the explanations and definitions are clearer.
Activity 2: What is a portfolio?
My definition in 50 words or less: A portfolio is a package containing the work that has been done by a student during a course. It can be in any form and contain any information that the student and/or teacher consider relevant to demonstrate that learning that has occurred.
Rocio's definition: It is in fact a collection of things (pictures, samples, evidences of performance, etc). You can always go back and revise previous work. An important feature of a portfolio is the reflection pieces that should be included after you did something or produced something. It is a reflection of the process and the product Ss do. I think this is the most important element in a portfolio.
Activity 3: What do include in our portfolio for this course?
From Rocio:
CHARACTERISTICS OF A MODEL PORTFOLIO PROCEDURE
Five features typify model portfolios that can be used as a systematic assessment tool in instructional planning and student evaluation. Each of these features has implications for ESL classrooms.
Comprehensiveness. The potential for determining the depth and breadth of a student's capabilities can be realized through comprehensive data collection and analysis. A comprehensive approach (a) uses both formal and informal assessment techniques; (b) focuses on both the processes and products of learning; (c) seeks to understand student language development in the linguistic, cognitive, metacognitive, and affective domains; (d) contains teacher, student, and objective input; and (e) stresses both academic and informal language development.
Although comprehensiveness is a critical component of a good portfolio procedure, a portfolio can too quickly become an aggregation of everything a student produces. A screening procedure needs to be established that will include only selected, high-priority information in the portfolio. The degree of comprehensiveness should be tempered by practical limitations of the evaluation environment such as teacher-student ratios and teacher workload. Setting realistic goals for portfolio assessment increases the probability of sustained teacher interest and use.
Predetermined and Systematic. A sound portfolio procedure is planned prior to implementation. The purpose of using a portfolio, the contents of the portfolio, data collection schedule, and student performance criteria are delineated as part of portfolio planning. Each entry in the portfolio has a purpose, and the purpose is clearly understood by all portfolio stakeholders.
Informative. The information in the portfolio must be meaningful to teachers, students, staff, and parents. It also must be usable for instruction and curriculum adaptation to student needs. A mechanism for timely feedback to the teachers and students and a system for evaluating the utility and adequacy of the documented information are characteristics of a model portfolio procedure. In ESL settings, a portfolio can be particularly useful to communicate specific examples of student work to students, to parents, and to other teachers.
Tailored. An exemplary portfolio procedure is tailored to the purpose for which it will be used, to classroom goals and objectives and to individual student assessment needs. Assessment instruments and procedures are adapted to match information needs, to reflect student characteristics, and to coincide with student linguistic and developmental capabilities. With ESL students, assessment procedures are designed to reveal information about student performance in all curriculum areas relevant to the students.
Authentic. A good portfolio procedure provides student information based on assessment tasks that reflect authentic activities used during classroom instruction. In ESL, authentic language may be assessed across several contexts: formal classroom activities, natural settings (such as the playground), and informal classroom settings (e.g., cooperative learning groups). An effective portfolio procedure will include assessment of authentic classroom-based language tasks, i.e., tasks that the student encounters naturally as part of instruction. Focusing on authentic language proficiency across sociolinguistic contexts and naturally occurring language tasks acknowledges the holistic and integrative nature of language development and focuses on communicative and functional language abilities rather than attainment of discrete, fragmented skills.
Activity 4: Definitions and Ideas about Assessment
Evaluation is the big picture. It gets fed by all the assessments that are done including, but not limited to, student assessments, teacher assessments and program assessments with everyone involved in the process participating with the goal of making improvements.
I like how Trussell (1998) defines assessment as “the gathering of evidence and documentation of the learning.” This process of collecting and organizing information about the students’ learning aids in evaluation. When we talk about assessment, there are a number of different types as seen in the readings. While we usually to think of testing as a synonym of assessment, in fact testing is just one part of assessment. We generally do testing, also called formal assessment, in a summative form after learning, for example at the end of a unit, as a kind of achievement test to see if the students have learned what we wanted them to learn. We usually give the students feedback from these tests as a grade either a number or letter.
The authors mention a number of drawbacks to relying solely on testing or formal assessment. For example the summative assessment often occurs at the end of the course when it’s too late for any kind of feedback to help the student succeed. Another example is the danger of the “wash back effect” as mentioned by Harris & McCann (1998) where the teaching choices are governed by what will be on the test rather than what should or need to be learned. Also most tests assess only those skills that are easy to measure which may not be what is the most important. This is not to say that we shouldn’t do testing but we need to balance it with other types of assessment.
Informal assessment is a continuous, everyday, ongoing activity where teachers monitor the students to be able to give them timely feedback about their performance and progress. I think this kind of formative assessment is important so that we can let the students know of problem areas early so then can to work on them before the end of the course.
In self-assessment the students themselves reflect on their progress or lack thereof, and identify any problem areas. I think that this kind of assessment is really valuable because I believe that the students know better than their teachers what they know and what they don’t know, what they have learned and what they haven’t learned, and what they can do and what they can’t do. So doing this type of assessment at regular intervals throughout the course gives students the opportunity to get help or to do whatever is necessary to ensure that learning occurs before the course is over! It also helps the students to become autonomous and responsible for their own learning but it can only be useful if the students really take it to heart and are honest in their self-assessments.
Teaching involves providing activities to help the students learn by working with the process on a day-to-day, class-by-class basis, not just to pass a test.
In summary in the classroom, we do the teaching. During and after the teaching, we do the assessments sometimes informally and sometimes formally in the form of testing. Using the assessments, we evaluate the students, the course, the teacher, the environment, etc., making judgments and decisions based on this information.
My Reflections on Unit O: What is assessment?
There are lots of different terms involved in evaluation and assessment, and it is very easy to confuse them. However having read the different authors,worked with the definitions, and discussed them with my classmates, the explanations and definitions are clearer.
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