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The Writing Portfolio

LEARNING OUTCOMES
Upon completion of this chapter, you should be able to: 1. Design portfolio assessment; 2. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of portfolios; 3. Become familiar with designing, managing and assessing portfolios; and 4. Utilise portfolios evaluation.

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INTRODUCTION
As teachers of writing, we are expected to assess and evaluate students' writing. Teachers are required to weave assessment into instruction and provide chances for students to utilize evaluation skills as a learning task (Chen, 2006). Whatever our approach to the teaching of writing, we must assign grades and prepare students for programmatic assessment. As Peter Elbow (1993:187) has noted, "Much of what we do in the classroom is determined by the assessment structures we work under". In the field of second language writing assessment, the return to the direct assessment of writing, as seen as an attempt to make the assessment structures we work under more valid (Albertini, 1994). The writing of portfolio seems to show the greatest promise in enhancing diverse dimensions of learning and developing multiple intelligences as well as promoting learner autonomy in comparison to other non-traditional approaches to instruction and assessment (Chang, 2001; Dai, 2003). As Gottlieb (1995:12) puts it, portfolios "serve as a guide for students in making choices and in demonstrating how they reason, create, strategize, and reflect''. In short, in pedagogy the assembly of a portfolio is regarded as conducive to students' multiple intelligences, self-reflection, critical thought, learning responsibility, plus content area skills and knowledge. Research evidence also suggests portfolios as a potent device to gauge students' effort, achievement, improvement, and self-evaluation (e.g. Chen, 1999, 2000; Far & Tone, 1994; Hamp-Lyons & Condon, 2000; Hsieh et al., 2000; Newman & Smolen, 1993; Smolen et al., 1995). Hamp-Lyons (l994:54) labels portfolio an excellent pedagogical tool interweaving assessment with instruction: it provides chances to integrate more forms of evaluation into teaching, such that evaluation will become "a less threatening and more supportive activity" to learners. Moya and O'Malley (1994) claim portfolios can be used as a systematic assessment tool in instructional planning and student evaluation. Matching assessment to teaching and supplying a profile of students' learning and growth in multiple domains or skills, portfolios are thus recommended as an alternative to standardized testing and all problems found with such testing. Currently, the body of literature related to a portfolio approach to instruction and assessment is growing. Documented studies include the fields of teacher education, web-based learning, writing, sciences, and English learning. Nonetheless, relatively little is known about EFL portfolio use. Chen (1999, 2000) asked her EFL university students to compile writing portfolios; significantly, they stated the task made them better learners, readers, and writers, and was conducive to their personal growth and learning reflection. Teachers are constantly strained by heavy workload and limited time for class preparation will very likely fall back on "old but convenient" practices. Facing waves of new measures in education, apparently, many teachers cling to old practices and do not attempt anything unfamiliar. Now what they need most is a feasible model: a portfolio combining multiple approaches to instruction and assessment, plus (most important of all), one that motivates students and improves their learning. The process to create portfolios has been suggested as favorable to student learning in selfreflection, critical thinking, learning responsibility, and multiple intelligences (Belanoff & Dickson, 1991; Cole & Struyk, 1997; Gardner, 1983, 1991; Lockledge, 1997; Newman & Smolen, 1993, Valencia, 1990; Yancey, 1992). A content analysis of teachers' reflective notes, interviews, classroom observations, and students' portfolios scrutinized recurring themes and particular events/acts in students' learning. The findings indicated teachers' observations in support that
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students benefited from the portfolio system in terms of development of English confidence, learning ownership, versatile talents, and critical thinking.

10.1

PURPOSE OF CLASSROOM ASSESSMENT

The best assessment of writing in the classroom is an on-going, descriptive documentation of behavior and attitude, and that conscientious assessment at this level will allow us to move more freely in the harnesses of program-level evaluation (Albertini, 1994). The assessment strategies considered here are both valid and manageable at the classroom level; that is, they reflect real writing behaviors and strategies that teachers already use for instructional purposes. To assess writing, teacher becomes researcher and observer, records, collects, categorizes and evaluates data. The data includes documentation of changes in attitude and knowledge of oneself as a writer as well as the acquisition of skill. Because we want the student to become involved in the assessment process, the strategies go beyond observation by the teacher and include collaboration with and reflection by the student. Finally, it is important to note that assessment activities may be conducted in more than one language, and the data itself may be recorded in written or videotaped form.

10.2

PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT

Portfolios are multiple writing samples, written over time, and purposefully selected from various genres to best represent a students abilities, progress and most successful texts in a particular context. Portfolios in ESL writing contexts are a response to testing situations which ask students to produce a single piece of timed writing with no choice of topic and no opportunities for revision, seriously disadvantaging L2 writers who often require much longer to perform such tasks. In contrast, portfolio evaluation reflects the practice of most writing course where students use readings and other sources of information as a basis for writing and revise and resubmit their assignments after receiving feedback from teachers or peers. Portfolio assessment is being used as an alternative to testing in some school districts and colleges (Brand, 1992; Weiser, 1992), The writing portfolios are longitudinal in nature, diverse in content, and collaborative in ownership and composition (assuming that the student has received feedback on various drafts from instructor and classmates). The student is asked to reflect on content and process and to provide some sort of introduction to the pieces. A writing portfolio can include product, process and reflection. Inclusion of product and process allows others to evaluate the acquisition of skill or strategy; reflection reveals the writer's attitude and point of view. As an assessment tool, the writing portfolio compares favorably with standardized indirect measures of writing with regard to validity. Given the complexity and variety of real writing tasks, a collection of final drafts written on different topics at different times is more valid than a single sample of writing as well. To the extent that the creation of a portfolio mirrors the writing process followed in other college courses, it is a valid and relevant assessment of a student's academic writing ability (Hamp-Lyons, 1991:263). On the other hand, the individuality and variety inherent in this method make it difficult to estimate the reliability of portfolio assessment. Comparability and replicability of the evaluations of the portfolios is the issue. Ratings across portfolios become more stable to the extent that we
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can elicit the ratings of colleagues who read the final drafts with the same criteria as we do. One additional rating greatly improves the reliability of a final evaluation; and an additional set of comments provides the student with objective feedback in the sense it is a response from someone who has not been involved in the process of writing the pieces. Student writers can present to the teacher a portfolio of their writing, a collection of texts produced over a defined period of time to the specifications of a particular context (or to several different contexts) (Bridwell-Bowles, 1990; Lucas, 1992; Smith et al., 1991). Christopher Burnham (1986:126) defines the curricular process of a portfolio writing class: at specific points during the semester, students submit finished drafts of papers developed in class workshops. Instructors respond to these drafts not to provide an evaluation with a grade but to provide suggestions for revision as well as some general commentary about the individuals development as a writer. Student-teacher conferences during the course encourage interaction and negotiation beneficial for revision (Smith, 1991), and metacognitive learning log entries describe why students are choosing portfolio papers and how they are revising them. At the end of the course, teachers grade the portfolios which represent the results of what the students have learned and the best work they have produced during the class (Condon and Hamp-Lyons, 1991; Gold, 1992).

10.3

FEATURES OF PORTFOLIOS

A good example of a portfolio structure for an L2 writing class is given by Johns (1977), who describes a portfolio devised by secondary school teachers in Singapore for final-year students preparing for a public exam (Figure 10.1). The model illustrates how a portfolio can be used even in a highly constrained curriculum by drawing on the genres required by the school and encouraging students to reflect on these genres, on their task experiences, and on their writing practices and attitudes. Such reflections are often seen as a major strength of portfolios as they make visible what students see in their work, in their development, and what they value about writing.

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(a) A timed essay (argumentative or expository) Reflection questions include: Why did you organize the essay in this way? What phrases or parts of the essay did you particularly like? Are you satisfied with this? Why or why not? (b) A research-based library project (all notes, drafts and materials leading to the final paper) What difficulties did you encounter writing this? What did you learn from writing it? (c) A summary (one summary of a reading) Why did you select this particular summary? How is it organized? Why is it organized like this? What are the basic elements of all the summaries you have written? (d) A writers choice (any text in L1 or L2 that has been important to the student) Why is this? When did you write it? Why did you choose it? What does it say about you? (e) An overall reflection of the portfolio (a letter to the teacher integrating the entries) What were the goals of this class? Describe each entry and why it was important for achieving these goals.

Figure 10.1: A portfolio structure for advanced secondary school students Source: Johns, 1997: 140-41.

Essentially, the purpose of portfolios is to obtain a more prolonged and accurate picture of students writing in more natural and less stressful contexts. They can include drafts, reflections, readings, diaries, observations of genre use, teacher or peer responses, as well as finished texts, thus representing multiple measures of a students writing ability. The texts are typically selected by students, often in consultation with a teacher, and comprise four to six core items in categories which reflect the goals of the writing course. They can serve to either showcase a students best work or display a collection of both drafts and final products to demonstrate process ad highlight improvement. By assembling their texts over time, students are able to observe changes in their work, compare different genres and writing experiences, and discover something about the entries and their learning. Portfolios thus encourage students to reflect on their writing and criteria employed for judging it; it is an assessment that promotes greater responsibility for writing (Belanoff and Dickson, 1991; Purves et al., 1995).
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10.4

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF PORTFOLIOS

Portfolio assessments appeal to teachers of L2 writing because of the increased validity provided by multiple samples and the fact that evaluation can be matched with teaching objectives. HampLyons and Condon (2000) point out that portfolios strongly support pedagogies which involve multidrafting, revision, peer review, collaborative learning, and reflective writing. This not only helps students to more clearly see a direct connection between what they are taught and how they are assessed, but can also provide more data on individual writing progress, enabling teachers to offer more support in their weaker areas (Brown and Hudson, 1998). Multi-genre portfolios, perhaps including both narrative and expository genres, can also highlight how texts are organized differently to express particular purposes. Similarly, a portfolio can illustrate how one genre often relates to or interacts with others, as in cases where students assemble all the genres for a formal job application. But as White (1994:127) observes, a portfolio is not a test; it is only a collection of materials, and teachers still have to evaluate what is collected. Scoring a portfolio may, in fact, actually be harder than dealing with a single piece of writing because of the heterogeneous nature of what is assessed and the greater complexity in ensuring reliability across raters and rating occasions. Standardizing a single score to fairly express a students ability from a variety of genres, tasks, drafts, and perhaps different subject discipline material can be extremely difficult. There is the problem of controlling the variability which can arise from different tasks assigned by different teachers, particularly if some are intrinsically more interesting, or easy, to write about (Grabe and Kaplan, 1996:417). Teachers also need to consider the difficulties of establishing grade equivalence across raters and their own decisions in rating different portfolios. In fact, portfolios place huge cognitive and time loads on raters which mean that they may take shortcuts in making decisions (Hamp-Lyons and Condon, 1993). Table 10.1 summarizes these issues. Table 10.1: Some Potential Advantages and Disadvantages of Portfolio Assessments
Advantages Represents program goals Reflects progress over time, genres, and conditions More broad, comprehensive, and fair than exams Closely related to teaching and students abilities Students see portfolio as a record of progress Focuses on multidrafting, feedback, revision, etc. Assignments build on each other and show genre sets Allows different selection and assessment criteria Students reflect on their improvement and weaknesses Disadvantages Produces heavy workload for teachers May encourage teaching the portfolio Difficult to compare tasks set by different teachers Difficult to assign a single grade to varied collection Problems with plagiarism or outside assistance Problems with reliability across raters

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10.5

DESIGNING, MANAGING AND ASSESSING PORTFOLIOS

Portfolios differ widely as they reflect the goals of different courses and the needs of different learners, but all require careful thought from the outset. When designing a portfolio assessment, a number of questions can be addressed as a concrete starting point: What do we want to know about the writer progress? Genre awareness? Selfreflection? What texts will best achieve this purpose what genres? Drafts of final only? Peer reviews? Who will choose the entries? Teachers only? Students only? Teacher and student together? What should the performance criteria be and how will these be linked to course objectives? Should the entries receive a preliminary initial grade or the portfolio only be graded as a whole? What part will the students reflections and self-assessments play in the assessment? How will consistent scoring and feedback be achieved what rater training is needed? How many people will grade the portfolio and how will scoring disagreements be resolved? How will the outcomes of the evaluation process washback into students learning? What mechanisms should be set up for evaluating the program and making changes to it?

Once a portfolio system is agreed upon, it needs to be implemented and managed, with an initial emphasis on teacher and learner training. Students will need explicit guidance in selecting items and learning to write reflective comments on their choices, while raters must have clear criteria to ensure consistency and reliability in compiling and assessing these choices. It is important that students understand their responsibilities in choosing texts and that they are aware of the rating process. It is also important that teachers participate in benchmarking sessions to familiarize them with the scoring rubric to be used. This is to improve reliability and to ensure that students receive formative commentary based on course performance criteria. A checklist for managing a portfolio might include the points in Table 10.2.

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Table 10.2: A Checklist for Managing a Writing Portfolio

1. Determine what the portfolio is to include based on course objectives and student needs analysis. Ask students to buy a ring binder for the portfolio. They should paste a sheet in the front with the submission texts and due dates and divide the binder with labeled tabs. Discuss the purposes and procedures of the portfolio with students throughout the course. Agree on assessment decisions and scoring criteria with other teachers and communicate these, both formally and informally, through feedback comments to students throughout the course. Set aside days to conduct checks to monitor progress and help learners reorganize their portfolios. Provide opportunities for students to display their work through portfolio representations, design competitions, readings, and so on. Encourage reflection on entries by asking students to write an introduction to their portfolios and diary entries or letters to readers on its contents.

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The heterogeneity of portfolios makes them difficult to score, but there are two main approaches to grading them: Holistic Previously scored portfolio samples are used as models representing certain score levels and student work is measured against these to provide a single grade. Multiple-trait Can include text features of specific genres, but may also include criteria for draft stages, awareness of processes, self-reflective, cooperative interaction, content knowledge.

Whereas the holistic method may be effective with smaller samples, it is unlikely to be reliable with longer and more open portfolios which display considerable variation. The multi-trait option more faithfully reflects the complexities of both the products and the processes involved, but may become unwieldy if too many different criteria are scored. Hamp-Lyons and Condon (2000) suggest a useful heuristic for devising criteria based on the main elements to be assessed (Table 10.3).

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Table 10.3: Dimensions for Assessing Portfolios

Consistently present or high Characteristics of the Writer Fit between reflection and portfolio evidence Awareness beyond immediate task Perspective on self as a Writer Quality of reflection about writing Characteristics of the Portfolio as a Whole Variety of tasks Awareness of reader/writer context Sense of purpose and task Choice and management of genres Characteristics of Individual Texts Engagement with subject matter Significance of subject matter Resources used Amount of writing Quality of development and analysis Critical perspective on subject matter In-Text Features Control of grammar and mechanics Management of tone and style Coherence/flow/momentum Control and variety of syntax Consistently absent or low

Source: Adapted from Hamp-Lyons and Condon, 2000:144 When assessing portfolios, or any kind of writing task, it is important that there are some accountability processes involved so that the basis fore a particular score can be given (Hyland, 2003:239). Multiple-trait systems seem to offer the most effective means of accomplishing this, while simultaneously developing raters appreciation of the features of good writing. It should be pointed out that portfolios do not necessarily bring greater accuracy to assessment, but they do promote a greater awareness of what good writing might be and how it might be best achieved. The advantages lay principally in that the validity, and value, of assessment in increased if it is situated in teaching and based on a clearer understanding of writing (ibid.).

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10.6

PORTFOLIOS EVALUATION

Portfolio evaluation has several advantages. It reinforces commitment to writing processes and multiple drafts. It establishes the course as developmental and sequential. It establishes a classroom writing environment as the basis for effective writing. It encourages students to assume responsibility for their own writing. It allows a more complex look at the complex activity of writing.

Portfolio grading has disadvantages as well. First, teachers may not be able to prepare their students for final grades, and the resulting surprises for students who receive grades only at the end of a course may cause frustration and anger. Moreover, if students improve and improve their consecutive drafts, without grades, all students may expect the final grade of A for their best, portfolio work. Second, if the cumulative drafts of students are carefully commented on but not graded, students may learn to practice irresponsible revision. That is, they may revise only what the teacher marks, either just getting by or relying absolutely on teacher comments and becoming teacher-dependent. And as such students do less and less work on successive drafts, the teacher may find himself doing more and more. The most dramatic result of this imbalance of responsibility occurs when the teacher is the sole or most authoritative responder to studentwriting. Then a final portfolio may be more a reflection of teacher-writing than of student work. That is, constant teacher intervention can result in the appropriation of student text. One solution that retains the advantages of the portfolio approach is the modified portfolio approach. Students write 7 or 8 papers during the class; each final product is preceded by group work, peer workshops, drafting, and revising draft. Each is turned in, evaluated, and graded. The students then revise several final drafts correcting errors, adding detail, considering larger issues. During the last two weeks of the course, students select two of the revised essays, and the teacher chooses one, for additional revision and rewriting. Students apply knowledge of writing they have accumulated during the course and the cognitive changes they have made as they revise these three papers for an additional (and presumably better) grade.

10.7

ANECDOTAL RECORDS

As a form of assessment, Anecdotal Records are a way of recording information about students literacy as they do reading and writing in classrooms or other settings (Tierney and Readence, 2005). They usually represent information that is collected on the run by a teacher. Anecdotal Records have become a way of assessing students literacy development. Unlike checklists, Anecdotal Records can be made without anticipating the ways in which students engage with various events in school. Thus, Anecdotal Records not only allow teachers to engage in kid watching, but they also allow them to consider their observations and use those observations in their future interactions with students and their parents. Anecdotal Records (ibid.) require teachers to: (a) Draw upon their understanding of the child in relation to their understanding about literacy development;
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(b) Recognize significant events, as it is neither possible nor desirable to record every event in the process of a child's acquisition of literacy; and (c) Use the event to inform their instructional practice. Thus, Anecdotal Records provide teachers with information that can be used in the classroom, leading ultimately to action and then collecting more information as events unfold. Assessment is cyclical in nature. Significant incidents or specific, observable behaviours can be recorded by teachers in anecdotal records. These records provide cumulative information about students' development in the learning objectives of the language arts as well as their physical and social growth and development. By systematically collecting and analyzing anecdotal comments, teachers can evaluate students' progress and abilities to use language and then plan appropriate instruction (see Saskatchewan Education English Language Arts, June 1992). Purposes: To provide information about students' development over an extended period of time To identify the instructional needs of students

Teacher Note: To be useful, anecdotal records should be brief and focused. Anecdotal comments may be recorded in binders with a single page for each student, in a notebook with each entry dated to provide a chronological record of classroom activities and students' growth and development, or on checklists. Record an accurate description of the situation and comments or questions that may guide further observations. Anecdotal comments should be recorded daily and immediately after the observation. Anecdotal records should include information about students' strengths and weaknesses. Comments should be recorded during different times and during different activities of the day in order to develop a complete profile of students' language abilities, interests and attitudes. Examine the records regularly to be sure that comments are made for each student on a variety of skills and behaviours. Individual entries may or may not be shared with students or parents.

Anecdotal Records allow teachers to bring together knowledge of literacy development and the history of a particular student in a process of recognizing events that are significant to that students reading and writing development. In turn, this information leads teachers to a process of analysis that leads to instructional planning and the generation of new questions for assessment. Anecdotal Records are a form of assessment that acknowledgesand depends onteachers understanding of students and ability to work constructively with them. Unlike behavior
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checklists (which limit the process of observation), Anecdotal Records allow wise teachers who have a great deal of insight into children 's behavior and progress to bring all their skills and information to bear in the process of assessment. They also can be used alongside with many other assessment tools as well as the analysis procedures (such as rubrics) and reporting mechanisms (such as conferencing).

10.8

CHECKLISTS

Teachers can use the following criteria for analyzing an anecdotal record. Check the appropriate box next to each numbered statement. Write comments that will help in the analysis. Table 10.4: Checklist: Guidelines for Writing Anecdotal Records
No 1. 2. Record Develop an observation plan. Record the anecdote as soon as possible after it happens. Describe the context in which the incident occurs. Write useful notes about the activity. Notes are in separate section of form. Exact words recorded in writing dialogue/in quote marks. Paraphrased remarks not in quote marks. Information about how others responded to speakers words or actions. Written in proper order: Describe setting, then action, then how incident ended. Complete enough in data recorded to get clear idea of event. Written objectively. Interpreted carefully (interpretations in body of anecdote in brackets; most interpretation done in separate section). Met Not Met Comment

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Source: http://wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/486/497735/ObservationFiles/OT02.PDF

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10.9

EVALUATION PROFILE

Writing tasks are a form of testing (that is, students are asked to demonstrate knowledge of writing skills), and evaluation of those tasks should provide students with: Diagnosis of the tasks strengths and weaknesses; The motivation to revise and improve their writing; and A reward for hard work (Brown, 1992).

Among the decisions the teacher will make before evaluating the first set of student papers (which s/he will communicate to the class) are: (a) Whether all written work will be turned in for grading: Early drafts reviewed by peers but not graded by the teacher? Later draft reviewed by teacher and marked but not graded? Only three out of every ten journal entries (selected by the student) graded? (b) Whether written work will be graded in a variety of ways: Some revision without feedback In-class writing scored holistically? Small assignments given A+ or A? Some writing without teacher intervention? Larger assignments graded with A, B, C? (c) How the final grade for the course will be determined. (d) How the final draft of each major paper will be evaluated (the grading criteria). As the course progresses, teachers will establish baseline criteria for specific assignments beforehand (below are sample evaluation guides). Advanced writing students can be given the opportunity for input into the grading criteria for individual assignments; however, the students will probably not be able to establish the criteria alone. Teachers will also make decisions about marking student papers. Some options include: Writing corrections above each error. Writing correct language forms for errors not yet taught. Indicating an error and identifying it with a symbol (e.g., VT = incorrect verb tense, WO = incorrect word order). Underlining errors, and asking students to identify and correct. Indicating an error on a line by making a check-mark in the margin; student finds the error and corrects it.

Teachers in the process of formulating a philosophy of evaluation might consider Elaine Lees (1988) taxonomy of evaluation. She divides the activity of evaluating student writing into seven areas, some of which are teacher-responsible and others writer-responsible. The first three areas-correcting, emoting and describing-are teacher-responsible activities in which the
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teacher marks, articulates feelings and thought, and describes what s/he finds. The second three areas-suggesting, questioning and reminding-are attempts by the teacher to make direct contact with the student. They also shift the burden of revision to the student, who will use the comments to begin to form her/his revision plan. The final area, assigning, is a way to see whether or not the student has accepted responsibility; the teacher asks for specific revisions, feedback and/or rewriting in which the student will demonstrate changes in her/his writing. 10.9.1 EVALUATION CRITERIA

Many factors can be evaluated in writing, among them content, purpose and audience, rhetorical matters (organization, cohesion, unity), and mechanics (sentence structure, grammar, vocabulary, and so forth). Writing assessment works best and is most fair to learners when it takes into account who the learner is, the parameters of the situation in which the learner produces writing, and the overall context in which educational success is to be achieved for the student writer (Hamp-Lyon, 1990). Ideally, teachers should approach every evaluation as if they were readers encountering the work for the first time; they should give the students the best possible reading of their work. Evaluation of the student writing usually begins with response: written comments on a draft, student-teacher conferencing, brief teacher interventions in class. The major objective of such evaluative responses is to focus on how to help the writer solve problems by giving specific advice that is honest but never cruel or sarcastic. 10.9.2 COVER SHEETS

In addition to grading criteria, teachers can develop cover sheets as a first page for each student paper. A cover sheet allows the teacher to respond to the student writing, whether in lieu of or in addition to marginal comments, and to adhere to the criteria established on the sheet and given to students as they draft their papers. After the paper has been evaluated, the cover sheet functions as a map for student revision and a resource for revision conference. Cover sheets can change over a course term in several ways, as the number of criteria grows. Students help design criteria, either individually or as a class, and these criteria can be incorporated into cover sheets. Finally, as assignment objectives change and/or as the students accumulate more skills, evaluation categories can be added: effective transitions (or coherence), good lean-in, or successful use of outside research sources. 10.9.3 EVALUATING EVALUATION

While teachers mark and grade a piece of writing, they should consider these questions: (a) About marks in the margin or in the text (Reid, 1992b): Are my marks/comments correct? Are the meanings of my marks/comments clear to the student? Can the students read my handwriting? Have I put the mark/comment close enough to the error so that the student can identify it?

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Have I identified errors in ways that will enable the student to study them and learn to avoid them in the future? Am I labeling (awkward, bad, poor, etc.) rather than teaching? Will the student know how to improve a sentence if s/he didnt think it was awkward in the first place? Have I pointed out strengths as well as weaknesses, given encouragement as well as criticism? Have I made some specific suggestions to show the student how to improve as well as telling why?

(b) In the general comment at the end of the paper (ibid.): Does the comment reflect what I have said in the margins and the text? Is the order of my points effective and logical? Do I discuss larger, more important issues (such as organization, development, thought) before the less important areas (mechanics)? Do I complete one comment before going on to another? Are my comments vague or too abstract? If I said Work on coherence, will the student know where and how to apply this advice? Have I clearly identified the coherence problem (or whatever) in the text? Have I made specific suggestions to get the student started on revision (Work on development by asking yourself, What evidence can I use here?). Have I directe d the student to the text itself when/if I thought it might be helpful? Are my comments expressed in a way that makes the student feel s/he can improve? Have I avoided being curt, sarcastic, personally critical? Have I remembered a time when I was learning a new skill? If I question the students logic, am I sure its more than a simple difference of opinion? Can I honestly say something good about this piece of writing? Did I? Do my comments offer suggestions and open avenues for improvement for the student to consider, or do they rewrite the assignment in my own preferred style?

10.10

SUMMARY

The foundation for effective evaluation of ESL student writing rests on careful, thoughtful preparation by the teacher; planning and evaluating are complementary and continuous processes. That preparation begins with the formulation of a philosophy of evaluation and the development of approaches to evaluation. It continues with the articulation of clearly designed criteria to the students, and the application of those criteria in the early stages of student writing by teacher intervention and peer response workshops. The actual evaluation of a student draft should show respect for each students paper and work from the perspective of the studentwriter. It should identify strong as well as weak points and comment constructively so that the student will be able to form a clear revision plan.

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Students, too, have responsibilities in the response and evaluation processes. First, they must commit to the principle that revision in an integral and ongoing part of the writing process. They must be able and willing to learn to read and reread their papers from the perspective of their audience, and to listen for cues that will stimulate revision. They should be open to the responses of others and able to evaluate those responses; in workshops, group interaction reinforces the notion that writing is not just what you end up with but the activities you undertake in creating it (Spear, 1988:4).

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