USING
PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT FOR TEACHING READING COMPREHENSION TO ADULT LEARNERS
By
Luh Putu Artini
Ganesha University of Education
Email: lpartini_undiksha@yahoo.com
Abstract
Adult learners have distinctive
characteristics in comparison to younger learners. In English as a Foreign
Language teaching and learning, adult learners have the preference of
independence, choice and monitor their success in learning by involving themselves
in assessing their ability. To accommodate these, the teaching of Advanced
Reading for the third year students of English Education Department, Ganesha
University of Education facilitates students with an opportunity to read in
class and outside the class (extensive reading). They select the topics (under pre
determined themes) and implement portfolio assessment strategy that includes
the use of self-reflective journal and self assessment. After one semester of
in-class and extensive reading, their attitudes, motivation, and their reading
comprehension achievement was analyzed. The findings indicate that portfolio
has a probable impact on student positive attitudes and high motivation to read
systematically, and consequently results in good reading comprehension
achievement.
Key words: portfolio assessment,
reading comprehension, adult learners.
INTRODUCTION
The
learning paradigm nowadays has shifted from teacher-centered to
student-centered. This shift has brought about tremendous changes in the approaches, methods and strategies to teach and to learn.
Students are considered subjects of learning who come into the classroom with
learning potencies, and actively seek new knowledge and experiences (Johnson
& Johnson, 1987). Accordingly, the major role of the teacher is to
facilitate them to learn so that they can maximize their potencies.
The
latest curriculum in Indonesia (i.e. Curriculum 2013) was developed to
accommodate the need of students as active learning agents. Three learning
models are recommended to be in use in the classroom. First, project-based
learning is highly recommended since it involves students to do activities or tasks
that require them to do an investigation, scaffolding, collaboration and
reflection (Grant, 2002). Project-based learning is student-driven and
realistic activities that strengthen competencies in the subject areas
contextually (Thomas, 2000). Second,
problem-based learning is similar to project-based learning since both are
underlined by the concept of constructivism. The implementation of this model encourages
students to actively engage with real-life problems or issues (Toomey in Duch,
2010) so that they develop understanding of the world. Third, inquiry-based
learning is also underlined by the concept of constructivism in which students
build their knowledge by activating their inner curiosity, researching,
interpreting and reporting. They are driven by open-ended questions and collect
data in order to be able to answer the question (Kahn & O’Rourke, 2005;
Samarapungavan et al., 2008).
The
three learning models emphasize on students’ responsibility to their own
learning. Teachers are required to be creative to establish tasks and
facilitate the process. On the part of the learners, they construct knowledge
and skills and incorporate prior knowledge, beliefs and preconception to make
sense of the new information (Prince & Felder, 2006). The tasks and
activities are complex so that students develop thinking skills, including
critical and creative thinking (Killen, 1996).
In
the context of English as a Foreign Language teaching and learning the models
above are not only appropriate for teaching mature learners but also young
learners, including kindergarten and primary school children. The main point is
for the students to produce creative language in establishing a task or a
project. The models can be used for teaching the four language skills (i.e.
Listening, Speaking, Reading and Listening). For example, for teaching writing
using project based learning, young learners can be assigned to create a poster
demonstrating the story of their life from year to year with real photos
attached in the poster. They are expected to use creative language in writing
expressions like I was one year old when
I started to walk. I was two years old when I started to ride a bike. This
kind of project exercises them with grammatical language expressions in real
life setting. The complexity of tasks increases with the age or grade of the
students, therefore teachers should be alert of their levels of competencies and
design learning activities accordingly.
The
challenge for a good EFL teacher is not only on designing instructional
materials, establishing the tasks and facilitating the process but also in
developing appropriate assessment strategy. A good assessment strategy will not
only provide learners with information for reflection but also enables
learners’ mind to transform information into useful knowledge (Lombardi, 2007). According to Nitko (2001), assessment should
be authentic, realistic and meaningful. It must help learners to build their
competence as well as to do self reflection to improve their own academic
achievement.
In
teaching Reading in the context of English as a Foreign Language, teacher’s challenges
start from deciding on the reading texts, the types of assessment, and the
follow up activities. For young learners, the target may be on word recognition
and answering simple comprehension questions. For adult learners, the tasks may
include analyzing, synthesizing and evaluating certain issues; and therefore
need more complex assessment procedures. In an advanced reading course, the
types of texts, tasks / activities and assessment should meet the
characteristics and needs of adult learners. One assessment strategy that has
been considered appropriate to assess adult learners is portfolio assessment
(see for example, Brown, 2002; )
THE METHOD
This paper reports the findings of a classroom research on the
implementation of portfolio assessment strategy in Advanced Reading classes in
English Education Department of Ganesha University of Education. The research
involves 59 students from 2 different classes (Class 5C: 31 students; Class 5F:
28 students). The purpose of the research was to discuss the students’
attitudes and motivation about instructional materials and activities involved
in Advanced Reading course that employs portfolio assessment strategy. Finally
the probable impact of portfolio assessment strategy on the subjects’
attitudes, motivation and achievement is discussed. The
research was conducted for the whole semester in the academic year 2014/2015.
Classroom observation was first of all done to note the classroom management
during the implementation of portfolio assessment strategy. Students’ self reflective journals were
presented at the end of the semester from which data on attitudes and
motivation were collected. Students’ achievement in Advanced reading course was
analyzed from the results of their provisional marks from the course which were
accumulated from the portfolio assessment, mid-term and final test.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Characteristics
of Adult Learners
The
definition of adult learners varies according to the purpose of a research. Cercone (2008) quotes Moore & Kearsley (1996)
for whom adult learners are learners between the ages of 25 and 50. The
learners of these ages were considered to have distinctive characteristics to
younger learners who study in primary or secondary schools because they may be
studying and at the same time having responsibilities to their families and
job. University students may also be considered adult learners and they need
‘some types of structure’ to assist them to become independent and self
directed (Cercome, 2008). Merriam & Caffarella (1999)
define adult learners from the concept of Andragogy. These scholars suggest
five assumptions regarding the characteristics of adult learners. First, they
are considered to possess independent self-concept and ability to direct their
own learning; second, they have had growing learning experiences that become a
‘rich resource’ for learning new knowledge; third, social role of the learners
is related to their learning readiness; fourth, there is a dynamic change of
adult learners’ perspectives along the way; fifth, adult learners are likely
more motivated by internal factors (not external ones). Thus, adult learners
are more likely to be independent and self-directed learners, while younger
learners need more direction and guidance, or in other words, more dependent
upon the teacher.
As the basis of her Research and Development, Cercone (2008)
listed thirteen characteristic of adult learners. First, adult learners may have some limitation as
the result of the established learning habit such as learning stamina,
concentration span, etc. Consequently, the teacher should consider the
limitation in designing instructional design for them. Second, they have a wide
range of individual differences, including the difference in learning styles.
This should also be considered especially in material development and types of
tasks. Third, they need to be actively involved in
the learning process because they have to use their thinking ability to make
learning result in permanent ownership of competencies. Fourth, as they have
background knowledge of a particular topic as the result of their learning experiences,
learning should provide scaffolding activities. Fifth, adults have a pre-existing learning
history and they need support to work in new learner-centered paradigm. Sixth, adults have to relate what
they already know with the new knowledge, and the major role of the teacher is as
a facilitator. Seventh, adults need consideration of their prior experience. Eighth,
they need to see the link between what they are learning and how it will apply
to their lives. Ninth, adults need to feel that their learning focuses on
issues that directly concern them and want to know what they are going to
learn, how the learning will be conducted and why it is important. Tenth, adult
learners need to fulfill their curiosity about how well they have achieved,
therefore they need to test their learning as they go along, rather than
receive background theory. Eleventh, adult learning requires a climate that is
collaborative, respectful, mutual, and informal. Twelfth, adults need to
self-reflect on the learning process and be given support for transformational
learning, and finally thirteenth, adults need dialogue, therefore social interaction must be
provided during the process of learning. These distinctive learning
characteristics (as compared to younger learners) may make teaching adult
learners challenging. Their need to draw out meaning from what they learn and
to be curious about how well they have achieved the pre determined standard of
competencies will make the teacher to be selective and considerate about the
instructional materials, the types of tasks and activities, the strategy for
assessing their competencies as well as the follow up activities.
Reading in EFL
In
exploring the literature, there are different classifications of readers’
levels (see Graves, Connie & Graves, 1998; Nuttall, 1996). One of the
classification was put forward by ……….who
proposed eight levels of reading ranging from the lowest level (emergent reader
to maturing & advanced reader). As
this article focuses on adult learners, the level of reading discussed in the
highest level (i.e. advanced reading) which characterized by reading fluency
(100+ wpm), accuracy of pronunciation, and proper expressions. An advanced
reader conveniently reads longer texts in a variety of genres and employs a
variety of strategies in order to comprehend the texts. They confidently decide
on appropriate and effective strategies to meet different purposes of reading.
In advanced reading course in Ganesha University of Education, students are
trained to develop high order thinking abilities through the activities of
comparing and contrasting different elements of a text such as the theme and
topic, problems and solution as well as cause and effect relationship.
An advanced
reader is supposed to have rich vocabulary so that s/he has the capability to use
them in appropriate contexts (Mokhtar, 2010). Rich vocabulary ownership will
help readers understand and at the same time have the ability to make
inference, summarize, synthesize or evaluate information. It is then sensible
to say that advanced readers easily cope with long texts such as novels,
magazines, newspapers, internet articles, journal articles and any other forms
of reading texts.
Portfolio
Assessment in Reading Classes
Paulson
et al. (1991) define portfolio as a collection of works compiled by students
that indicate their effort, progress and achievement. The emphasis of this
notion is on students’ active involvement in their learning process which
includes selecting, judging and reflecting.
They select the evidence or sample of their work and efforts, self
assess their achievement and do self reflection on what have and have not been
learnt.
Later publication by Moya & O’Malley
(1994) suggests that the implementation of portfolio in the classroom support
the process-oriented curricula especially in the area of English as a Foreign
Language teaching and learning.
According to these scholars, there are five features of portfolios in
ESL classes: Comprehensiveness, predetermined and systematic, informative,
tailored and systematic. Being comprehensive involves critical evaluation
(either formal or informal) about what is meant by a good work or ‘high
priority’ of information. Predetermined
and systematic refer to students’ awareness of using portfolio, the procedures
of planning, deciding on the content, the assessment and performance criteria.
What is meant by informative here is that the portfolio should provide
meaningful information to teachers, students, staff and parents. The meaning of
tailored in this context is that all the work/task are carefully designed and
have clear purposes. Finally, authentic means that the assessment should be real
life and contextual so that learners can develop their understanding in both
the concept and topic and it’s relationship to real life contexts.
One
of the characteristics of adult learners is that they need
to see the link between what they are learning and how it will apply to their
real life (Cercone, 2008). This confirms that there must be a close link
between the instructional materials and the assessment strategy use. Adults also
need to test their learning while they go along. In this case, they are in need
to assess their own capability through self assessment strategy. As a matter of
fact, according to Paulson et al. (1991) as cited in O’Malley & Pierce
(1996), “without self assessment and reflection on the part of the student, a
portfolio is not a portfolio” (p.35). Thus portfolio assessment is appropriate
for adult learners since it includes self assessment in its step by step
implementation.
In this research, adult learners are the third year students of
Ganesha University students majoring in English education. They were
undertaking Advanced Reading Course, the highest level of the four series
reading courses in the department. The main goal of the course is to train them
with high order thinking abilities through reading themes that are related to
the life of adult professionals. The course is a two-credit hour lesson with
the total number of in class sessions of 16 times9including the mid-term and
final tests), each of the session comprised 2x50 minutes. In class activities, students
are trained to think critically about a particular issue. First, they read the
text under a theme silently. And then a class discussion was run by the teacher
which is guided through informative and hypothetical questions. After that, students work in groups of 4 or 5
to create analytical and evaluative questions about the text. Two groups were
then mingled and ask and answer questions. This in class activity may be
followed with writing activity that demonstrates students’ critical thinking
skill.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
General Overview about
Advanced Reading Course
The
instructional materials for Advanced Reading course were compiled in the form
of handouts and loose reading texts or articles. The texts were selected from
magazines, newspaper, journals, and online resources. There were two major
segments in Advanced Reading Course: First, in-class reading activities that
includes analyzing, evaluating, question composing, summarizing and using difficult
words into contexts. In this first segment, students were provided with the
reading texts to be discussed with the teacher taking the role as the prompter.
Usually there is only one reading text that is discussed in one session with the
variations of individual, group and class activities. Second, Extensive Reading that includes
summarizing, composing and answering analytical and evaluative questions,
listing difficult words, finding their meaning in monolingual English
dictionary and making sentences using the words, summarizing, writing opinion
about the text, and filling in self assessment rubrics. In this segment,
students are assigned to find a text or more under the same theme. They had to
read the text(s) at home and fill in their self reflective journal (see Table
02 below). There are 6 themes of texts
used in the course, with the following details.
Table
01. Themes and Topics of Texts for AR Course
No
|
Themes
|
Reading Topics
|
|
In class
|
Extensive
|
||
1
|
Human Rights
|
Gender
Discrimination
|
Student
own choice
|
History
of War
|
Student
own choice
|
||
2
|
Health & Education
|
Born
to be the Best
|
Student
own choice
|
Should
Abortion be legal?
|
Student
own choice
|
||
3
|
Unusual Life Style
|
Weird
habits of successful people
|
Student
own choice
|
The
most famous drinkers of all time
|
Student
own choice
|
||
4
|
Biography of Famous People
|
Great
Invention in human history
|
Student
own choice
|
Great
Men in history
|
Student
own choice
|
||
5
|
Economy & Business
|
His
own Boss
|
Student
own choice
|
Successful
Family Business
|
Student
own choice
|
||
6
|
Government & Politics
|
General
Election
|
Student
own choice
|
Terrorist
threats
|
Student
own choice
|
||
The
students were challenged to read as many texts as they want to and then they
have to fill in their journal. There was one week in between one session to the
other, which means they had seven days to search, print out, read, and do the
journal. The following is the content of the journal.
Table
02. Content of Self-reflective journal for Extensive Reading
Text No
|
Title
|
Comprehension
|
Vocabulary
|
Comments/
Reflection
|
||
Summary
|
Analytical
Questions & Answers
|
Evaluative
Questions & Answers
|
||||
#1
|
||||||
#2
|
||||||
#3
|
||||||
etc.
|
||||||
The
format of the reflective journal above illustrates the complexity of the
extensive reading follow up activity that the students had to do independently.
Their comprehension towards the text was represented by their summary,
self-composed analytical and evaluative questions and the answers. There was
also an activity to enrich vocabulary on a particular issue, and finally giving
comment and self-reflect on the text read.
Students Attitudes and
Motivation in Advanced Reading Course
Attitudes
in the context of learning in this research refer to what someone thinks and
feels about what he/she learns (Fielding, 2015). These were interpreted through
the comments written in the reflective journals. Motivation is defined as the
willingness to take necessary actions in order to achieve the intended goals.
In this research motivation was traced from the effort to do the extensive
reading. It includes the number of texts read and analyzed independently as
seen in the journal.
Based
on the close reading to students’ portfolio and self reflective journals of
Class 5C, the majority of the students (74.6%) showed consistent positive
attitudes towards the advanced reading course. They wrote expressions like: “I like the text because I can learn more
about interesting life style”. “I
learn many words about court and law through this topic”. Slightly
different trend was demonstrated by class 5F. 63.7% said positive things like “I learn many new words from this reading
activity”. I like reading the text because the topic is interesting for
me”. This is understandable since both
groups probably have developed ‘some strategies’ to cope with various reading
texts during the ‘in-class’ reading activities. The lecturer always encouraged
students to think critically to respond to analytical questions posed orally by
the lecturer.
From
the number of texts read independently and the effort done in filling in the
journal after reading activity, it was found that most students in Class 5C demonstrated
motivation to do extensive reading independently. There were 16.1% students who
reads more than two (3 – 4 texts) independently. This shows good motivation to achieve well in
portfolio assessment. At the beginning of the semester, students had been made
aware of the consequences for their good effort. When they read more than 2 texts
independently in a week time, they have full mark for the aspect of effort
which will affect the overall score of the portfolio. 51.6% of the students in
class 5C read 2 extensive reading texts and did their best effort to fill in
the journal (which take them at least 4 hour extra time). This can be
considered as the indication of motivation to do the extensive reading. The
remaining 32.3% of the students were found to read one extensive reading text
and did their best effort to fill in the portfolio journal. This could also be
interpreted as motivation in Advanced Reading course. Meanwhile, Class 5F
showed a different trend. None of the students from this class showed the
evidence of having read more than 2 extensive texts in a week. Only 14.3% of
the students read 2 texts and the rest 75.7% read 1 extensive reading text in a
week. Some of the comments written in the journal of Class 5F are: “The time is very limited to find and analyze
extensive reading text”. “The text
are all difficult, it takes so much time to fill in the journal”. This
difference may be the indication that there is some degree of difference in
attitudes and motivations of the students from the two classes. The reasons for
the difference are beyond the scope of this research. It may have something to
do with the background knowledge and learning experiences of the two groups of
students. The input quality of Class 5A, 5B, and 5C could be expected better
than Class D, E,F and so forth, because the students test results in the
selection process was ranked. Class A, B, and C can be expected to comprise
those with better test results.
It
is undeniable, however, that the interpretation of the data potentially be bias
due to the limitation of the research method on attitudes and motivation in
this research. But what obvious is that students seem to be very proud of their
portfolio. Each of them made the portfolio very well-organized and they
decorated it with pictures and professional cover. This also tells something in
the journal about their attitudes and motivation.
The Probable Impact of
Portfolio Assessment on Reading Achievement
During
one semester of instruction, students had gone through learning processes that require
them to interact frequently with various texts and write in their
self-reflective journal in their portfolio. The portfolio comprises cover page
for every theme, table of content, reading texts, reflective journal and self
assessment rubrics. Thus it is not hard to imagine that students built their
reading comprehension skills, analytical and evaluative thinking skills and at
the same time did self reflection toward their learning. At the end of the
semester, students have to present their Advanced Reading portfolio. They had
to put emphasis on how much they learnt, what they like/dislike, what
suggestion they would like to pass on to the Advanced Reading Instruction. The
series of activities can be expected to build good effective habit in the course.
All these systematic reading can be expected to bring about positive impact on
students reading achievement. The following table shows students achievement as
the impact of portfolio assessment strategy.
Table
03. Students’ Reading Achievement as the Impact of Portfolio Assessment
Strategy
Class 5C
|
Average
Score
(out
of 100)
|
Class 5F
|
Average
Score
(out
of 100)
|
Qualitative
|
85.3
|
Qualitative
|
77.8
|
Quantitative
|
87.5
|
Quantitative
|
79.5
|
Independence
|
86.3
|
Independence
|
78.0
|
Presentation
|
85.7
|
Presentation
|
80.0
|
Mid Term Test
|
85.0
|
Mid Term Test
|
79.7
|
Final Test
|
84.5
|
Final Test
|
76.3
|
Note
Qualitative
score
: The score taken from observing closely the portfolio at the end of the
semester
Quantitative
score :The average score between
students’ self assessment scores and teachers’ scores
about the
completeness and the quality of work as compiled in the portfolio
Independence :The
score of student’s effort as seen from the number of texts they managed to
read and the
tasks they fulfilled.
Presentation
:The score gained from a presentation on particular issue.
Table
03 indicates the achievement of students from both classes in Reading as the result
of the implementation of portfolio strategy. Students become active learners
who take initiatives to search and select the text they would like to read. The
systematic guidance about what to focus on and how to think critically in class
was directly applied independently by the students outside the class. As
Cercone (2008) points out, adult learners have initiatives to learn because
they are aware why they are doing so. All students closely followed the step by
step activities as guided by the journal in their portfolio. As the results
they become more detailed in reading a text and improve their comprehension
accordingly.
It
is interesting that there is a consistent different trend between students of
Class 5C and Class 5F. The lower attitudes and motivation in working on the
portfolio journal was followed by lower achievement in Reading comprehension.
There are two possible explanations for this finding. First, the two classes
are basically different in background knowledge and experiences about reading.
These affect their attitudes and motivation and consequently their reading
comprehension achievement. The correlation between attitudes, motivation and
achievement, have been established through intensive research. Secondly, the difference may have something to
do with commitment and dedication to work on the portfolio (including the self
assessment and the journal). Class 5C may have more commitment, spending more
time and working harder so that they can satisfy themselves with what they wrote
in the journal. This can be seen from the higher score of the portfolio
followed with the higher score in the reading comprehension achievement. It
this is true, it means that portfolio assessment strategy do bring positive
impact on students reading skills and achievement.
CONCLUDING REMARK
As
mentioned earlier, this research has a potential bias due to limitation of the
research method. Students’ attitudes and motivation were interpreted through
what students wrote in the self reflection journal of their portfolio. Positive
statements were interpreted as positive attitudes. Similarly in interpreting
motivation, the reference was the commitment of the students to do the most
effort that can be seen from the number of extensive reading texts the searched,
selected, read and analyzed. Only motivated students that can be expected to
spent hours of work independently. For more reliable findings on this
particular research topic, further research should design a more sophisticated
research method and involve bigger size of subject.
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Paper #2: Presented at CAMTESOL International Conference (March 2015) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Hidden Curriculum in Authentic
Assessment:
Investigating EFL Teachers’ Awareness and Readiness in Bali
By:
Luh Putu Artini
Abstract
This paper is written in
an attempt to describe how assessment procedures can train students to be
reflective, responsible to own learning, and develop independent learning. An
investigation on teachers’ awareness of this hidden curriculum and their
readiness for the implementation of authentic assessment in EFL classes was
conducted to 32 English teachers from 32 junior high schools in Bali. The data
were collected through document (lesson plan) analysis, interview with teachers
and classroom observation. The findings
reveal that the majority of teachers were aware of the content of hidden
curriculum in authentic assessment procedures. However, the data show low level
of readiness on the part of the teacher in the implementation of authentic
assessment. The problems encountered by the teachers refer to lack of
experience in developing assessment instruments and the absence of a good
assessment model for the teacher to refer to in developing the instruments.
Keywords: hidden
curriculum, authentic assessment, teachers’ awareness, teachers’ readiness
INTRODUCTION
Teaching is generally defined as
learning experiences that are facilitated by a human being (Smith & Ragan,
2005). In the context of schooling, the human beings refer to the teacher whose
teaching job requires the degree of professionalism. According to the
guidelines of Indonesian latest Curriculum (2013), teacher’s professionalism
covers four competencies: professional, pedagogical, social and personal.
Professional competencies refer to expertise in the subject area that a teacher
teaches; pedagogical is to do with competencies in planning, developing and
implementing methods and strategies for conducting effective teaching and
learning process; social is related to abilities to communicate, socialize and
interact positively and effectively to students, school staff and community;
and finally personal competence refers to commitment, dedication and
personalities that support successful performances as a teacher.
In the context of English as a foreign language (hereafter,
EFL) teaching and learning, a teacher has the most influential roles to the
success of learning. According to McKeachie (1998), a teacher is an expert who
has the mastery or has good proficiency in English; a formal authority who has
the rights to decide on what and how classroom activities are run or managed;
social agent who has communication strategies that encourage or motivate
students to do their best; facilitator who provide tools, facilities and media
for optimum learning; and ego ideal who guides students to be aware of what
they can do in the future with what they have learnt at school. In addition to
the factor of the teacher, Naiman et al. (1996) suggest that success in EFL
teaching and learning is also influenced by the quality of input or students
(who are different in many factors such as motivation, aptitude, attitude,
personality and cognitive styles); content (which covers curriculum, syllabus,
resources), and context (which refers to the status of the target language and
environment supports). It is then not hard to understand that teaching
profession (in this case EFL teaching) is very complex. Teachers, students,
content and context come into play to determine successful output and outcome.
From student
perspective, Strevens (1977) in Skehan (1991) suggests two major factors that
contribute to learning outcomes; first, those which are innate (which to
do with learner’s characteristics) and second, those which are internalized after participating in learning
experiences either inside or outside the
school (i.e. related to the ‘manageability of his learning’). Strevens
describes the first factor as learner’s static qualities since the
teacher can generally do very little about them. On the other hand, the second
factor is affected by teachers’ methods and strategies in teaching. This second
factor is known as dynamic
qualities.
Dynamic qualities refer
to personal development in the learning that are caused by the external
factors, such as teachers’ teaching methods and strategies. The development
comprises the variables of personal learning rate (i.e. learning speed) that is
different from one individual to the others);
learning styles and learning strategies, which also influenced by
learning experiences where the teacher has some contribution; minimum success-need relates to the learner’s
expectation of acquisition success; self-view is related to learner’s beliefs
about the importance of the learning.
From those theoretical
reviews above, there are at least four important issues that relate to EFL
teaching and learning in a school context. First, both teachers and students
determine success in the learning outcomes. Second, students come into the
classroom with individual differences, yet teachers have the formal authority
to direct them to learn toward achieving the same goals. Third, learners are
not passive agents because they have dynamic qualities that develop along the
experiences that they get during the teaching and learning process. Fourth,
English language teaching in the classroom does not only affect their language
proficiency but also develop their characters through optimalizing the dynamic
qualities (Artini, 2009).
As far as teachers’
influence to learners’ learning outcomes and dynamic qualities is concerned,
teachers have the authority to decide what the students learn and achieve.
Garmo (2011) points out that, educational policies should aim to achieve well
in school and life (p. vii). Achieving well in school refers to knowledge and
skills, which is explicitly stated in the school curriculum, while in life
refers to characters that should come together with the other two, which is not
explicitly stated but should be inserted in the pedagogical practices (hidden
curriculum). According to McLaren (1997), hidden curriculum is ‘unintended
outcomes of the schooling process. These outcomes are planned by the teacher
and are achieved through .standardized learning situation such as classroom
organization, informal pedagogical procedures, teaching and learning
strategies, and assessment procedures.
EDUCATIONAL
REFORM IN INDONESIA
Educational reform in Indonesia was
started since the launching of Competence based Curriculum (hereafter, CBC) in
2004. This is probably the beginning of the awareness to intentionally include
characters into the pedagogical daily practises. At first, characters were
limited to attitudes towards learning which covers motivation, enthusiasm, and
life long learning. In 2006, when School based Curriculum (hereafter, SBC) was
in practice, 18 character values were mentioned and to be inserted in teachers’
teaching strategies. The 18 values include religious, honesty, tolerance, discipline, hard working,
creative, independent, democratic, patriotic, dedicated to the country, aiming
to good achievement, sociable/communicative, love peace, like reading, social
care, environment care, and being responsible. These values were recommended to
be inserted in teaching routines. So far, efforts by the teacher were
emphasized on explicit insertion of character values into teaching and learning
activities. The common practice is, teacher plans the values they targeted to
and decides types activities that s/he assumed to bridge the attainment of the
values. For example, to attain the values of discipline, creative, independent
and sociable, the teacher employs cooperative learning approach.
Character
education
was revised in Curriculum 2013. There are four core-competencies that were
developed as the bases for national education practices at schools. Two of the
core competencies deal with character values and qualities. The first core
competency is specially developed for religious manner, the second is about the
social characters such as being honest, discipline, responsible, care
(cooperative work, tolerant, love peace), polite, responsive, and pro active.
These are explicitly stated as the goals of learning and are demanded to be
part of teachers’ daily coverage in their classroom activities.
AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENT IN CURRICULUM 2013
The term
‘authentic assessment’ was popularized by Wiggins (1989), referring to the idea
that “assessment should engage students in applying knowledge and skills in the
same way they are used in ‘real world’ outside school” (in Marzano, et.al.,
1993:13). According to O’Malley and Pierce (1996), assessment is authentic when
it corresponds and mirrors good classroom instructions and the results can be
used to improve instructions. The two scholars implied that authentic
assessment is a part of instruction, not apart from instruction. This
emphasizes the close connection between teaching and assessing. A good teaching results in a good assessment and
a good assessment results in a good teaching.
There are 5 types of authentic assessment that are
recommended to be used in classes including in EFL instructions (Rolheiser
& Ross, 2005). First, self-assessment and
peer assessment which are reflective in nature since students should be
able to figure out their learning strengths and weaknesses. By means of
specially designed rubrics, they assess their own ability and learn what need
to be improved and maintained. Second, Product Assessment is the type of
assessment that refers to a product of learning (for example, writing
composition). In this assessment, students may also assess themselves in
addition to assessment made by the teacher. From the results of the assessment
process students learn to be critical of their own work and of the others’.
Third, project assessment is a strategy to assess thematic product of learning.
While product assessment is usually on the topic of a lesson, project is
normally wider in scope as it involves a bigger theme. Fourth, Performance assessment is an
assessment on students’ achievement which is traced from their performances on
a communicative task. Fifth, Portfolio assessment, which mainly concerns about
the process and output of learning that can be traced through students’ collection
of work ( see fo e.g. Barootchi, & Keshavarz 2002).
The connection between
teaching and assessing was emphasized by Indonesian Department of National
Education (2003). Assessment should reflect the real-world problems and involve
various measures, methods, and strategies to be compatible to learners’
characteristics and learning objectives. Apart from becoming the bases to
diagnose students’ learning problems as well as to measure how well students
achieve the curriculum expectations (Chittenden, 1991), appropriate assessment
employment can also guarantee that students attain expected educational goals
or standards, including the academic and non academic achievement (O’Malley
& Pierce, 1996). The academic achievement refers to the achievement from
the curriculum (the goals that are explicitly stated in the curriculum
document) and the non academic one refers to the achievement of the hidden
curriculum (character values and soft skills that are implied in the curriculum
document).
This paper is written in an attempt
to describe how assessment procedures can bring an impact to the development of
the hidden curriculum (i.e. character education to students). The investigation
was made to detect the character content of the assessment techniques and
strategies and also to find out the awareness of the English teachers in junior
high schools in Bali about the hidden curriculum through assessment procedures
and how ready they are to implement the authentic assessment as recommended by
the new curriculum.
METHOD
This is a
need analysis study which was conducted in order to describe how authentic
assessment procedures could become a vehicle to teach character values. Data
were collected to find out how aware the Balinese English teachers in junior
high schools of the role of assessment procedures in developing students’
character. It also aims at finding out how ready the teachers are in
implementing the authentic assessment, including what problems that they
encountered in implementing it. 32 English teachers from 32 junior high schools
around Bali were assigned to respond to a survey questionnaire. This was followed
up with Focus Group Discussion to collect data on their awareness of the
importance of authentic assessment and their readiness to implement this type
of assessment in their EFL classes. To describe the hidden curriculum in the
assessment procedures, an analysis to a number of authentic assessment rubrics
was done with reference to the character values stated in the second core
competency in English curriculum for Grade 7. The data of teachers’ awareness
and readiness are presented in the form of percentages, and the data on the
hidden curriculum in the assessment procedures are in the form of qualitative
data.
FINDINGS
There
are three subtitles presented in this section. First, the character contents of
the authentic assessment in use according to Curriculum 2013; second, teachers’
awareness of the importance of authentic assessment for detecting academic and
non-academic achievement; and their readiness to implement authentic
assessment.
Types of Assessment and Character
Content
Spiller
(2012) points out the is a positive effect of well designed assessment
procedures on developing students’ learning. The approach motivates students’ active
participation, responsibility, dialogical and collaborative learning. In line
with this, Andrade & Du (2007) state that there is a considerable overlap
between self assessment and peer assessment. They are similar in some ways; both
encourage active participation, decision making, hard-working and independent
learning. In Product
Assessment, students have to show good efforts to produce quality work.
Teacher, first of all, gives orientation about what is expected from students
to produce. They are also equipped with self-assessment rubric to guide them to
achieve product requirement. The hidden curriculum from this type of assessment
includes encouraging honesty (to produce original work), responsibility (to do
effort to finish quality work on time), honesty (about the type of
assessment that refers to a product of learning (for example, writing
composition). In this assessment, students may also assess themselves in
addition to assessment made by the teacher. From the results of the assessment
process students learn to be critical of their own work and of the others’.
Similarly, in, project assessment students are educated to work hard, to be creative,
honest, responsible, discipline, pro-active, and creative. Finally, in portfolio assessment, students learn about managing own work, working
hard and discipline and improve their self-directed learning skills. This
content of hidden curriculum was perceived from the nature of authentic
assessment, characteristics of each type of assessment, as well as their
implementation in real EFL classes. All assessments strategies also involves
interaction and communication, so the hidden curriculum is to achieve good
communication skills in the foreign language, respect others by listening
attentively when one is speaking, improve teamwork. Thus, the implementation of
authentic assessment does not only positively affect students’ academic
achievement but also their good habit of learning as well as good character as
an individual. To make it clear, the
following is an example of self-assessment and the character content.
Assessment
Type: Student
Self-Assessment
Task: “A description of the biggest animal
I’ve ever seen and touched”
ü The
skills and techniques I learned from completing this task: _______________
ü The
steps I took to complete this task: __________________________________
ü Some
problems I faced: _____________________________________________
ü I
overcame them by: ________________________________________________
ü My
personal rating for this task is:
Very High High Medium Low Very
Low
From
those rubrics above, it is obvious that students develop reflective and self
directive learning as they have to give feedback to their own learning. They
also develop own strategy (hard working and discipline) to complete the task
well. This assessment contains hidden curriculum in which regular
implementation can be expected to results in satisfactory academic achievement
as well as good characters. This is supported by Bransford, Brown & Cocking
(1999), for whom authentic assessment make students become more aware of their
own thinking and more knowledgeable about cognition in general. In addition,
they develop an awareness of the need to be responsible to their own learning,
and this makes them learn better.
Teachers’ Awareness of the Role of
Authentic Assessment in Educating Character
Teachers’ awareness was investigated through questionnaire
administration and Focus Group Discussion. In general English teachers in Bali
are aware of the importance of authentic assessment to be implemented in their
classes. This was indicated by the percentage of 95% teachers responded that
through authentic assessment, students learn both academic and character
education. They believe that authentic assessment make students understand
their strengths and weaknesses and can take necessary efforts to improve their
learning. Only 5% of the teachers were not sure which was interpreted as having
low awareness. The following figure illustrates teachers’ awareness.
The awareness was built through
special trainings that the teachers have gone through in preparation to the
implementation of the new curriculum (i.e. Curriculum 2013). All the teachers
participated in this research have had the experience of attending two to three
days of training on innovative teaching strategies and authentic assessment organized
by the Department of Education and Culture, Bali Province.
Teachers’ Readiness to implement
Authentic Assessment in the Classroom
Teachers’ high awareness of the
importance of authentic assessment in teaching English as a foreign language
does not seem to be consistent with teachers’ readiness to implement the ‘new’
trend of assessing. The data reveal that teachers got used to the implementation
of classical assessment (i.e. paper and pencil test) and were reluctant to try
new trend in assessment. This is represented by the following figure.
As indicated by the pie chart above,
the majority of teachers (85.7%) responded that they were not ready to
implement authentic assessment in their English classes. There were a number of
reasons that elicited from the Questionnaire and Focus Group Discussion. One of
the reasons is because authentic assessment is difficult and complicated. Developing
assessment rubrics is considered to be complicated as well as time consuming.
In addition, the scoring is not straight forward. The classical reason is
because the class size is very big, with sometimes over 40 students. In
speaking lesson for example, teachers will not have enough time to use rubric
in assessing their speaking performance.
Another reason for teachers’
reluctance in implementing the new assessment approach is because there is no
example or model of assessment rubric to assess every language skill that they
can refer to when developing their assessment instruments. The availability of
example or practical guide is important to improve teachers’ confidence with
the new culture of teaching (Giroux, 1984). The professional development program
on assessment that they attended usually ended up with information about the
concepts and no examples or practical guidance were provided for the teachers.
In the Focus Group Discussion, they pointed out the importance of practical
model and adequate examples of ready to use assessment instruments so that they
can use them directly or do minor manipulation when necessary.
The lack of practical guides and
professional examples of authentic assessment to be used in EFL classes is
likely to result in minimal development of student dynamic qualities (Naiman et
al. (1996). As mentioned earlier, it is these qualities that need to be
emphasized in the classroom through effective teaching and assessing
strategies. The activation of dynamic qualities will consequently develop good
characters such as high personal learning rate (i.e. learning
speed), learning styles and learning strategies, ; high level success-need, expectation of
acquisition success; positive self-view. These are the foundation for the
targeted character values as stated in the latest curriculum in Indonesia.
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS
Up to this point it can be concluded
that junior high school English teachers in Bali have had an understanding of
the importance of authentic assessment to assess students’ academic achievement
as well as the non academic ones. However, they perceive that this relatively
new trend in assessment difficult to implement. They maintain the preference of
using the classical assessment approach instead as it is considered more
direct, holistic and easy to implement. However, when ‘ready to use’ assessment
instruments are available, they would do an attempt to implement authentic
assessment in their classes. Therefore this need analysis study concludes that
there is an urgent need to develop authentic assessment instruments for English
teaching and learning in Junior high schools in Bali. This finding becomes the
empirical evidence of the urgent need for the Research and Development on
authentic assessment model in junior high school in Bali.
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