Chapter 9.
Assessing Writing
In the PAST…
Writing was a skill that was the exclusive
domain of scribes and scholars in
educational institutions as well as in
religious institutions.
In the PRESENT…
This ability has become an
INDISPENSABLE skill in our global
literate community.
In the field of SECOND LANGUAGE
TEACHING…
several years ago, it was thought that
writing was just for recording speech, for
reinforcing grammatical and lexical
features of language.
NOW, teachers understand the
UNIQUENESS of writing as a skill with its
OWN features and conventions.
Writing in ANY language is difficult.
Children learn to write, but they do not
explain themselves clearly, with logical, well-
developed organization that accomplishes an
intended purpose.
And yet, teachers expect second language
learners to write COHERENT essays.
TESTING WRITING
Clear objective or criterion.
Handwriting ability?
Correct spelling?
Grammatically correct sentences?
Paragraph constructions?
Logical development of a main idea?
Genres of writing
ACADEMIC WRITING
paper and general subject reports
essays, compositions
academically focused journals
short-answer test responses
technical reports (e.g., lab reports)
theses, dissertations
JOB-RELATED WRITING
Messages (phone messages)
Letters/mails
Memos
Reports (Job evaluations, project reports)
Advertisements, announces
Manuals
PERSONAL WRITING
Letters, mails, greeting cards, invitations
Messages, notes
Calendar entries, shopping lists, reminders
Financial documents (checks, tax forms, loan
applications)
Forms, questionnaires, medical reports, immigration
documents
Diaries, personal journals
Fiction (short stories, poetry)
TYPES OF WRITING
PERFORMANCE
IMITATIVE
INTENSIVE ( controlled)
RESPONSIVE
EXTENSIVE
IMITATIVE
Learners must ATTAIN (achieve, accomplish, reach, obtain, gain)
skills in the fundamental, basic tasks of writing letters, words,
pronunciation, a brief sentences.
Spelling correctly.
Learners try to master the mechanics of writing.
Form is the primary focus.
Context and meaning are of secondary concern.
Imitative writing is all about the correct way to form words and
letters
INTENSIVE (controlled)
Producing appropriate vocabulary within
context, collocation, idioms and correct
grammatical features up to the length of a
sentence.
Meaning and context are of some importance
in determining correctness and
appropriateness.
RESPONSIVE
Learners perform at a limited discourse level.
Connecting sentences into a paragraph and creating
a logically connected sequence of two or three
paragraphs.
Lists of criteria and outlines.
Genres of writing (narratives and descriptions, short
reports, lab reports, summaries, brief responses to
reading and interpretations of charts or graphs).
EXTENSIVE
Successful management of all the processes and
strategies of writing for all purposes, up to the
length of an essay, a term paper, a major research
project report, or even a thesis.
Organizing and developing ideas logically, using
details to support or illustrate ideas, demonstrating
syntactic and lexical variety, engaging in the
process of multiple drafts to achieve a final
product.
MICRO- AND MACROSKILLS OF
WRITING
Taxonomy that will assist you in defining the
criterion of an assessment procedure.
The microskills apply more appropriately to
IMITATIVE and INTENSIVE types of writing
tasks.
The macroskills are essential to master the
RESPONSIVE and EXTENSIVE types of writing.
DESIGNING ASSESSMENT
TASKS: IMITATIVE
TASKS IN (HAND) WRITING LETTERS,
WORDS, AND PUNCTUATION.
3. Picture-cued tasks.
4. Form completion tasks.
5. Converting numbers and abbreviations to
words.
PICTURE-CUED TASK
Spelling tasks and detecting
phoneme-grapheme correspondences.
1. Spelling tests
2. Picture-cued tasks
3. Multiple-choice techniques.
4. Matching phonemic symbols.
DESIGNING ASSESSMENT TASKS:
INTENSIVE (CONTROLLED) WRITING
Controlled
Display
TO DISPLAY COMPETENCE IN WRITING
Real
NOT NECESSARY TO CONVEY MEANING FOR AN
AUTHENTIC PURPOSE
1. Dictation and Dicto-Comp
2. Grammatical Transformation Tasks
3. Picture- Cued Tasks
4. Vocabulary Assessment Tasks
5. Ordering Tasks
6. Short-Answer and Sentence Completion
Tasks
ISSUES IN ASSESSING RESPONSIVE
AND EXTENSIVE WRITING
Authenticity
Scoring
Time
1. PARAPHRASING
2. GUIDED QUESTION AND ANSWER
3. PARAGRAPH CONSTRUCTION TASKS
4. STRATEGIC OPTIONS
REPORTS (LAB REPORTS, PROJECT SUMMARIES, ARTICLE/BOOK REPORT,
ETC.)
SUMMARIES OF READINGS/ LECTURES/ VIDEOS
RESPONSES TO READINGS/ LECUTRES/VIDEOS
NARRATION/ DESCRIPTION/ PRESUASION/ ARGUMENT AND EXPOSITION
INTERPRETING STATISTICAL, GRAPHIC OR TABULAR DATA
SCORING METHODS FOR RESPONSE
AND EXTENSIVE WRITING
HOLISTIC
PRIMARY TRAIT
ANALYTIC
