task#15 -- Communicative Approach2

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Date Posted: 14:15:44 08/10/03 Sun
Author: grasiela izaga
Subject: task#15

TASK#15
PROFA.: VERA MENEZES
ALUNA : GRASIELA IZAGA

YOUR TASK IS:
How can we use portfolios to evaluate our students' progress?

"Portfolio assessment is an ongoing process involving the student and teacher in selecting samples of student work for inclusion in a collection, the main purpose of which is to show the student's progress"
It is usual to give the students a test to evaluate their knowledge. It serves to the teacher and the students, measuring the student's performance.
Every student knows that sometimes when they do not do well on tests, it is not because of a failure on their part to study or prepare. Because language performance depends so heavily on the purposes for which students are using the language and the context in which it is done, the importance of opportunity for flexible and frequent practice on the part of the students can not be overestimated. That's why it makes sense to provide similar opportunities for students in instruction. Here enters the idea of portfolio that gives a continuous evaluation of the student work giving him/her more than one opportunity to demonstrate that they can complete tasks successfully.
The idea of portfolio is to give an ongoing strategy through which student learning is not only monitored but by which students are involved in making decisions about the degree to which their performance matches their ability.
Other advantages of portfolio are that students are provided with opportunities before and after units of instruction to assess their own performance (self-assessment), the teachers can periodically assess students' performance and both discuss their respective assessments (tests and measurements), there is even the possibility of na external monitor to access the student's performance and discusses it with the teacher.
"Assessment, then, should be viewed as an interactive process that engages both teacher and student in monitoring the student's performance".
According to Allwright (1988) greater quality of learning can be ensured by putting the control over learning in the place where the learning is occurring, namely in the mind of the learner despite possible claims of subjectivity as a negative factor in their use. Perhaps the greatest overall benefit of using portfolio assessment is that the students are taught by example to become independent thinkers, and the development of their autonomy as learners is facilitated.
It is important to remember that a portfolio is much more than a simple folder of student work. There is a wide variety of portfolios like: working portfolio, performance portfolio, assessment portfolio, group portfolio, etc. Depending on the purpose, the portfolio can include many items: samples of creative work; tests; quizzes; homework; projects and assignments; audiotapes of oral work; self-assessments; comments from peers; and comments from teachers.
The call for increased use of meaningful (authentic) assessments that involve language students in selecting and reflecting on their learning means that language teachers will have a wider range of evidence on which to judge whether students are becoming competent as language users. It also means that language programs will become more responsive to the different learning styles of students and will value the diversity in them. Finally, language programs that focus on alternative assessment are good to maintain in students mind lifelong skills related to critical thinking (like the ability to analyze, generalize, and hypothesize) that build a basis for future learning, and enable them to evaluate what they learn both in and outside of the language class.
In the field of foreign-language education, the advantages of using portfolios are many : provide students with opportunities to display good work (and facility to reach them), serve as a vehicle for critical self-analysis, and demonstrate the increasing of the learner in a foreign language.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Student portfolios: classroom use http://www.ed.gov/pubs/OR/ConsumerGuides/classuse.html
Alternative Assessment and Second Language Study: What and Why? http://www.cal.org/ericcll/digest/hancoc01.html
Development and Implementation of Student Portfolios in Foreign Language Programs http://www.stanford.edu/group/CFLP/research/portfolio/portfolio1.html

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Replies:

Re: task#15 -- Vera Menezes, 14:57:04 08/13/03 Wed