PBEY 3101: ASSESSMENT IN THE ESL
PLACE: BSB 306
TIME: 8:00 TO 9:30AM
DAYS: MONDAYS AND WEDNESDAYS
LECTURER: DR. MOHD RASHID BIN MOHD SAAD
CONTACT: 03-79675087
E-MAIL: mrmsaad2008@gmail.com
Week 1- Introduction: Background and Issues of Teaching Young
Learners; How Children Learn
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 1
7th and 9th of July, 2008
Activities
1. 7th of July 2008: Read Chapter 1 and in group of 5s please discuss Table 3.4 on page 13. Your discussion should centre on the literacy development of children.
2. 9th of July 2008: Read Chapter 1 and in group of 5s please discuss page 20-25. What do you understand by the purposes of assessment?
Weeks 2 - Priorities of Young Learners
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 2
14th and 16th of July, 2008
Activities
1. 14th of July 2008: Read Chapter 2 and in group of 5s please discuss Figure 2.1 on page 32. Your discussion should centre on the range of contextual support and degree of cognitive involvement in communicative activities.
2. 16th of July 2008: Read Chapter 2 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Effective assessment of young learners combines knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes. Discuss.
Week 3- Research into Assessment of Young Language Learners
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 3
21st and 23rd of July, 2008
Activities
1. 21st of July 2008: Read Chapter 3 and in group of 5s please discuss Rea Dickins’ (2001) different stages in the teacher assessment process on page 69. Your discussion should centre on the working model for the analysis of teacher-decision making in formative assessment.
2. 23rd of July 2008: Read Chapter 3 and in group of 5s please discuss this: There are four (4) main purposes for research to provide a useful way to organise a discussion of the scope of research in young learner assessment. Discuss.
Week 4- Assessing Language through Tasks
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 4
28th and 30th of July, 2008
Activities
1. 28th of July 2008: Read Chapter 4 and in group of 5s please discuss Table 4.1 which of William’s (1994) language use tasks on page 103. You should focus on ways to implement these language use tasks in the primary-school classrooms.
2. 30th of July 2008: Read Chapter 4 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Discuss this statement based on Chapter 4: The most effective assessment of language use is through performance in language tasks.
Week 5- Classroom Assessment of Language Use
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 5
4th and 6th of August, 2008
Activities
1. 28th of July 2008: Read Chapter 5 and in group of 5s please discuss Figure 5.2 on page 150. You should centre your discussion based on the 4 stages processes and strategies instruction- embedded classroom assessment.
2. 30th of July 2008: Read Chapter 5 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Discuss this statement based on Chapter 5: Classroom assessment can encourage children to participate in the learning processes and can build motivation and confidence in children as they are given on-going support to learn.
Week 6- Assessing Oral Language
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 6
11th and 13th of August, 2008
Activities
1. 11th of August 2008: Read Chapter 6 and in group of 5s please discuss Table 6.1 on page 183. You should centre your discussion based on Bachman and Palmer’s (1966) model of language knowledge
2. 13th of August 2008: Read Chapter 6 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Discuss this statement based on Chapter 6: “There are many issues for teachers and assessors to consider in relation to oral language assessment. Assessment of oral language requires knowledge of, amongst other aspects, the quality of classroom interaction…understanding of the issue in task selection including task difficulty; and knowledge of the best ways to assess grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation in oral language” (Kay, 2006, p.215)
Week 7- Assessing Reading and Writing
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 7
18th and 20th of August, 2008
Activities
1. 18th of August 2008: Read Chapter 7 and in group of 5s please discuss this in class. “Current theories of literacy help teachers and assessors to see that literacy is a complex social and cultural endeavour; and that assessment of foreign and second language learners’ literacy need to take young learners’ cultural journey into account” (Kay, 2006, p.263)
2. 20th of August 2008: Read Chapter 7 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Do you agree by the ways of assessing reading and writing as discussed in this book?
Week 8- Evaluating Young Learners’ Performance and Progress
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 8
25th and 27th of August, 2008
Activities
1. 25th of August 2008: Read Chapter 8 and in group of 5s please discuss this in class. Based on Table 8.1 on page 271, discuss the considerations in the evaluation of scoring rubrics and reporting scales.
2. 27th of August 2008: Read Chapter 8 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Do you agree with this statement: “ Good scoring rubrics reflect the construct (s) to be assessed and are created by teachers and assessors who are familiar with the curriculum, how the curriculum is taught and the characteristics of the young learners in question”
Week 9- Testing Young Language Learners through Large-Scale Tests
MacKay, P. (2006). Chapter 9
1st and 3rd of September, 2008
Activities
1. 1st of September 2008: Read Chapter 9 and in group of 5s please discuss the model of test development which was adapted from Bachman and Palmer (1996) on page 320.
2. 3rd of September 2008: Read Chapter 9and in group of 5s please discuss this: Alternative assessment is advocated by many educators as a replacement for large-scale testing. Discuss some of the advantage and disadvantage of this alternative assessment in the Malaysian context.
Week 10- Tips for Assessing Very Young Learners (4-8 Years Old)
Handouts
8th and 10th of September, 2008
Activities
1. 1st of September 2008: Disciplines and Fun Ideas for Maintaining Disciplines. Discuss this: How do we assess disciplines in the classroom for the very young language learners?
2. 3rd of September 2008: How can you make your classroom pleasant and familiar in order to assess your very young language learners?
Week 11- Tips for Assessing Young Language Learners (9-15 Years Old)
Handouts
15th and 17th of September, 2008
Activities
1. 15th of September 2008: How do you assess topic-based lessons for young language learners?
2. 17th of September 2008: Discuss two ways ( making a class newspaper and making a class magazine) you could assess language use of young language learners.
Week 12- Music and Songs in the Classroom
Handouts
22nd and 24th of September, 2008
Activities
1. 22nd of September 2008: Select 3 out of 28 lists of activities that you could you use to evaluate your language learners. Discuss why the chosen 3 are more appropriate in the Malaysian context.
2. 24th of September 2008: Create an activity to assess young language learners using nursery rhymes or jazz chants or traditional songs.
Week 13- The Role of Fun and Games
Handouts
29th of September and 1st of October, 2008
Activities
1. 29th of September 2008: What roles do fun and games have in assessing language use for young language learners?
2. 1st of October 2008: If fun and games are utilised in the classroom, how do you maintain ‘fairness’ in your assessment? Discuss.
Week 14- Drama as an English Teaching Aid
Handouts
6th and 8th of October, 2008
Activities
1. 6th of October 2008: How do teachers utilise drama to assess young language learners. Discuss.
2. 8th of October 2008: In your opinion, why drama is one of the best technique to assess students’ communicative skills?
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week 1
Group members:
1)Imanuddin bin Sa'dun
2)Mohd Fairuz Raziman bin Mohd
Hijazi
3)Mohhd Fahmiizani bin Fadzil
4)Muhammad Fadzli bin Sidi Omar
5)Kamarul Hafizan bin Mohamad.
Answer for Question 1.
Table 3.4 page 13.
Literacy development of children.
The table discussed about the differences on the expectation of literary development of children ranging from the age 5 to the age 13.
As the age develop, we can see that the expectation in their literacy development become higher from 5 to the age of 13. This is due to their development in cognitive, linguistics as well as their social interaction skill with others. We also think that the expectation in table 3.4 is in line with six level of cognitive domain in Bloom Taxonomy which are knowledge, understanding, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. This is because we can see that the expectation required the pupils to remember or understand or apply some form of knowledge as their age increasing.Then, this table can also be link to the Solo Taxonomy (Structure of Observed Learning Outcome) as they have to learn to recognize and understand print(informations)through learning from knowing words.
Answer for Question 2.
As we all know, assessment that being carried out may differ in its purposes.
Firstly, there are various types of assessment. There are placement test, diagnostic test, progress test, achievement test, attitude test, proficiency test and standardized test. These types of test are placed into two major groups which are formative and summative test.
The purpose of summative test is to evaluate the achievement of the students after the end of school term or year. For an example final year examination. Based on the result of this test, parents, teacher, schools can see the progress of students and be able to evaluate on the effectiveness of the teaching methods that have been applied through out the whole year.
Meanwhile, formative test is a continuous process as to determine students progress, strength and weaknesses for remedial and enrichment activities.
In addition, the result of formative test is very helpful for the teacher to make further decision with observing the students performance over time to time. For example, the teacher can shift from low stakes decision to more higher stakes decision by considering students abilities.
Furthermore, formative test includes diagnostic test, on the run test and planned test. Meanwhile summative assessment includes for placement purposes, grading,and certifying mastery of objectives.
Week 1
Group members:
1)Muhammad Ridhuan B. Md. Nor
2)Nur Habibi Bt. Ghazali
3)Ainaa Yasmin Bt. Alias
4)Amira Shakira Bt. Ahmad Sabri
5)Nor Zulaikha Bt. Nor Azmi
Question 1
Discuss Table 3.4 on page 13. Your discussion should center on the literacy development of children.
Children are gradually developed their literacy skills as their age increased. From the table, the development starts at the age of 5. Between 5 and 7 years old, children convey their messages by combining drawing and writing. At these ages, drawing and writing are important because they function as mental symbols that represent something which is not physically present. According to Piaget’s cognitive development theory, children at these ages are in the pre-operational stage. They have limited vocabulary that consists of sight words. This is because they are still not able to perceive abstract words. Besides, at these ages, they read slowly and deliberately because they still cannot assemble the prints to form words that carry meaning.
Between 7 and 11, children are entering the concrete operational stage. At this stage, they are exposed to concrete explanations that give them direct experiences. These experiences contribute to cognitive growth. So, their literacy skills developed whereby their ability shifts from understanding that writing can be used to express meaning with limited used of drawing to writing and reading for specific purposes to the ability of expanding thinking through writing and reading.
As they reach the ages of 11 to 13, their skills in reading and writing are continuing to increase and expand. However, they start to understand that people may come out with different opinion for the same material. This is because, they have stepped into formal operational stage where it suggests that individuals at this stage are able to make conclusions from the information available and they are also capable of thinking logically and abstractly.
Question 2
Read Chapter 1 and in group of 5s please discuss page 20-25. What do you understand by the purposes of assessment?
Based on our understanding of the purposes of assessment, main purposes of assessment can be divided into two which are pedagogic purposes for assessment and administrative purposes for assessment. Pedagogic purposes are focusing on promoting learning whereby from the results of the assessment, teachers can improve on teaching instructions as well as identify students’ strengths and weaknesses for follow up actions. Meanwhile, administrative purposes for assessment are focusing on providing information of students and schools performance for the purposes of management and accountability. The results can determine schools’ reputation and help to allocate students to appropriate groups or class.
There are a few types of assessment which are formative, summative, placement, assessment to encourage and motivate as well as assessment for research. These assessments carry different purposes. Formative assessment is carried out to know students’ learning progress. It involves diagnostic assessment for teachers to identify students’ strength and weaknesses. On –the- run assessment is another formative assessment that involve teachers’ observation and immediate feedback of learners. The purpose of this assessment is to ensure that students’ weaknesses can be immediately attended to. The other assessment that may be formative is planned assessment where teachers plan language use tasks to check if students have achieved the objectives.
Besides, summative assessment is conducted to give information of students’ achievements to parents, administrators and education department while assessment for placement is to place students in the appropriate learning group. A well planned assessment can promote motivation and sense of industry. Finally, assessment for research is carried out so that researchers can gather information needed regarding language knowledge of children.
Group members:
Siti Sukainah binti Che Mat,
Loi Choi Yee,
Vina Quake Lee Eng,
Nurul Syaza binti Ahmad,
Eliana Pak Ying Thein and
Tan Ai Choo
Question 1:
Children are becoming more selective readers as they grow up. In the early age, the young learners literaly read all the printed words and they begin to understand that the print conveys meaning, but due to their cognitive immaturity, they would not be able to recognize the message underlying the printed words. In fact at the beginning, children are trying to make sense of the language they come across while reading by relating to the pictures seen or substituting them with words. However, as their cognitivity become more mature at the age of 11 and above, they start to see the purpose of reading and become more selective in terms of the strategy they adopt while reading to suit their reading purposes. Children learning language at early age of 5-7 are greatly influenced by direct learning and concrete objects. This is in accordance to Piaget which suggested that children in preoperational stage are able to deal with concrete objects and ideas. This is demonstrated through the use of drawing in their writing activity. But later, as children acquire more vocabulary and able to grasp on abstract ideas, they slowly eliminate the use of drawing to convey the message. This is also because they have develop finer motor skills thus enable them to use the language in its form through different language skills. In fact, as they progress cognitively, they develop their thinking skills in which prepare them to acquire better understanding of reading and writing and the ability to manipulate ideas and thoughts.
Question 2:
Purposes of assessment centres on the stakeholders which deal with the people who will be affected with the assessment procedures. Assessment as the whole serves many purposes in which if at low stakes, it only affects the students where they learn about their strength and weaknesses and develop sense of progression through formative and summative assessment. While for assessment that centres at the higher stake will affect those in the bigger group involving the teachers, school,education community as well as the society. Assessment provides teachers with the information on the teaching and learning process whether successful or not while it gives the school with information on the students performance throughout the whole academic session through different types of assessment such as formative, summative and placement assessment. The education community such as the education adminstration at the district level and the state level will benefit from assessment too where they are able to make comparison between schools in the academic achievement hence help them to evaluate whether the curriculum has succeeded its objectives.The society mainly consists of the parents that will be affected to with assessment as they always query on their children's progress in academic. Other than that assessment to provide information for pedagogic purposes through motivational, encouragement and research assessment.
Week 1
Group members:
Azliza bt Ramlee,
Nurulhuda bt Pauzi,
Nurulhuda bt Ghani
Nur Safrina bt Abu Bakar
Lee Yeh Ching
Wai Lai Yee
Answer for Question 1, Week 1
Children varied in their growth, literacy and vulnerability. In terms of literacy, children who learn language have first to develop skills and understanding especially in reading and writing. These are the basis that they need as a first step in learning language.
From the table of “Widely Held Expectations of Literacy Development” we observed there are four levels, i(5-7years), ii(7-9years), iii(9-11years) and iv(11-13years). Children in each level are developing their literacy skill continuously. They will learn the skill from basic to more complex structure. However, different children have different rates in acquiring this skill. Children in the first level are beginning to make experiment and assumptions on the words and pictures from their reading and writing. They will just understand the meaning of their reading or writing text by relates it with concrete experiences. That is why we think that children’s storybooks always have picture accompanying it to deliver the message successfully. This skill is continuing to the level ii where children begin to use the experiences in previous level. Then, level iii is where they expand and apply their knowledge. For example, reading and writing for purposes. Children in level iv continue to develop their literacy skill where this skill is more manipulated towards personal interests and daily life.
Thus, this proved why children and adult language learners are different. Children are still progressing to achieve skill needed to learn language while adult mostly already achieved their maximum growth in this skill. We think that these four levels can be related to Piaget’s theory of Cognitive Development where children move from preoperational to concrete operational stage. So, in order for children to learn language they will go through these levels step by step before they master the language wholly.
Therefore, we think that teachers and assessors should alert with this literacy development of children so that they able to set effective assessment to assess children’s progress in language learning.
Answer for Question 2, Week 1
There are several purposes of assessment which differ depending on the needs or the information that the assessors want out of the assessment.
Firstly, assessment is done for the purpose of administration. The result from assessment is used for management and accountability purposes, for instance, to keep record on the pupils’ performance. The record is kept in the school so that teachers can keep track on the pupils’ performance from time to time.
Next, assessment is done for pedagogic purposes as well. This is to promote learning within the teachers. Assessment does not only contribute information on pupils’ success academically, but also on the teachers. Based on the result, teachers are able to reflect on their application on pedagogy and then find out where to improve.
Assessment tells the teacher on the pupils’ progress from time to time. For instance, with the use of diagnostic test, teachers can identify the pupils’ strengths and weaknesses in certain desired field. For follow up, enrichment or remedial can be done. Teachers can also do observation in the classroom to get immediate feedback.
In some context, assessment is done for the purpose of placement. Placement test is done to place or group the new pupils into appropriate group according to their level of proficiency. To achieve this purpose, assessment can be done in the form of interview, a short reading session and a writing task. However, this is to be done very carefully as wrong placement might give great impact to the pupils.
Assessment is done for the purpose of encouragement and motivation as well. Assessment can be done to help the pupils identify what they have learned. Assessors have to be very clear of the pupils’ level and set task with reference to that. Hence, being able to complete the task, children are able to develop a sense of success within them which will drive them to learn more and strike for better performance. Acknowledging the pupils’ success will also fulfil the purpose of encouragement and motivation.
Lastly, assessment is done for research purposes as well. Assessment can be done to find out the nature of language acquisition by children. With the outcome from the assessment, more planning can be done in order to enable the pupils handle the second language acquisition better. Assessment too helps the teachers to advance the application of methodology in the classroom.
Group members:
1. Azian Azman
2. Mohd. Izzuddin Ahmad Fuad
3. Mohd. Izzudin Sahabudin
4. Mohd. Zulhirzi Zainal
5. Mohammad Fikkri Said
Q1.
The table mainly talks about the expectations of children's literacy development. However, it only applies to young first language learner. Thus, it may not be suitable to be adapted in young foreign language learners' case.
This table explains about children from the age of 5 to 13. As the children get older, they are expected to be more cognitively matured and more prepared to learn. The way they see and accept things will also change. They improve from only being able to grasp concrete things to being able to understand abstract concepts. As mentioned in the table, in the early phase, a child would need to combine both, drawing and writing to convey their meaning. This shows that he/she needs a constant reference to a concrete object to allow them to see and understand thing clearly. This is another reason why we can see that book for children are filled with colourful pictures. As they move to the next phases, they were able to slowly understand abstract concepts thus, allowing them to use only word to convey their meaning.
As the child able to understand abstract concepts, they also begin to see the world in a wider view. They begin to understand that they can choose their own reading material and that different person may interpret the same material in different ways.
As the child grows, their ability to read will also increase. Earlier on, they could only read slowly and deliberately and as they become more cognitively mature, they could read silently, read aloud with expression and their readings will also be more fluent and faster. They would also discover various reading skills such as skimming, scanning and so on.
All the development mentioned is influenced by the growth of their physical, emotional, cognitive and social aspects. This differs from the adults whereby the adults are more matured in the aspects of their physical, emotional, cognitive, as well as their social.
The mentioned literacy knowledge and skills will also assist these children in their second language learning. Thus, assessment should not be bias and should consider the learners’ level of development. Questions should revolve around familiar topics and the difficulties should in par with their previous knowledge as they may result in learners being demotivated if they are too easy or too hard. Assessors should also consider the learners’ physical development. For example, assessment for elementary learners should not require them to write too much as their fine-motor skill have not yet fully developed.
Q2.
Assessments are done to fit different types of purpose. To achieve these different purposes, various types of assessment were created.
Firstly, assessments are to fulfil the need and requirement of the stakeholders, namely the parents, teachers, pupils, admin and so on. Each of these stakeholders requires different kind of information depending on who they are and what their interest is.
Basically, the two main purposes of assessments are pedagogic purpose and administrative purpose. Pedagogic purpose is more towards promoting learning. It concerns more about what the pupils have learned. However, administrative purpose is more about certificates, managements and accountability purpose.
These two main purpose can later be expand to other branches such as to motivate, to diagnose a learner’s weakness and strength, the success of certain programme, for research, to place pupils in appropriate groups, to find out whether the objective of the lesson in achieved, to compare a learner with the others in his/her group and so on.
These two main purposes can later be explained clearly by looking at our education system. There are few different stakeholders arranged hierarchically; school, district, state, Ministry of Education and politician. In our elementary education, pedagogic purpose of assessment is only applied within school context. The rest will be taken over by the administrative purpose. As an example, teacher will put on a formative assessment to motivate students to do better in the summative assessment at the end of the year (pedagogic purpose). The data from summative assessment such as UPSR held by external assessor will be taken to the district, state and ministry of education level for administrative purpose such as level of successfulness of certain programmes. The data will influence the decision by the politician in establishing new policies. For example, the use of English in teaching math and science.
GROUP MEMBERS
1)ABD. MU'MIN BIN ARIFIN
2)EDORA LEEZIA BINTI ALIAS
3)FADLIYANA BINTI MOHAMAD FATHIL
4)NUR AZIMAH HANI BINTI MOHD SHAHARUDDIN
5)NUR HANNIM BINTI IDRIS
ANSWERS FOR EXERCISE 1
a)From the table, it shows that the children develop their literacy where initially they use drawing and writing to convey idea and slowly later their writing can stand alone to convey meaning. As their ages increase, they expand their thinking through writing and reading.
Meanwhile for reading,(5-7 years old) In this phase, readers use memory of familiar texts to match some spoken words and written words. They realize that print contains a constant message and begin pointing to words. They may comment on pictures but seldom question written text.(7-9 years old) In this phase, they have an increasing bank of sight words including some difficult and subject – specific words. For instance; science, experiment, February and Christmas. They begin to self-correct and develop the ability to read silently.(9-11 years old)They are becoming efficient in the use of the following words identification strategies for constructing meaning. For instance use known parts of words to make sense of the whole words.(11-13 years old) They select appropriate material and adjust reading strategies for different texts and different purposes for example, skimming to search for a specific facts, scanning for a key word. In short, children literacy develop as they grow older.
b) generally, there are two purposes of assessment which are pedagogic and administrative purposes for assessment. For pedagogic purposes, it tends to promote learning. Meanwhile, for administrative is to give information about performance of children and school to education department, administrators and others. They used the information for management and accountability purposes. As for formative assessment, it can identify the pupils' strengths and weaknesses in mastering a certain skill which they have learned. it can also help the teacher to prepare for future teaching and learning session. In summative test, the purpose of this assessment is to determine pupils' achievement based on a few learning units and arrange their grades level accordingly. It also provides information for the stakeholders for instance parents, school administrators and education departments. Besides that, assessment is also important for placement purposes, to encourage and motivate learners as well as for research purposes.
BY JASWINDER KAUR, G.KASTHURI, m.KOMATHI, S.BHAVARITA, M.RIMALA
WEEK 1
7th of July 2008:
The Literacy Development of Children
Literacy can be defined as the abilities of reading, writing, speaking, listening, IT, language etc. Children learn and understand literacy skills during the process of learning their target language. Literacy requires knowledge of the language and it develops step by step according to the age pattern of child.
Generally, children from age five to seven years old tend to acquire basic skills of literacy. For instance, these children continue to develop a sense of how writing and reading works. Besides, they begin to combine drawing and writing to convey ideas. They also can understand that print actually expresses a story. Therefore, they show interest to read printed material. To add on, during this age period, children build up a set of simple vocabulary of words that are personal. These vocabularies may be related to experiences they encounter daily. As they only beginning to develop their vocabulary, their reading tends to be slow but it is deliberate as they are eager to explore the printed materials. In order to understand what they read, they are apt to substituting words to make sense to them.
As the children reach seven to nine years old, they usually develop their writing skills to the level where they can write for a particular reason such as writing a birthday greeting on card. Though they use writing to convey meaning, they also still combine writing with drawing to express meaning. Moreover, at this age they widen they vocabulary through everything that they see. In others words they use their sight to expand their vocabulary. This is in alignment with Piaget’s theory of cognitive development whereby, children in their concrete operational stage need direct experience like concrete material to learn language. Therefore, as they look at and gain experience from real objects, their literacy develops. As their vocabulary widens they are able to self-correct errors. During this phase, they develop two types of reading abilities. They are, reading silently and reading aloud fluently with expression.
Children’s literacy develops to a greater phase, as the age nine to eleven years old. This is so, as they are able to expand thinking more readily through writing and reading. Thus, they tend to open up for a wider perception on things which helps in reducing their egocentrism which they experience in their concrete operational stage. Apart from that, they continue to increase their reading vocabulary and self-correct errors. This shows that their literacy development grows slow but steadily. The silent reading ability that they developed at the age of seven to nine years old is refined into a better one now. This is because silently, they can read faster and understand better. Yet, they can regulate their rate of their own reading to suit a particular intention. For instance, skimming and scanning purposes. Besides, they can now use reading for various purposes like for collecting information and for pleasure.
As young learners continue to advance to eleven to thirteen years old, they carry on expanding all the abilities they developed earlier. In addition, they begin understanding the concept that not all five fingers are the same. Hence, different people interpret the same material in different ways.
In conclusion, literacy develops in stages and it must be understood by teachers and assessors in order to create effective assessment that tests what is within the child’s ability.
WEEK 1
7th of July 2008:
PURPOSES OF ASSESSMENT
There are many terms related to assessment such as stakeholder (anyone affected by the assessment procedure) , low-stakes (minor decision and easy to correct) and high-stakes (decision that can affect students’ lives and hard to correct). Besides that, assessment might be formal or informal. Informal assessment is carried out in classroom while formal assessment is more planned and usually has formal procedure. Classroom assessment is designed and conducted by teachers while external assessment is prepared by personnel from central education office. These both assessments are used to compare achievement of the students, school, or programmes. Generally, assessment serves for pedagogic and administrative purposes. In terms of pedagogic purposes, assessment encourages learning among children. Assessments also provide information on the students’ progress and schools’ progress to the education department administrative. These administrators use the information gained to manage resources allocation. Curriculum standards are used to help administrators describing the curriculum, observing learner progress and examine the accountability of teachers and the school. Standards are viewed from two different perspectives which are content standard (describe on what the students should know and do) meanwhile performance standards (describe the level of achievement that the students perform).
There are two kind of assessment; formative and summative. Formative assessment is a continuous, informal and it gives information on how well the pupils are doing. Through formative assessment teachers can analyse learners’ strength and weaknesses and collects data for future decision. This assessment also helps teachers to determine whether the students have achieved the objective of the lesson. Summative assessment takes place at the end of the year or term. It is conducted to compare and see the different between past and future result. Assessment also carried out for many purposes. Firstly, is to place children appropriately when entering new classroom or school. Besides that, it is to encourage and motivate to them succeed based on their result. However, this assessment also can discourage and de-motivate if the children’s knowledge and language learning is not considered. Furthermore, it is for research purposes in order to get information on pupils learning process.Assessment gives information to researchers on the nature of second language ability and acquisition.
GROUP MEMBERS: NUR ADILA YAHYA
NOR HAFIZAH NAHAR
ALFAIZAH ASMI
NUR SAKINA JIDIN
NoRHEDAYAH MD ALI
WEEK 1
Question 1
Based on table 3.4, we have divided the literacy development of the young learners into two phases. The first phase is five to nine years’ old and the second phase is from nine to thirteen years’ old. Overall, in the first phase, children slowly start to understand how language works through understanding of writing and reading. This acts as the foundation of literacy aspect. Besides that, children at this phase comprehend meaning by relating it with pictures and writing and making sense of it. As they grow up until nine, their literacy skills are expanding. They begin to increase the ability to understand and use writing and reading for specific purposes, for example, writing letter to parents and friends. They are also aware the mistakes that they make in grammar and begin to self-correct.
As children move into phase two, their language ability is expanding. They are able to think more readily through reading and writing. They also develop reading skills to gather information and for pleasure. This will continue until the age of thirteen. They are able to read a variety of fiction and nonfiction. However, they begin to develop critical literacy skill where they will interpret material in different ways.
Overall, the literacy development among children can be related with their cognitive development. As we can see, from phase one until phase two, children develop their literacy from concrete to abstract idea. The development of their literacy reflects the development of physical growth. For example, development of writing progress parallel with the development of fine motor skill. In a nutshell, teacher and assessor have to consider children’s literacy development in assessing children’s language learning. It is important for the appropriate choice of tasks that are text that are used for reading.
Question 2
Assessment is carried out due to many purposes. First, for pedagogic purposes, teacher can make decision in teaching and learning activity. For example, from assessment, teacher can make decisions about what to teach next. Second is the administrative purposes whereby it can furnish information about the performance of children and schools to Education Department administrators and others.
Purposes of assessment depend on the type of the assessment. For example, placement test is conducted to place pupils into the most appropriate class or group. Besides that, formative assessment is carried out to monitor the progress of the pupils during teaching and learning progress and to give information to the teachers how well their students are doing in learning. From the result of the assessment, teachers are able to make further decisions about teaching. Moreover, summative assessment is carried out to determine pupils’ achievement in a period of learning, normally at the end of a school term or year. Based on the result, this will provide information to the education departments to ensure the effectiveness of the curriculum. If it is not effective, the curriculum can be modified and make some research. In addition, parents rely on assessment to know their children’s progression and how well their children perform compare to the expected rate of the progress of their peers. It also functions to give feedback to the learners themselves on what they have done well or perhaps misunderstood. It continually provides some creative tension to motivate them to study harder.
Group members:
Safura Sulaiman
Zhafharina Mohd Sabri
Khairunnisa Mad Fazil
Nur Ayuni Azmi
Nur Zawanah Jamaludin
Question 1
Children develop differently in terms of their literacy due to reasons such as growth and vulnerability and this also affected by in what age the were. We can see through the table that children develop further from the age of 5 to the age of thirteen. Some of the ability that has not been possessed by the children at the early age such as thinking logically has been mastered in the age of 13. However, this may not be applicable to all as not every children progress at the same rate. Children who are having problems reading and writing at the age of 11 may not be able to perceive things the same way as their peers who were able to give reasoning to something that they can not see before their eyes. Cognitive growth is the one that underlies most of the ability of children to develop in terms of their literacy. Ability to read and think either abstractly or logically will determine how the children will be able to develop themselves.
The table itself can be related to Piaget Cognitive Development Stages. Children move from preoperational stage into concrete operational. We can see that children in the age of 5 have yet to think rationally, their view are rather egocentric in which they only perceive things from their own view. They understand things that they can see such as pictures and often draw in order to understand something thoroughly. However, this changes as they move from one stage to the other. They began to think rationally able to study more complex type of literature that requires them to picture of give reasoning as why something might happen.
Question 2
Assessment provides information to administrators on the achievement of students and this enable them to identify their effectiveness in delivering the curriculum. Instead of giving the information to the administrators, assessment also gives students knowledge of their own progress in learning and gives them feedback on what they have done.
However, each types of assessment have different types of purposes. Take for an instance, formative assessment. The purpose of formative assessment is to give the teachers the information about how well the students perform in their learning. So, from the result gained from the assessment will help the teacher to diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of the students. It will help the teachers to make decisions in order to improve their teaching. While for placement assessment, the result gained is to place the students in appropriate class or group. In order to carry out an effective assessment, teacher should have deep understanding about children’s cognitive development, students’ background, and students’ proficiency level so that the assessment is valid and reliable to each students. Assessment has the power to change children’s lives, so that is why teacher should plan and carry out the assessment very well so that it would not give great impact to the children.
Week 1
Group memebers:
1.Joshua Paul
2.Connie Sim
3.Rubinidevi Veloo
4.Bak Zi Yang
5.Lai Shu LIng
Question 1.
The table 3.4 discussed about the literacy development of children aged from 5 to 13 years old. Children aged 5-7 develop a basic vocabulary of personal words. They understand that ‘print’ tell stories. However, their reading pace is still slow and they read deliberately. They tend to substitute words that make sense when reading. At the age of 7-9, children develop rapidly increasing vocabulary of sight words when reading. They begin to self-correct and begin to develop the ability to read silently. At this age also, children’s ability to read aloud fluently with actions will increase. Next, children aged from 9 to 11 years tend to read silently with increase speed and comprehension and continue to self-correct the errors. However, they are able to adjust their reading rate to suit the purposes. Their reading skills are expanded to gather information from a variety of resources. They also make personal choice in reading for their own pleasure. Lastly, at the age of 11 to 13, children continue to increase silent reading rate and time spent at reading. Their ability to adjust rate and reading to suit purpose will also continue to increase. In addition, they continue to broaden their interest in a variety of fiction and non-fiction. They will also begin to understand that people will interpret the same material in different ways.
Question 2.
Summative- end of the year assessment, see pupils achievement at the end of a study term.
Formative- ongoing assessment, in classroom. Teacher able to administer the progress of pupils
Assessments are commonly used to provide information to teachers/administrative to administer and see the progress and achievement of pupils. Besides that, for pupils, they can use the information obtained from assessment to better them and know their weaknesses.
A simple explanation:
Pedagogic-teacher used information obtain to decide his/her next lesson or steps
Administrative- see the performance of students in a school as a whole, usually for Ministry of Education.
Placement- arranges pupils into respective groups effectively. (Class streaming)
Group members:
Mohd Hafiz Mohd Khairon
Tg Nor Amirah Tg Anuar
Noor Arina Nadiah Abd Razak
Izyan Ismail
Farah Filzah Azizuddin
7th of July 2008- (Question 1)
Table 1.1 shows the expectations of young language learners’ literacy development. In the table, we can see that young language learners’ literacy develop as they grow up. In the age between 5 to 9 years old, young children combine drawing and writing to convey ideas. This means that the children in these ages need pictures to ‘represent’ the words. For instance, an A, B, C book which has a picture of an apple to represent the alphabet ‘A’, and a picture of a ball to represent the letter ‘B’, is usually used by parents to teach their children to recognise alphabet. Meanwhile, in storybooks for children, there are various colourful pictures accompanying the printed words. Without a picture, it is quite hard for the children to understand the printed word because their cognitive development is not mature enough. As they grow up, they build their literacy knowledge, and become more mature in their cognitive development. That is why, in the table, we can see that children in the age of 7 to 9 years old can understand printed words even though there is no pictures accompanying the words. The young learners also develop their literacy in their reading skills. Younger learners tend to read more slowly and deliberately, while children in the age of 11 to 13 are able to read faster and start to use other reading skills such as scanning and scanning. Their vocabulary will also expands. In short, young language learners will develop their skills in literacy and become more mature in their cognitive development as they grow older.
9th July 2008- (Question 2)
There are various reasons why assessment is important in young second language learners. Decision that needs to be made determines the purpose of the assessment as it will provide necessary information that is needed from the assessment. Furthermore, results that will be obtained from the assessment can affect the ‘stakeholders’ where they require different kinds of information depending who they are and on what are their interest of knowing the results from the assessment.
Basically, assessment can be divided into 2 categories which are formal assessment and informal assessment. Formal assessment refers to the assessment that is planned and carried out with formal procedures while informal assessment usually refers to classroom assessment such as observations done by the teacher during teaching and learning process. Both formal and informal can tied to high stakes decisions especially when the assessment is done to select students or to compare the students’ achievement across school.
There are many different purposes for assessment. One of them is pedagogic purposes as well as administrative purposes. These 2 purposes can be overlap to certain extend. For instance, pedagogic purposes emphasize on the methods used by teachers in the classroom to promote learning where administrative purposes will used the information gained from pedagogic purpose to measure effectiveness of students’ performance in certain educational programme such as the implementation of KBSR. Assessment is also used for placement; to place students according to their abilities, motivation; to give support, encouragement and motivation to students to progress in their learning, and also as research purposes; for example, assessments about how effective the leaning of mathematics and sciences in English are carried out and the results are used to measure the effectiveness of the programme.
Under formal and informal assessment, there is summative and formative assessment. Summative assessment is categorized under formal assessment. The purpose of summative assessment is to know how students had progress and give reports to certain stakeholders such as parents, teachers or school administrator about the students’ progress and achievement. It usually takes place at the end of school term and the results may be made public that may use for comparisons with past and future results.
On the other hand, formative assessment that falls under informal assessment is ongoing assessment during teaching and learning process and it is predominately used for pedagogic purposes. Based on the results, it will give information about how well the students are doing. Formative assessment often involves diagnostic assessment where teachers can analyze students’ specific strength and weaknesses through observations. It can also involve on-the-run assessment and planned assessment. on-the-run assessment involve observation and immediate feedback given by the teacher in classroom where planned assessment is used to help teachers to target specific observation or plan language use task to check if children have achieved the objectives of the lesson.
Week 2
Group members:
1)Muhammad Ridhuan B. Md. Nor
2)Nur Habibi Bt. Ghazali
3)Ainaa Yasmin Bt. Alias
4)Amira Shakira Bt. Ahmad Sabri
5)Nor Zulaikha Bt. Nor Azmi
Question 1
Discuss Figure 2.1 on page 32. Your discussion should centre on the range of contextual support and degree of cognitive involvement in communicative activities.
The figure 2.1 explains the range of contextual support and degree of cognitive involvement in communicative activities. The figure shows 4 quadrants which separated by 2 continuum which refers to the degree of active cognitive engagement and the degree of contextual support.
Quadrant A referred to the communicative activities which are cognitively undemanding and context embedded. The examples of these activities are face to face conversation, following directions and oral presentation. The tasks in quadrant A are cognitively undemanding but there is constant interaction among the group participants and they are exposed more to the contextual support such as intonation, pictures and gestures to make the message more comprehensible. The tasks in quadrant C are also cognitively undemanding. However, the contextual support is reduced. Telephone conversation, written directions or instructions are the examples of the tasks. The tasks in quadrant A and quadrant C are also described by Cummins as social language (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills or BICS)
Meanwhile, quadrant B shows that the tasks are cognitively demanding and context embedded. The examples of these tasks are demonstrations and experiments, projects and activities as well as social studies. These activities involve active involvement of cognitive such as understanding and memorizing facts, analyzing cause and effects and criticizing of article and arguments. There are also involved contextual clues that will help the learners to understand and complete the tasks. Quadrant D is the ultimate goal for learners as the tasks in this quadrant are cognitively demanding but less or no contextual support provided. Once they manage to complete the tasks in this quadrant, it shows that they have increased their ability in understanding academic language as they are able to figure out the tasks without contextual support. These activities can be from standardized tests, mathematics concept and application and most content classes. The tasks in quadrant B and quadrant D are also described as academic language (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency or CALP).
Question 2
Effective assessment of young learners combines knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes. Discuss.
Every child has different level of language proficiency based on their growth rate and level of cognitive. Young learners will go through every level of physical and cognitive development before they are able to use the target language within the appropriate discourse. It is very crucial for the assessors to take into consideration of the children’s growth and their language learning process as children from different age and proficiency may exhibit different way of responding and understanding towards the target language. For instance, 7 years old children are still developing their writing skills where they are experimenting with letters and how to create words by combining the letters. Thus, it is crucial for the teacher or assessor to set tasks within the level of the children’s proficiency and should not extend beyond their experience of the world so that their performance can be assessed effectively. If the teacher or the assessor sets the task beyond the capabilities of the children, they may failed to exhibit their skills and understanding and that will lead to the decreasing of children’s motivation and they may suffer inferiority.
The social and cultural backgrounds of the children are also factors that will affect the language learning process of the young learners. For instance, young learners who are using the target language at home or living in the environment of the target language will find that they can easily learn the target language compared to the young learners which are not familiar with the target language. These children will face problems in learning the target language and their developmental phase may be slower than expected. In this situation, the teacher or the assessor should set tasks or activities which can accommodate every level of proficiency from weak, intermediate to the advance level. The implication of this approach is that the learner can be assessed on their level of understanding of the target language. Thus, the weak learner will be motivated to attempt more challenging task as they can complete the easy tasks while the advance learner will be motivated to attempt more difficult tasks. Besides, assessors and teachers need deep knowledge of children’s use of the first language to enable them to apply the same rules in the first language to the second or foreign language. Therefore, the ability of children to acquire the rules in the first language can influence the success of second language acquisition.
By: M.Komathi a/p Marappan
Kasthuri a/p Govindasamy
Bhavarita a/p Subramaniam
Jaswinder Kaur a/p Kulbant Singh
Rimala a/p Murugayah
Week 2: Question 1
Language learners are deeply influenced by both context and cognitive aspects of classroom activities. In the figure 2.1 of page 32 in Penny McKay’s Assessing Young Language Learners, their range of contextual support and degree of cognitive involvement in communicative activities are divided neatly into four quadrants. Cummins (1980;1983) has claimed the degree of active cognitive engagement in the quadrants represents Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP) while the degree of contextual support that available represents Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS).
In the figure, the horizontal and vertical scales refer to the degree of contextual support and degree of active cognitive engagement. The quadrants A and B have activities that are embedded with context while C and D are reduced of contest clues. On other hand, quadrants A and C have activities that are cognitively undemanding as B and D are high in cognitive demand.
This means that the activities in quadrant A consist of two elements which are low cognitive demand and embedded context. As such, the children tend to receive a lot of assistance in completing their task though the task is relatively easy. Some examples of these activities are following directions and face-to-face conversations.
The quadrant B contains activities that are still embedded with context but academically demanding. In this situation, the challenging task is completed with assistance. This stage is very important as it is through this stage that learners actually improve themselves. As stated in Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of human mental processing, “second language learners advance to higher levels of linguistic knowledge when they collaborate and interact with speakers of second language who are more knowledgeable than they are, for example, a teacher or a more advanced learner” (Lightbown and Spada, 1999). What the child is able to do in interaction with another but not alone is known as the Zone of Proximal Development. Teachers should use activities of this quadrant to help the learners to move on to the next level in their language learning. Some of the activities that can be incorporated are demonstrations and experiments.
Meanwhile, the quadrant C contains activities which are cognitively less challenging but low with context clues. Here the learners begin to work independently on not-so-difficult tasks. This will indirectly train them to work on their own without depending on the teacher. Examples of such activities are telephone conversations as well as instructions.
The last quadrant in figure, which is the quadrant D, contains the most difficult tasks because it is high in cognitive demand and reduced in context clues. At this point, learners would be able to complete given task independently though they are highly challenging.
We find that this progress from the quadrant A to D is quite similar to the Principal of Diminishing Control applied in composition writing skills. The principal of diminishing control is all about designing “activities along a continuum like this: Controlled Guided Free Writing”(Nesamalar, 2005). The similarity here is seen in the way where learners are initially dependant on then teacher but later they gradually move into working independently.
Week 2: Question 2
Effective assessment is a combination of the knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes. It is important for the teachers and assessors to understand the knowledge of the child growth in order to have an effective assessment. One of the purposes is to encourage and motivate the learner. An assessment could cause negative emotional states among the pupils if the growth of the children is not taken into consideration when preparing the assessment task. According to the affective filter hypothesis, proposed by Krashen (1982), the child would filter out the input when he or she is unmotivated. Assessment should act as a tool to arise positive emotion in learners towards language learning. This is why an assessor needs to understand about the language learning process itself.
Moreover, the assessor should also gain necessary knowledge regarding the growth of the children. It is very important because assessments that are designed for large group of learners may not be reliable because children grow at different. Some may not have developed abilities that their peers have already developed. At different phases they are capable of doing different things for instance from ages 5 to 7years old, they are capable of reading slowly and deliberately only but in ages 7 to 9years they can read aloud fluently with expression. As such the assessment must be parallel with what their growth permits them to perform. An assessment of reading aloud is not suitable for children aged 5 to 7 years old. Some learning, for instance learning second and foreign language learning is influenced by a learner’s appraisal system. Appraisal systems are the value systems that individuals develop through interaction with their environment and bring to their language learning. Due to different experiences, the children’s appraisal systems make each of them to react emotionally in different ways. Therefore, the assessment criteria should cater each child’s motivation, interest and attention in second language learning.
week 1.
group members:
1.Mohd Irwan Syah b Kamaruzzaman
2.Nur Aisyah bt Said@Sa'dun
3.Nurul Husna Mohd Taher
4.Nor Azirah Ibrahim
5.Siti Suhaili Sarif
1)7th of July 2008: Read chapter1 and in a group of 5, please discuss table 3.4 on page 13 your discussion should centre on the literacy development of children.
Literacy is a very important matter while dealing with the Second or Foreign Language Learners, especially with the Young Language Learners. Most of them are still learning in having a good command of their own First Language, therefore when we are discussing about Literacy, it is very crucial for us to understand that Young Second Language Learners are developing their skills and understandings of literacy in learning the target language; Adult learners, mostly have mastered or are able to differentiate between how the first and target languages are differs in terms of the literacy. They do have to deal with two or more languages at the early ages. So, we as the teachers or assessors should be able to know the level of pupils’ proficiency in designing assessment for the young learners. Teachers or assessors should be extra careful when developing the tests for the young learners compared to adult learners who usually have achieved the Formal Operational Stage. They should alert with the fast or slow transition of skills and understandings of each pupils so that teacher will be able to design appropriate assessment based on their level of acquisition of the second language. From the table, we can see that, the progress of the young learners in literacy skills and understandings from age 5 to age 13. They will master the skill one-by-one or part-by-part before they would be able to master the skill as a whole concept. For instance, the pupil will learn to recognize the alphabets at the age of 6, then later he will learn and try to memorize on how to form a word by using the alphabets. Then, he will know on how to construct the sentences by using the word and he will continuously develop his understanding on how to write an essay. So, by understanding this development of children in literacy by referring to the table, teacher for example can most probably set the test of writing a report at the age of 12, and not at the age of 6 or 7 years old.
Now, let us take a look in Malaysian context, for instance the Teaching of Science and Mathematics in English in primary school. Do you think it is relevant? We think it is relevant to a certain extent, we do agree if Science and Math are taught in English because children will be able to use the second language indirectly because they were exposed to the language most of the time in a week, but the problem is, can those who have a really low proficiency in English cope with this kind of situation? Now let us relate with the literacy skills and understanding of literacy in learning the target language, if the children are still developing their skills and understanding in English, so how can they learn new subjects in English language while those two subjects (Math and Science) have their own terminology. So, those who have low proficiency in English and are able to score high marks for both subjects, they might be learning for the sake of exams and not learning it by their own willingness.
2)9th of July2008: Read chapter 1 and in group of 5 please discuss pg 20-25. What do you understand by the purposes of assessment?
The purpose of the assessment is basically to gather information of the young learners’ performance to what extent they have achieved the curriculum goals. The assessment is needed in order to make decision in teaching. It can be either formal or informal assessment, whereby, teacher can carry it out during teaching and learning process, which is informal or a well-planned and organized assessment in such a way that it requires the students to do it on their own without the interruption of the teachers or peers during a limited time given and they have to submit it in order to be marked by the teacher at a separate time.
Other than that, the purpose of assessment is to give information to the stakeholders, for instance the parents, the administrators, the teachers, principals as well as to the students themselves. It is for pedagogic purposes and for administrative purposes. Pedagogic purposes aim at promoting learning, thereby, it is useful for the teacher to create something that is slightly higher than the knowledge that the students already master so that the teacher can enhance the pupils’ performance. Administrative purposes supply the information about the performance of children and school to Education Department administrators and others, who use this information for management and accountability, for instance they may want to use the data to give the scholarship to students who achieve the goals they have set, to group the students or to qualify them to the boarding school.
Assessment also gives idea to the teacher to set particular standard of the curriculum, either they want it to be content standards or performance standards in order to let the administrator knows the progression of the pupils. This will be feasible if the teacher always monitor the progress of the students’ performance throughout the previous tests. In addition, in primary schools, assessment for placement purposes are very popular and it is to place the pupils in the most appropriate class or group; for examples the interview or the short reading session.
Besides, assessment can either have negative or positive impact on students. Positively, assessment can encourage or motivate students to study hard and smart. They will know their level of understandings in each topics or subjects which can help them to improve on their weaknesses and enhance in their strengths. On the other hand, assessment can have big and negative effect to students when the tests not meet with their level of understanding and ability.
Group members:
1) Muhammad Syahrul Nizam bin Ismail
2)Kamal Efendi bin Harun
3)Mohd Afiq bin Zainal Azmi
4)Siti Zarne binti Fakurol Razi
5)Nor Azimah
Discuss on the literacy development of children.
Various literacy skills are acquired by children at different age or specific period of times throughout their life.
Through our discussion, we believe that children begin to have awareness about the function of reading and writing. In the term of writing and reading skills from year five to seven, we believe that the children are able to understand the new ideas, which are created and delivered through the right mixture of concrete objects. For example, they can’t understand the abstract verbs such as love as they can only understand verbs that refer to their five senses such as touch, smell, hearing, sight and taste. According to Jean Piaget, he suggested that children in preoperational stage are able to deal with concrete objects and ideas. This is demonstrated through the use of drawing in their writing activity. At this stage, activities such as colouring and drawing may aid children to improve their fine motor skills in order to increase their writing development.
During this period, the children’s reading ability begins at a slow pace but progresses as they grow. They may already have a rough idea that printed text functions as a medium of transferring messages. Here, in the classroom, the teacher should prepare the students with materials that are appropriate to their level of ability. Since the children still have a limited number of vocabulary, they often attempt to use the basic ones, mainly words that are meaningful to them like eat, cry, jump (mostly one syllable words). Thus, we should provide the pupils with simple words in an attempt to help their reading more comprehensible and meaningful. At the same time, we can encourage the pupils to begin reading aloud the text and then develop into silent reading later on.
During the age of seven to nine, children are becoming more improved by having less dependency on drawing form and more to writing in delivering their messages; even through writing form alone their ideas can still be understood clearly. They also begin to self correct their own errors, which also may indicate an awareness of trying to imply the target language grammar rules into written form. There is a significant development in vocabulary, particularly on sight words like chairs and tables, which is visually meaningful and visible to them.An addition to the development of reading, children have improved in reading aloud more fluently including making facial expression and gestures to make their message more real and accurate.
From year nine to eleven, they may begin to explore abstract ideas like faith and beliefs, though may not fully understand the whole concept in a meaningful manner. Reading development has improved in both speed and understanding, especially in silent reading. Children are now capable of manipulating their rate of reading to fulfill various reading purposes for example skimming or scanning. Children have become more aware of their need to acquire knowledge, thus make attempts to become resourceful by seeking other medium of information aside from reading materials to internet, magazines and so on. Gradually, children may use the IT channel as it proofs to be one of the most accessible source of latest information available.
Finally, at the age of eleven to thirteen, children become more in depth thinking about abstract ideas and concepts that are not visible to them. According to Jean Piaget, they are going through formal operational stage where children are beginning to hypothesize, bulid abstract categories and handle more than two variables at one time. Successful reading efforts have grown interest to children in expanding their reading genres to fiction and non-fiction, which may serve the purpose for pleasure or fun. Children attempt to have different ideas about the same text they read which is a good thing as they may share and justify their own reasons for coming up with their own individual ideas.
Overall, from table 3.4 on page 12 of Penny Mckay, it is clear that children begin to develop only basic literacy skills like starting to discover the functions of reading and writing. From the early years, they are still unfamiliar with these skills but at the same time continuously attempt to combine, develop and understand ways to make them meaningful and purposeful, which is actually building a strong foundation for them to master more complex tasks and concepts in later years.
Assessment terms and purposes
Apparently, the purpose of assessment is to provide information to educators, parents, administrators and students which are also know as stakeholders, who may require specific information depending on who they are and on what their interest is. Assessment might either be formal or informal. Informal assessment basically refers to classroom assessment carried out during teaching and learning process while formal assessment refers to assessment that is planned and carried out following formal procedure. Pedagogic purposes are aimed more towards promoting learning while administrative proposes focus at management, filling in details and accountability purposes.
There are few types of assessment such as formative assessment, summative assessment, assessment for placement purposes, assessment to encourage and motivate and assessment for research. Formative assessment is an ongoing process, informal and usually made during teaching and learning processes. This kind of assessment gives information to teacher about how well the student is performing. Formative assessment involves diagnostic assessment whereby to analyze learner’s specific strength and weaknesses, helping teachers to prepare remedial classes for weak pupils and enrichment classes for the advanced ones. On-the-run assessment refers to informal, instruction-embedded assessment that is formative in purpose and carried out by teacher in classrooms while planned assessment is to help teacher to target specific observations or plan language use tasks to check if children have achieved the objectives along the way. On the other hand, summative assessment usually gives information to teacher on how a student has progressed during a period of study plus to report to others about achievement. Summative results may be made public and may be used for comparisons with past and future results. Moreover, assessment for placement purposes is to place the student in the most appropriate class or group. This kind of assessment involves an interview, a short reading session and writing task. A part from that, assessment can also encourage and motivate learners. Teacher encourage student by showing them what they have learned and give positive feedback, motivating them to success. Assessment also can be carried out for the purposes of research. Initially, research is about the effect of one particular subject or curriculum toward students.
Hi,
This is the name list for our group:
-Mohd Syazwan Jonit
-Nur Syahana Shaharuddin
-Nur Dalilah Mohd Redzuan
-Nur Asma Abd Somad
-Siti Rohainiza Abd Latif
-Zulfadli Ab Rahim
This is the result for our discussion assigned in Week 1.
Question 1
Table 1.1 summarizes the abilities that can be recognized during the development of literacy. In this table, we can say that children start establishing the foundation as early as 5 to 7 years old, when they start to understand how reading and writing work. At this stage, children's ability in literacy is bound to basic vocabulary that is personalized to them. Therefore, when they are writing, children tend to include drawings, as at this stage, children might not have acquired words that they are not familiar with. This is in line with Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development, whereby at the pre-operational stage, as they convey messages through the use of symbols. However, their thinking is done in a nonligical manner. That is why at this stage, when they read, they only understand that the print (eg. storybook) 'tells' the story.
However, when they are 7 to 9 years old, children start developing their literacy skills when they read and write with particular purposes. At this stage, writing can stand alone without the need of drawing and children can also correct errors by themselves. As experience grows, their vocabulary increases and they can put expressions into reading. At the age of 9 to 11, they are still continuing the process of literacy development, in which they self-correct errors and increase vocabulary. Children at these ages start choosing what they like to read. Therefore, their thinking expands when they read and write. The following stage (11 to 13 years old) shows that children put interests in reading fictions and non-fictions, thus they begin understand that people may interpret a single material in many ways.This can be referred to Piaget's Concrete Operational Stage of Cognitive development whereby their operational thiking develops.
As a conclusion, through this table, we can see that children's literacy develops as they grow.
Question 2
Assessment is important to determine the level of understanding of each individuals. Assessments might be informal and formal :Informal assessment (carried out during the teaching and learning process) and Formal assessment (assessment is planned and carried out in formal procedures), in which it can be classroom-based or external assessment. However, both are equally important especially for the high-stakes decisions.
Purposes for assessment:
1)pedagogic purposes for assessment (PPA) - aimed primarily to promote learning
2)administrative purposes for assessment (APA) - to furnish info about the children's performance
* EG: these two purposes often overlap. for eg: with the use of the KBSR, PPA is when teacher implement the method of KBSR to use in teaching while APA is where theadministrative use the results for management and accountability purposes.
3)assessment for placement purposes - it is important to place the children in the appropriate class or group according to their results. this assessment might involve high-stakes ( if wrongly placed the children, it can give major impact on his lives)
4)assessment to encourage and motivate - through assessment, children can compete with each other in positive way and encourage them to learn from mistakes and progress better.
5)assessment for research - children's performance can be measured to give information to researchers on particular areas of language ability and acquisition.
Generally there are many types of assessments but mainly it is divided into two:
1)Formative assessment : to give teacher information on how well the student is doing. It often involve with diagnostic assessment, where the data collection will help the teacher to identify strength and weaknessess and thus to carry out remedial or enrichment activities. On-the-run assessment give immediate feedback to teachers. Finally, planned assessment help the teacher to check if the children have achieved the objectives of the lessons.
2)Summative assessment : it usually take place at the end of year or mid year. Stakeholders at this point become more involve as they want to know how the student's progress during the period of the study. it is an important assessment as the results will mostly use for the future and acceptance to the next level.
That's all for now
Regards
Wanjoe, Asma, Shana, Dalila, Niza, Azul.
group members
Muhammad Khairil Ahmad
jezrina Jaafar Sidek
Nurul Amalina Yusof
Farah Zawani Zulkifli
Nurhidayah Mat Hassan
QUESTION 1
All of us agree that children from 5 to 7 years old are not really develop their ability in certain or particular knowledge yet. Children at this stage usually use their prior knowledge on the first language to understand text or context in foreign language. They tend to apply rules in first language directly and try to discover or understand material in foreign language. This group of young learners are usually familiar with words that closely related to them. They first learn words in foreign language by knowing or discovering vocabulary that they usually used such as book, bag, pencil, mother and etc. Because of this limited ability or vocabulary, they are more comfortable to scribble in order to convey meaning or ideas. This is also the effect of undeveloped muscles which limits their ability to focus on writing activity. This group of children improve their literacy when they reached 7 to 9 years old. At this stage, they are already able to write full sentences and aware of grammatical errors in their writing. They also had more vocabulary compare to those at the first stage. They are confident enough to read alone and understand the reading text. While moving from 7 to 9 years old to 9 to 11 years old, they are also improving their cognitive development. They are able to produce ideas based on topics given and elaborate the points logically as they become more mature toward acquiring the skills they are capable to choose their own reading material based on their interest. Moreover, they are also starting to acquire the skill to identify only important points in particular text. These children will slowly improve the skills when they reached 11 to 13 years old, where they become more specific and open to any other input besides the one which written in the text. They treat people as individual and respect others' opinion as well as own opinion about issues in the reading materials. This is also the stage where children develop the interest to explore different types of reading materials. In overall, the young learners did use their knowledge of the first language to acquire skills in learning foreign language. They develop the skills by learning from own mistakes and experiences and slowly improving the skills as they grow older.
QUESTION 2
There are two main purposes of assessment which are pedagogic purposes and administrative purposes. Pedagogic focused more on promoting learning to students. We believed that in this part, assessment is used to encourage students to learn more by knowing their own strength and weaknesses. This will enable them to identify which area that they should give more focus. The decision makes in this part is at a low-stake level as the impacts or decisions made are easy to correct. The other purpose of assessment is for administrative purposes. Administratives involve not only teacher and school but also the Ministry of Education. School needs all the data about students' capabilities and abilities in order to group the students according to their cognitive ability. Ministry of Education on the other hand, needs the assessment's report to be able to make decision about resource allocation correctly. Assessment also help the Ministry of Education to find the weaknesses and strengths of the syllabus so that Ministry will know what and how to modify the syllabus. However, the decision makes in administrative purpose is at high-stake as any wrong decision will leave impacts on students' future and life. The decision is also very costly to correct.
Week 2
Group members : Mohd.Irwan Shah Kamarulzaman
Siti Suhaili Sarif
Nor Azirah Ibrahim
Nur Aisyah Sa'aid @ Zaidun
Nurul Husna Mohd. Taher
Discuss figure 2.1 on page 32. Your discussion should centre on the range of contextual support and degree of cognitive involvement in communicative activities.
This figure shows 4 quadrants which closely related with the cognitive ability in learning language. Cummins has described social language as (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) (BICS) and academic language as (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) (CALP). Both of this language are different on two dimensions through the degree of active cognitive engagement and the degree of contextual support available for the students. The horizontal continuum refers to the level of contextual support , for instance intonation, pictures and clues that help students the acquire the language whereas the vertical continuum refers to the degree of cognitive involvement involve in the activity. The problem that always arise in language learning is because the students may be proficient in their social interaction (BICS), but may perform unsatisfactorily in their academic part. Hence, we can see the importance of both BICS and CALP in language learning. Let us first analyse the four quadrants. The A quadrant is the most basic and the easiest among all, in which the context is well embedded and it is cognitively undemanding. This include face-to-face conversation and following directions. Since this is the basic one, it is very suitable for new beginners who are just starting to learn the language. The B quadrant is the second level, which is cognitively demanding and context embedded. Examples of activities are demonstrations and experiments. In handling an experiment, the teacher must provide some context in order to guide students, and students have to put on their thinking cap to ensure the success of the experiment. Quadrant C is the stage where the context is reduced and it is is cognitively undemanding. Examples are telephone conversation and note on the refrigerator. However, we do feel that quadrant B is supposed to be in the place of quadrant C, since it is more challenging compared to quadrant C. This is because quadrant B is cognitively demanding, although it is context embedded. In contrast, although quadrant C is context reduced, it is cognitively undemanding. The last quadrant is quadrant D, which is the most difficult among the all. It is cognitively demanding and the context is reduced. Since this is the most complicated one, it can be said that the people who have achieved this level possess a good language skill, since there are very little assistance in their learning and they are able to learn independently.
Hence, the ultimate goal of the teacher is to bring students from quadrant A to quadrant D, where they are able to handle cognitively demanding task without context clues. Therefore, teacher who act as an assessor need to be aware of students' level of proficiency, so they can set on which quadrant they want to start with. Besides that, teacher has to always remember on the importance of contextual clues in language teaching. This is because clues such as gestures and intonation will always boost the learning process and help children to develop their thinking. Besides that, the activities conducted in the classroom must always base on real-life situation and familiar with students, so that they can relate it with their schemata or previous knowledge. This is because social language plays a dominant role in children's' life compared to academic language.
In conclusion, Cummin's quadrant provides a clear view on how the range of contextual support and the degree of cognitive involvement affect the language learning process.
2. 16th of July 2008: Read Chapter 2 and in group of 5s please discuss this: Effective assessment of young learners combines knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes. Discuss.
Assessment is one way to assess or evaluate students’ performance after a teacher has carried her lesson whether in a summative test or formative test or while dealing with the activities in the classroom. It is essential for a teacher to construct an effective assessment so that the purposes of assessment can be achieved successfully. However, it is just a waste of time if the assessment is not effective as it cannot achieve or assess what the teacher expects from his/her students. In addition, effective language assessment builds up children’s abilities to use language in the full meaning (Mckay 2006) In fact, it is not easy for the teacher or assessor to construct an effective assessment as he/she should consider the knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes very well. The combination of the knowledge of children’s growth and the language learning processes are important as they are related to each other closely. These two factors will influence the results of the assessment. By considering these factors, the better result of the assessment can be achieved. Our discussion will focus on emotion, motivation, personal characteristics and first language acknowledgement of the students.
Firstly, effective assessment language acquires the teacher to aware with the role of emotions of the children. The children should build a positive emotion while learning the second language acquisition in order to make the language learning takes place. It is essential for the teacher to enhance motivation and the feeling of success in order to enhance the language acquisition among children. Children need to feel safe, comfort and secure and they will develop their confidence to get involve with the classroom activities. They are many ways that teacher can do such as activities that attract their interest, familiar with them and related with their daily life. This is due to the fact that children seem feeling uncomfortable with the unfamiliar environment. The assessment materials also play an important role in order to carry out the activities. According to Mckay (2006), colourful, shiny paper, music, friendly-looking puppets can also influence emotional response in young learners. They will feel attracted to these assessment materials and reduce the affective filter that may block the process of language acquisition. In addition, the cultural background, first language, educational background, and type and amount of preparation or prior experience are some of the factors that always been overlooked by the teachers. Hence, it is important for teachers to have a high consideration towards these factors as it will affect the language acquisition.
Teacher’s encouragement also helps children to feel motivated to acquire the language. If the teacher demanding the children with too high expectations, they will feel that learning language is difficult and cannot cope with other friends, especially if they are the new beginners. Secondly, the teacher should concern with children cultural differences and attitude while setting the task. For some student, they will feel uncomfortable to fulfill the task, for instance, a convent student needs to do her oral test with a male teacher from other school. It is different with her experience as she is rarely having a formal conversation with an adult male.
Thirdly, by acknowledging children’s first language, it also helps children a lot to acquire the second language acquisition. If children’s first language is well developed, then it should not be a problem for them to acquire the target language. As proclaimed by Cumminn’s, there is interdependence relationship between the first and the second language. The cognitive skills tied up with children’s linguistic skills can transfer from one language to the other. So, in order to make the assessment more effective, a teacher should acknowledge students’ first language by allowing them to use the first language if they face difficulties for their second language, especially in helping them to understand the assessment procedure. By considering this factor, it gives opportunity to the children to polish and use their first language as an assistance that may guide them during the process of language acquisition.
In short, the effective assessment requires great awareness regarding knowledge of children’s growth and their language learning processes. This will result in the strategic competence, where they are able to engage, bring all the components together in order achieve the communication purposes and the context. Since young children are still developing skills to handle discourse in their first language, it is the responsibility of the teacher to provide learning environment that relate with real language situations in communicative situations so that the objective of the assessment will be achieved.
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