INVESTIGATION OF WRITING ASSESSMENT LITERACY OF UKRAINIAN UNIVERSITY TEACHERS

Abstract

The rating process of students’ writing has been a long-standing concern in L2 large-scale standardized and classroom-based assessment. Several studies have tried to identify how the raters make scoring decisions and assign scores to ensure validity of writing assessment. The current paper addresses the issue of writing assessment practices of Ukrainian university teachers, how they approach rating scales and criteria with an attempt to understand culturally specific challenges of teachers’ writing assessment in Ukraine. To investigate the issue, this study employs the analysis of the survey results obtained from 104 university teachers of English. The survey consisted of 13 questions that provided insight into current practices in assessment of writing, such as frequency of assessment, use of rating scales, rater’s profile, criteria of assessment, feedback and rewriting, training in assessment of writing. The survey responses show that assessment in Ukraine is not regulated by common standard, and thus the approach to students’ writing assessment is often intuitive. A frequent practice is that teachers tend to rely on errors – as observable features of the text – to justify their rating decisions, Consequently, by shifting focus onto the surface features of writing, grammar mistakes in particular, the teachers underrate such criteria as “register”, “compliance with textual features” and “layout”. Additionally, the data reveal contradictory findings about writing assessment literacy of the teachers questioned. Even though most teachers claim they apply scales while rating, many confess they cannot tell the difference between holistic and analytic scales. Moreover, the results indicate that feedback is not yet a meaningful interaction between a Ukrainian teacher and a learner. Therefore, the results of the study demonstrate the need for the improvement in writing assessment practices, which could be achieved through providing training and reorientation to help Ukrainian teachers develop common understanding and interpretation of task requirements and scale features.