Abstract
This study sets out to examine whether ESL teachers design evaluation criteria according to the demands of different question types assessing literary competence. Four students enrolled in an MA TESL programme were asked to respond to three types of questions – a summary, a content based question, and a reader response question - based on one literary text. Five ESL teachers were asked to select appropriate evaluation criteria for each question type and assess student performance. The results show that all the teachers differentiate between content knowledge and language competence in identifying evaluation criteria for the three questions. But most of them do not select criteria to reflect variations in demands made by each question type. A pedagogical implication of the study is that ESL teachers need training to design evaluation criteria that can match the demands of different question types. This would make content based assessment fair, ensure high inter-rater reliability and produce beneficial washback for ESL students.
Highlights
In language education, there exists a thin dividing line between teaching and assessing ‘content’ and ‘language competences’
Questions that constantly worry us while assessing knowledge of literature are What should a language teacher concentrate on – a student’s knowledge of content or language competence or both? Should different question types such as describing the plot of a story or summarizing an author’s work or evaluating a literary text have different evaluation criteria or can all questions be assessed using one single criteria?
The primary aim of this paper is to explore whether teachers distinguish between content knowledge and language competence in assessing performance on English literature within an ESL curriculum
Summary
There exists a thin dividing line between teaching and assessing ‘content’ and ‘language competences’. 1.1 Role of evaluation criteria in writing assessment It is a well-known fact that performance on disciplines like literature or social sciences involves both content knowledge and language competence. To ensure fair assessment practices, ESL teachers need to be sensitized about the importance of designing evaluation criteria that would assess a student’s performance on both of these abilities independently. Teachers need to consider the varying demands in writing abilities made by different question types. For instance describing an event in a novel would require a writing ability that is quite different from critically evaluating an author’s work. The first would require a student to recall details of the event and describe it; in contrast, for the second one, the student would need to evaluate some literary features in a piece of work. Would involve a much higher level of writing skill than mere description of an event involved in the first one
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