Not everything works for everybody

According to Segers (2008) ‘a portfolio is a purposeful collection of examples of learning

collected over a period of time, and gives visible and detailed evidence of a person’s attainment of competence’ . This tool makes a great alternative assessment which decreases learners’ dependence on textbooks, worksheets, tests that gives important emphasis to a teacher-centered learning and less autonomy. 

Although portfolios provide valuable advantages to ESL/EFL assessment, Soruc (2011) shows in his study that as any other assessment tool, assessing with portfolios can have certain limitations or drawbacks such as lack of objectivity from the teacher when assigning grades and, difficulties related to time constraints that might result in a lack of motivation from the students and an unpleasant experience for everybody.

Soruc (2011) mentions some possible consequences of the misuse of portfolios in his report about Teachers and Students’ Perceptions regarding Portfolio Assessment in an EFL context.  Soruc states that "The pursuit taking place between teachers and students has strongly proved that an incoherent and disorganized alternative assessment tool may progressively reduce students’ enthusiasm and enervate portfolio’s authenticity and tendency to promote autonomy of learners". 

That's why it results very important to be as clear and specific as possible with your students about the characteristics of the portfolio, as well as the kind of work that it should reflect. Although the teacher is the one who is originally in charge of setting the tasks and guiding the students in the portfolio making process, it is always essential to take into account that the students actually have a say in the decision making stage of the project; which makes them active part of it. 

In that note, communication becomes of extreme importance in the development of this tool and its assessment, so both parties can have a clear picture of what is expected to accomplish with the portfolio; and in this way, preventing misunderstandings regarding content and materials included in the portfolio, as well as its assessment. 

The use of portfolios should not be taken lightly. Teachers must always evaluate how suiting or convenient this tool is for every group. Remember, not everything works for everybody. 

Here you will find an example of how the decision making process to establish guidelines for a portfolio can be conducted.

 http://www.scielo.org.co/scielo.php?pid=S0123-46412011000200009&script=sci_arttext

SPEAKING DOES NOT EXIST IN A VACUUM

"Two monologues do not make a dialogue." - Jeff Daly

Speaking is a skill which can be triggered by factors of any kind. it is mostly conditioned by receptive skills: reading (including interpreting images) and listening. That is to say, for any kind or level in speaking, imitative, intensive, responsive, interactive and extensive (Brown 2000); it is essential to rely on receptive skills like listening or reading. This characteristic makes the assessment of oral production almost impossible to determine in isolation. And why sould it be anyway? These two types of skills are fairly linked and are necessary to create communication in real life scenarios. Even monologues (extensive speaking) can start from written, visual or spoken stimuli, which means that speaking doesn't exist in a vacuum and it shouldn't be assessed as if it were. It will always need a catalyst.



Focusing on evaluating speaking and listening, I think we all understand the pressure most students feel when it comes to take a test. All these feelings affect their performance most of the time, which would make the outcomes lack from the necessary reliability to evaluate their performance. Thus, it is important to consider constant assessment based on observation of students' performance during classes, regardless scoring, in order to have a clearer idea of their abilities.

To conclude with this entry, I'd like to superficially refer to speaking tasks which allow the students to performe with more freedom, such as sentence/dialogue completion tasks ( intensive speaking). Although there exists some predictable output, as speaking is one of the most flexible skills (if not the most flexible one), there is always room for diverse responses. In my opinion, these responses should be considered part of the students' oral production even when the content is not the expected one. That is why it could result more accurate to assess those responses taking into account standard traits such as pronunciation, fluency and vocabulary use, in order to evaluate students' performance in a more equal way.

From Testing to Assessment

Not long ago, there was no distinction in my mind between testing and assessment. I have to confess the only way I knew to evaluate my students' performace was by designing a regular test containing part of the topics presented in class, and I believe most of the teachers in the country have been living in ignorace regarding the matter of assessment; just like I was.

As Brown clearly stated in the first chapter of his book Language Assessment: Principles and Classroom Practices (2000), tests are only a tool to assess students' performance, but they do not represent the only form of assessment that a teacher can make. A couple of weeks ago I decided I would try something different in my class. I came up with an idea to evaluate the topic concerning daily routines. I opted for designing a test (yeah, I know, not very creative...), but I chose to give it a little twist by adding some questions my students would have to answer by watching a short and simple video. In my mind it was such a good idea, but I started questioning if my choice would cause more harm than good after some of my students showed confused when answering the questions I had prepared.

Did I fail? Did I succeed? Well, it was my first attempt, and as most first times, it did not result in a complete triumph.

According to Brown (2000), "A well-constructed test is an instrument that provides an accurate measure of the test-taker's ability within a particular domain". He also makes reference to the complexity of creating a good test, which he believes involves both science and art. I think many of my classmates would agree with the fact that being creative does not always come easily to some of us. As being artistic is considered a gift, some people actually have to invest a greater ammount of time and effort to cope up with the demands and challenges that being an amazing teacher brings.

Several questions arise as we go deeper into the topic of assessment: What is the best way to assess my students' performance? How can I avoid psychologically scaring low performing students? However, the main query that pops out in my mind is how to succeed at implementing different tools when assessing a topic? For now this questions remain without an answer. Hopefully, time and experience will show me the answers I need.