Proponents of educational reform frequently call for ‘higher standards’ but in their influential article, Black and Wiliam (1998) point out that national reforms worldwide fail as ‘the sum of all these reforms has not added up to an effective policy because something is missing’ (1998:140): a focus on what actually happens in the classroom and how learning is managed. Classrooms have changed since 1998, but there is still a tendency for reformers to call for higher standards and better exam results without clearly explaining how to achieve them. This puts pressure on teachers, who already face time, administrative and curriculum constraints, to take responsibility for managing assessment processes while also promoting learning in the classroom. The primary aim of this article is to describe ways in which assessment tools, ranging from summative to formative assessment, can be combined systematically to promote learning as well as measuring achievement, with a particular emphasis on how formative assessment can aid learning and ultimately benefit learners in summative tests. This is illustrated by the system applied on the English for Professional Purposes (EPP) course, ‘English for the World of Work’ at Verona University. This is a postgraduate course, designed and implemented by the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures of Verona University, to form a bridge between the theoretical studies of language undertaken at the university and the more practical language skills required in the workplace (for a full description see Hartle 2018b). Although this is not a General English course, the assessment tools used can also easily be extended to school courses teaching professional English or General English.
Combining formative and summative practices in higher education ELT: Implementing learning-oriented assessment
Hartle
2020-01-01
Abstract
Proponents of educational reform frequently call for ‘higher standards’ but in their influential article, Black and Wiliam (1998) point out that national reforms worldwide fail as ‘the sum of all these reforms has not added up to an effective policy because something is missing’ (1998:140): a focus on what actually happens in the classroom and how learning is managed. Classrooms have changed since 1998, but there is still a tendency for reformers to call for higher standards and better exam results without clearly explaining how to achieve them. This puts pressure on teachers, who already face time, administrative and curriculum constraints, to take responsibility for managing assessment processes while also promoting learning in the classroom. The primary aim of this article is to describe ways in which assessment tools, ranging from summative to formative assessment, can be combined systematically to promote learning as well as measuring achievement, with a particular emphasis on how formative assessment can aid learning and ultimately benefit learners in summative tests. This is illustrated by the system applied on the English for Professional Purposes (EPP) course, ‘English for the World of Work’ at Verona University. This is a postgraduate course, designed and implemented by the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures of Verona University, to form a bridge between the theoretical studies of language undertaken at the university and the more practical language skills required in the workplace (for a full description see Hartle 2018b). Although this is not a General English course, the assessment tools used can also easily be extended to school courses teaching professional English or General English.
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