1.0 INTRODUCTION
Arshad Abd Samad (2011)
states that assessment is any of a variety of procedures used to obtain
information on students’ performance. Unlike a test, an assessment is seldom
exclusively quantitative. A teacher may assess students' learning by looking at
how students respond to instruction.
There are many ways to
assess students’ performance especially in English language proficiency. Self
and peer assessment are two of these alternative assessments.
Heidi and Anna (2009)
state that self-assessment is a process during which students collect
information about their own performance or progress; compare it to explicitly
stated criteria, goals, or standards; and revise accordingly. The authors argue
that self-assessment must be a formative type of assessment, done on drafts of
works in progress: It should not be a matter of determining one’s own grade. As
such, the purposes of self-assessment are to identify areas of strength and
weakness in one’s work in order to make improvements and promote learning.
Self-assessment can take in many forms such as writing conferences, discussion,
reflection logs, weekly self-evaluations, self-assessment checklists and
inventories, and rubric teacher-student interviews.
Cornell University
(2019) states that peer assessment or peer review provides a structured
learning process for students to critique and provide feedback to each other on
their work. It helps students develop lifelong skills in assessing and
providing feedback to others, and equips them with skills to self-assess and
improve their own work. Peer assessment
can be implemented in many forms such as allowing a group to mark its members.
Self and peer
assessments are important to encourage students to be independent students.
Every student needs self-assessment to identify their strengths and weaknesses,
and to find the best techniques and methods to overcome the problems.
Meanwhile, peer assessment needs to encourage, critique, comment, correct
mistake and provide feedback in any activities conducted at school. Both
assessments have to use widely in Malaysia.
When the students are involved actively in assessment process, they can
develop critical thinking because they need to analyse and think deeply when
they want to assess something. The critical thinking and analysing skills can
be used in any activities such as solve mathematics questions and construct a
creative essay. When I was conducting a quiz, I asked four students to be
evaluators by referring to the rubric that was given by me. The evaluators must
analyse, think deeply and know the reasons of their marks to make sure they
give reasonable marks. Meanwhile, I will be a facilitator by guiding and
advising the evaluators and also the participants. After finishing the
activity, I gave comments, suggestions, and encouragement. The participants can
be evaluated based on the marks that given by the evaluators. Yang, Badger, and
Yu (2006) state that peer feedback is beneficial in developing critical
thinking, learner autonomy and social interaction among students.
We are the only ones who
understand ourselves. We know our strengths and weaknesses. We know what we
know and what we do not know. We know what we have learnt and what we do not
learn. We know suitable techniques to overcome our problems in learning
process. That is why self-assessment is important in the teaching and learning
process. An assessment checklist is one
of the forms to assess themselves. In self-assessment process, certain teachers
give the students the assessment checklist to help them assess themselves after
finishing a lesson. The students only need to tip at relevant points based on
their assessment. When the students
recognise their weaknesses, it is easy for them to ask their friends or
teachers for guidance. Meanwhile, the teachers can implement their tasks easily
because they only need to focus on the weaknesses. The teachers can evaluate
themselves too based on the assessment checklists. It helps them to improve
their teaching techniques. It is supported by Centre for Education Innovation (2016)
which states that self-assessment emphasizes student learning and helps
students become better aware of their weaknesses and strengths.
The peer assessment
needed in learning process because the students have more influence to
encourage and motivate their peers to work hard to overcome their weaknesses.
They have close relationship compared to their teachers. The students can
evaluate by doing an assignment together and being involved in group
discussion. When the students recognise their peers do not understand about
something, they can encourage and motive them to do more analysis and exercises
to understand better. The students can evaluate their peers based on the
analysis and exercise. They can evaluate quickly compared to their teacher
because they are always together when needed. Teacher assessment can be
additional to self and peer assessments when the students need more explanation
and understanding. It is supported by Rimer (2007) who states that peer
assessment is used to enhance learning as an effective way to increase
motivation for students by engaging them in the evaluation process which has
received attention in recent years from a number of international universities
and to encourage peers to help each other to master the topic of learning.
Azarnoosh (2013) states that based on the study conducted, peer-assessment
seems to display positive effect towards students’ attitude and motivation in
learning.
Peer assessment
encourage them to be involved actively in the classroom because they will be
evaluated in any activity like responding to the teacher, give commitment in
group activities, and communicate with each other. In these situations, the
peer assessment may more accurate than the teacher assessment because the
teacher only has two eyes and he or she cannot give attention to all students
in the classroom. Direct method is suitable in this assessment. Besides, they
can use the experience in the classroom to develop their communication skills
in future. Tomayess (2012) states that this experience was interesting and an
outstanding achievement from the lecturer's perspective, as the majority of the
students indicated in their informal and formal feedback that completing the
assessments allowed them to promote and develop their communication skills for
university, future workplace, and life in general.
Peer assessment
encourages two way communication between the teachers and the students because
they have to be involved actively in the class and not become a receiver only.
They can assess not only on examination but also in any activity conducted in
the classroom. They cannot sit passively on the chair but they have to respond
to their teachers to get high marks. Wen and Tsai (2006) state through
peer-assessment, it is said to be able to enhance the two-way teacher-students’
communication. In this situation, we can change from traditional method to
fostering student-centred learning.
Taghi Jabbarifar (2009)
states that assessment is a process that includes four basic components: measuring
improvement over time, motivating students to study, evaluating the teaching
methods, and ranking the students' capabilities in relation to the whole group
evaluation.
In my opinion, even though the
government encourages the teachers to use student-centred approach like self
and peer-assessment, teacher assessment is still relevant until now. Many
teachers still use it especially when they want to evaluate students' essays.
They never believe on their students to assess the essays because they need to
check many terms such as grammar, punctuation, spelling, content and sentence
structure meanwhile, the students
do not have competence enough in assess them. The students do not have the
level of language proficiency in giving opinion, and comment in the task. My
lecturers and teachers never ask me to check my friends’ essays and so do I
when I was a teacher. That is because the English level of the majority of Kelantanese
are at the intermediate or beginner level. They do not use the language in
daily conversations. That is why they are not confident in English class and
tend to be a passive learner. Ferris (2004) states that student writers always
have preference towards teachers’ written feedback because they believe that it
is necessary for them to improve in their writing.
In my opinion, self and peer
assessment are only suitable for certain activities in Malaysia. The assessment
checklists are one of the self-assessments that are suitable to be implemented
in Malaysian classroom for English class. It is given when the learners finish
a lesson. It is used to evaluate the level of understanding among the students.
They only need to tick sincerely on the paper based on their understanding of
the lesson. According to Wragg (2004), the main use of checklists is to
stimulate students’ active learning through thinking about their answers and
work, which may help them learn more effectively. However, this method is rarely
used in Malaysia. My teachers and lecturers never use this method same do me. I
think maybe because they prefer to use traditional methods and they do not have
enough time. According to a study conducted by Zubairi, Sarudin and Nordin
(2008) at a single public university involving a sample of 135 lecturers,
lecturers adhered to the traditional method of student assessment; their
assessment knowledge and practice had not improved much over the years.
Meanwhile, Nurul Farehah Mohamad Uri and Mohd Sallehhudin Abd
Aziz (2017) state that educationists in Malaysia rarely consider
self-assessment as one of the options in their classroom assessment practices.
They generally agree that time constraint is one issue that needs to be
addressed first before one could contemplate implementing self-assessment as a
tool for evaluation purposes.
Rubric is
also suitable when we want to conduct self-assessment. Griffith and Lim (2012)
state that a rubric contains some assessment criteria and descriptors which
describe the different levels of proficiency or knowledge required for each
criterion. In my opinion, rubric is one of a good self-assessment. We can know
our marks or level based on its criteria and description. I always refer to the
rubric when I am preparing an assignment to make sure I prepare the best
assignment according to their criteria.
Peer assessment is suitable to be
implemented in presentation. The peers of the presenters will give oral
feedback to assist or correct the mistakes that is made by them, at the same time, they may learn from other
students’ mistakes during the presentation. Spiller (2012) states that students
receiving feedback from their peers can get a wider range of ideas about their
work to promote development and improvement. However, in my opinion, this
method is only suitable to be implemented for advance and intermediate
students. It is not suitable to be implemented for weak students because they
do not have enough knowledge and understanding to evaluate it.
4.0 REASONS OF SELF AND PEER ASSESSMENT IS RARELY USED IN MALAYSIA
Self and peer assessment
are rarely used in Malaysia because the students prefer teacher assessment. It
is supported by Tsui and Ng (2000) who discovered that all students prefer
teacher feedback than peer feedback. Meanwhile, Yang, Badger and Yu (2006) state that a huge percentage of
students adopted teacher feedback with reasons that teachers are more
‘professional’, ‘experienced’ and ‘trustworthy’. This
situation happens because the teachers are a qualified person so, the teachers’
level are higher than them. That is why they believe more on teachers'
feedback. The students also believe on the teachers’ knowledge compared to
their friends.
Peer assessment cannot
be fully implemented in Malaysia because some students are biased in giving
assessment for their friends because of friendship. The friendship may affect
the reliability of grades. They may give higher marks for their close friends
and give low marks for other students. It is supported by Saito and Fujita's (2004) report that a number
of studies indicate that there are a number of biases
associated with peer feedback including friendship, reference, purpose
(development vs. grading) feedback (effects of negative feedback on future
performance), and collusive (lack of differentiation) bias.
Self-assessment is
subjective. The students may not be sincere in evaluating themselves. They may
be over confident about their abilities, strengths and capabilities. Some
students may under-evaluate whereby they need self, teachers and peers help. It
is supported by Cornell University
(2019) which states that self-assessment can be subjective since students may
not be sincere and may over-evaluate themselves which could lead to grade
inflation and unreliability. Some students, however may under-evaluate. Need
both self and teacher, and peers where practical.
Besides,
even though self and peer-assessment are frequently used in Malaysia, the students still prefer teacher assessment.
This situation happens because they feel it is the teachers’ tasks. They also
believe on teacher guidance and knowledge. The teachers are more competent than
their friends. It is supported by Ariffin and Husin (2011) who state that peer
feedback is frequently used in the Malaysian classrooms. However, it is not
preferred as much as teachers’ feedback. This is because Malaysian students
have hesitance in completely trusting the feedback given by peers rather than
teachers. They feel that it is the job of the teacher to provide feedback and
at the same time students feel that they do not possess the linguistic
competence to give feedback on their peers’ works.
Some students are not satisfied with
assessment provided by their peers. It happens because of several factors such
as the peers may do not competence, do not enough understand and do not know
how to give the best feedback. Xiao and
Lucking (2008) state that some students were not satisfied with the quality and
quality of feedback provided by their peers. Wen and Tsai (2006) state that
learners happen to have low self confidence in evaluating their peers where
they prefer being briefed concerning the marking and grading system beforehand.
When we want to choose
certain techniques or methods, we must
look at our students' level first. If we want to implement self and
peer-assessment in primary school, we have to choose relevant method for them.
Assessment checklists and multiple-choice questions are examples of techniques
that suitable for them. Intermediate and weak students do not have competence
enough to evaluate activities like conversation, essay, and presentation
especially students in rural area. That is because, they do not use English in
daily conversations. They only use it at school, and they are very passive in
English class. They only give respond to simple conversation.
Self and peer
assessments are suitable to be implemented in secondary school for advanced and
intermediate students for certain activities like quiz, rubric, assessment
checklists, multiple-choice questions, self and peer marking, and presentation
session. However, assessing essay is suitable only for advanced students
because they have to check many items such as grammar and sentence structures.
The teacher centred
approach is still relevant in Malaysia. Even though the government encourage us
to use student centred approach, we have to choose suitable techniques for our
students which is suitable for the situation.
Teacher assessment is also relevant until now because
our students believe in the teachers’ qualification, knowledge, proficiency,
experience, and skills. It is still used widely until now. Even though the
government encourage us to use self and peer assessment, the teacher assessment
has to use as additional assessment. Critiques, comments, suggestions, and
encouragement from the teachers are still needed as references.
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