Masoome Azmoode Sis Abad; Gholam-Reza Kiyani; Gholam-Reza Abbasian
Abstract
The present research responds to the call for implementing diagnostic assessment through learner involvement. This study followed two aims: first, examining the distinctive effects of diagnostic self- and peer - assessments on EFL learners’ reading comprehension; second, exploring students’ ...
Read More
The present research responds to the call for implementing diagnostic assessment through learner involvement. This study followed two aims: first, examining the distinctive effects of diagnostic self- and peer - assessments on EFL learners’ reading comprehension; second, exploring students’ diagnostic rating accuracy in various reading genres. To achieve this, a number of diagnostic reading comprehension tests and a checklist were developed, the construction of which were based on the learners’ challenging reading subskills. The participants include 60 English translation university students. During 12 weeks of instruction, the rating accuracy of the subjects’ diagnostic self- and peer- assessments were investigated while the instructor ratings were taken as the yardstick. Data analysis, using T-test and MANOVA confirmed that the two groups had improvement in reading comprehension but there was no significant difference between the two groups’ gain. In addition, no statistically significant difference was detected among the accuracy of diagnostic self-, peer- and instructor- ratings except for the assessment of main idea and supporting details subskill in descriptive genre and cause and effect subskill in narrative genre. This study can offer evidence for conducting diagnostic assessment through learner engagement to provide students with appropriate feedback and remedial instruction.
Fahimeh Rafi; Natasha Pourdana; Farid Ghaemi
Abstract
Grounded in Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of mind and the learner-centered approach to second/foreign language acquisition (SLA), this study investigated the extent to which the embedded differentiated instructions and diagnostic assessment, being mediated on Google Meet™ computer-mediated ...
Read More
Grounded in Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of mind and the learner-centered approach to second/foreign language acquisition (SLA), this study investigated the extent to which the embedded differentiated instructions and diagnostic assessment, being mediated on Google Meet™ computer-mediated communication platform, would impact the improvement of mixed-ability English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) learners’ English words pronunciation and their degree of engagement in language learning. In a repeated-measures research design, an intact group of 66 EFL learners were partitioned into three tiers of higher, mid- and lower achievers to complete a virtual pretest of listening comprehension, followed by a series of parallel tiered performance tasks of English words pronunciation on a weekly basis. Their task outcomes were subsequently subjected to collective computer-mediated diagnostic assessment. After 10 sessions of intervention, the participants performed on an immediate virtual posttest of listening comprehension, and a post hoc interview. The results of mixed between-within subjects analysis of variance (ANOVA) indicated both the significant learning progress by the tiers, and the outperformance of the lower achievers on the tiered tasks. The statistical results of an analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) similarly reported significant improvement of the tiers’ performance on the pretest-posttest summative assessment in this study. The inductive content analysis of the participants’ responses to the structured interview elicited seven themes which were interpreted as the participants’ strong approval of the usefulness of differentiated instructions, effectiveness of diagnostic assessment, and successful appeal of Google Meet platform.
Fateme Nikmard; Kobra Tavassoli
Abstract
The main purpose of diagnostic assessment is to predict test-takers’ strengths and weaknesses and use the information to provide suitable feedback to them (Jang & Wagner, 2014). Accordingly, the present study focused on investigating the effect of diagnostic assessment on selective and productive ...
Read More
The main purpose of diagnostic assessment is to predict test-takers’ strengths and weaknesses and use the information to provide suitable feedback to them (Jang & Wagner, 2014). Accordingly, the present study focused on investigating the effect of diagnostic assessment on selective and productive reading tasks to help English as a foreign language (EFL) learners improve their performance on these tasks. The quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design was used and 60 participants were chosen based on the results of a Nelson proficiency test. The learners were chosen from four intact classes who were then divided into two groups of control and diagnostic assessment, each group comprising of two classes. Then, a modified version of the reading section of Key English Test (KET) (2015) with 28 selective and 27 productive items was used in the two groups as the pretest. The diagnostic assessment group received a feedback-based treatment on four reading tests during sixteen sessions of instruction. However, in the control group, the learners focused on reading texts and the corresponding tasks during the course. At the end of the semester, another modified version of KET reading test (2014) with 28 selective and 27 productive items was administered as the posttest. The results showed the diagnostic assessment group showed a significant improvement on both selective and productive tasks. Teachers may be the most beneficiaries of the present study as they can find useful information about their students’ strengths and weaknesses through using diagnostic assessment to help them improve their reading comprehension ability.
