Abstract
Nowadays, we can see reading accounts for a large proportion in some large-scale English tests in China and abroad, such as CET-4, CET-6, TEM-4, GRE, IELTS, and TOEFL. Many studies show that a considerable number of Chinese students can get high marks but they have never developed true reading skills and one of the major reasons is that they lack adequate effective reading. How to combine reading and writing effectively in teaching has become an important research field in EFL teaching in China. This study adopts a comparative way, in which two freshman English major classes with similar motivation, proficiency, sex distribution and taught by the same teacher will be engaged. Class A, where formative evaluation is practiced, is the experimental group and Class B with the conventional assessment is the control group. The data elicited from interviews, observation and students’ portfolios are used for qualitative analysis and the data from questionnaire and reading tests are used for quantitative analysis by using the software SPSS 16.0. The results thus obtained show that the application of formative evaluation to reading-writing model is of great significance in anchoring learners’ identity and improving students’ self-management of learning in that it is the students who can tell the teacher what they have learned and what they are learning.
Keywords
This project is financially supported by the Humanities and SocialScience Department, Ministry of Education, P. R. China during 2009–2012 (project code: 09YJA740054) and by the Education Department of Zhejiang Province during 2009–2012 (project code: yb09064).
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsReferences
Biggs, J., & Watkins, D. A. (Eds.). (2001). Teaching the Chinese lerner: Psychological and pedagogical perspective. Hong Kong: Comparative Education Research Centre, University of Hong Kong.
Bloom, B. S., et al. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of educational goals. New York: Longman.
Byrant, S. L., John, L. T. S., Timmins, A. A., & Williams, J. A. H. (2002). Formative assessment does enhancing learning: An annotated bibliography. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Institute of Education.
Chen Kai. (2002). The guiding role of writing in extracurricular reading. Foreign Language Teaching, (2):29–33.
Creswell, J. W. (1994). Research design: Qualitative and quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Esmaeili, H. (2000). The effects of content knowledge from reading on adult ESL students’ written compositions in an English language test using reading and writing modules. University of Toronto.
Freeman, D. L., & Long, M. H. (2000). An introduction to second language acquisition Research. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Harmer, J. (2000). How to teach English. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Janopoulous, M. (1986). The relationship of pleasure reading and second language writing proficiency. TESOL Quarter, 20(4), 763–768.
Johns, A. (1993). Reading and writing tasks in English for academic purposes classes: Products, processes, and resources. In J. Carson (Ed.), Reading in the composition classroom: Second language perspectives (pp. 274–289). Boston: Heinle & Heinle Publishers.
Krashen, S. J. (1989). We acquire vocabulary and spelling by reading: Additional evidence for the input hypothesis. The Modern Language Joumal, 173(4), 440–464.
Li, M. Y., & Lv, Q. (2002). Improving reading through writing. Shandong Foreign Language Teaching Journal, 91(6), 41–44.
Li, P. F., & Wang, L. X. (2011). Writing through reading and reading through writing. Crazy English, 4(3), 11–14.
Lorin, W. A., et al. (2001). A taxonomy for learning, teaching and assessing – a revision of Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. New York: Longman
Lorin, W. A., Krathwohl, D. R., et al. (2009). A taxonomy for learning, teaching and assessing – a revision of Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
MeMesser, S.D. (1997). Evaluating ESL written summaries: An investigation of the ESL integrated summary profile (ISP) as a measure of the summary writing ability of ESL students. The Florida State University.
Supervision Board for Foreign Language Teaching of Higher Educational Institutes (English Group). (2000). The syllabus for undergraduate English majors in higher educational institutions. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
Tian, Y. (2003). A study of practice and exploration of formative assessment in EFL middle teaching. Doctoral thesis, Central China Normal University, Wuhan.
Wang, D. Q. (2007). Authentic evaluation: From theory to practice. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Xu, H., & Gao, C. F. (2007). An empirical study on integrating reading with writing in EFL teaching. Modern Foreign Languages, 30(2), 184–190.
Yang, Y. L., & Dong, Y. Z. (2010). Writing through reading and reading through writing – a exploration of experiential teaching approach. Foreign Languages in China, 7(1), 13–27.
Yang, H., & Zhou, H. (2013). A study of reading-writing model based on Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. Journal of Lishui University, 35(1), 98–102.
Zhang, D. Y. (2005). English learning strategies and autonomous learning. Foreign Language Education, 26(1), 49–55.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Appendices
Appendix A
Appendix B. Questionnaire on Reading Strategy
6.2.1 Part A Background Information
Appendix C. Semi-Constructed Interview Questions
6.3.1 At the Beginning of the Project
-
Q1.
How did your teacher deal with EFL reading in your first semester?
-
Q2.
How did you deal with your EFL reading and writing in the first semester?
-
Q3.
Were your reading and writing improved effectively in the first semester?
-
Q4.
How much do you know about formative evaluation?
-
Q5.
Are you willing to take part in the new reading-writing model activities?
6.3.2 At the Middle of the Project
-
Q1.
Did your teacher always give you instructions to your reading and writing?
-
Q2.
Are you clear about the process of the new reading-writing model? If yes, what are the steps?
-
Q3.
Did your teacher often ask you to conduct self-assessment and peer-assessment?
-
Q4.
What kinds of feedback could you get from teacher assessment, peer-assessment and self-assessment?
-
Q5.
What do you think of the new reading-writing model activities so far?
6.3.3 At the End of the Project
-
Q1.
Do you think the new model can help you improve your reading and writing?
-
Q2.
In what ways do you think formative evaluation can help you improve your learning?
-
Q3.
What kinds of feedback could you get from teacher assessment, peer-assessment and self-assessment?
-
Q4.
How do you think of your portfolio? What are the advantages and disadvantages of portfolio?
-
Q5.
Did you gain some confidence in your EFL learning?
-
Q6.
Is there something else you would like to say about the new reading-writing model?
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Yang, H., Zhou, H., Zhao, Y. (2013). Investigating the Consequences of the Application of Formative Evaluation to Reading-Writing Model. In: Zhang, Q., Yang, H. (eds) Pacific Rim Objective Measurement Symposium (PROMS) 2012 Conference Proceeding. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-37592-7_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-37592-7_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-37591-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-37592-7
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawEducation (R0)