2.4. Formative Assessment in the writing classroom
2.4.1. Formative Assessment Strategies in the writing classroom
the secondary writing classroom, teachers automatically need to know that the three stages of the main question became the benches of Assessment for learning or formative assessment strategies Implementation. It is “Where I am going,” “How I am going,” and
“Where to next.”(Timperely, 2007). It means that the teachers need to know how to assess students entirely from the beginning by providing success criteria (William & Leahy, 2015). Besides, providing teachers and peers with quality feedback for “how I am going” (Lee, 2017) that is finished by encouraging students to do self-assessments or reflection and set their own goals for learning (Defianty, 2018). Here are some strategies that could guide teachers in implementing formative assessment in teaching writing(Lee, 2017).
2.4.1.1.Establishing learning goals and success criteria
The first question, “Where am I going?” means the students need a clear direction of what will be assessed, what they will do, and how they will do it. Therefore, teachers equipped students with the writing assignment with the success criteria, allowing
students to think, talk about, and evaluate their learning and writing using the same language (Lee, 2017). Success criteria can be established through instructional scaffolding. In the AFL- oriented writing classroom, the focus is on the active involvement of the students. It would be best if the teacher could negotiate and construct the success criteria with students(William & Leahy, 2015). Here is an example of sharing success criteria that is the
same as building learning goals.
Table 3Success Criteria and The Goals from Lee (2017)
By knowing the success criteria and learning goal above, students could automatically identify their current ability reflected in the criteria. After knowing that, they could set their ability and further their own goal of learning. It automatically involves their self- assessment at the beginning of the course. Furthermore, this stage also pedagogically allows the teachers to design the writing activity or set the pre-writing instructional scaffolding. It is where Learning Goals and Success Criteria for Biography
Writing a biography: Learning goals and success criteria
1. Include well-sequenced information about the selected celebrity in the following order
Personal information
Career
Achievements and contributions
2. Use appropriate connectives to link up the information
3. Use the simple past tense correctly to describe events in the past
teachers could provide an example of good writing that automatically also align with assessment criteria.
2.4.1.2.Encouraging Students to Set Personal Learning Goals
This strategy attempts to get the students to reflect on the success criteria they already know and personalize it to their learning. In other words, students could set their own goals based on the general success criteria of the subject that suit their personal needs (Syafrizal & Pahamzah, 2020). That is known as self- regulated learning.
Goal setting is divided into two types, according to Lee (2017).
Generic goal; the goal that is generally linked to the writing improvement and the goal that is linked to some specific aspect improvement. In the formative assessment of writing class, the teacher could encourage students to set their generic and specific goals at different times by documenting their personal learning goals in several ways. Such as learning log(William & Leahy, 2015), portfolio (Gikandi et al., 2011), regular draft revision, and learning goal monitoring. Here is an example of students' documentation of setting the goal in story writing.
Table 4. Students' Documentation of the Goal Setting Example by Lee (2017)
The table above shows that the students must set the reflection goals in their general goal setting to monitor and evaluate their learning and make further objectives in that writing activity. They can compare and evaluate what has been improved and what is still their writing challenges so they can know their next step by setting the updated goal.
2.4.1.3.Engaging Students Actively as Learning Resources for One Another
The previous theories suggested by William & Leahy (2015) stated that formative assessment requires students to actively take a role in helping one another, using their friends as peers to be their learning resource for mutual benefit. Students can go specifically into the writing area and ask for relevant comments to their needs (Zou et al., 2021). Besides, requesting an explanation from peers, disagreeing with peers, or even contesting peer comments (Fautley
& Savage, 2010b), and starting a conversation with peers about parts of writing that need more attention.
In the past, when I wrote a story In this story-writing task, I aim to I used to start in a boring manner;
one day, once upon a time, last week
Write an opening that can grab the readers’ attention
I used to finish my story quite slackly, usually in a hurry
End my story in an impressive way I did not use any dialogue Use dialogue to make my story
more interesting
According to Lee (2017), the teacher can utilize peer feedback at a different level. It means the students, as a peer, can contribute to the students as the writer differently based on the stage of writing (pre-writing, during the process, and after revisions). The key to this strategy is “the feedback.” Lee (2014) emphasized that the feedback should align with the mediated learning interaction.
It is intentionality/reciprocity, transcendence, and meaning (Presseisen, 1992). As well as, Lee (2017) inferred that feedback must be based on the purpose that is linked with the instruction (intentional), promote dialogic engagement among students (reciprocity), and significantly facilitate the learning transfer through multiple drafting (transcendence). In designing feedback quality, teachers should know the direction and the possible opportunities for learning interaction. Below is an example of purposeful dialogue between students in peer assessment activity.
Figure 1. Dialogue between Students Writer and Peer Assessor adapted from Lee (2017)
The teacher could use this diagnostic purposeful dialogue model for students to avoid the mindset of writing products. It could shift the student product focus to the process. The process is aligned with “How I am going.” It was feedback where the quality and criteria of the feedback should not be in an arbitrary or clueless comment. Besides, do not focus on errors and avoid damaging the motivation among students by using purposeful dialogue. William and Leahy (2015) suggested that formatively, students can have a positive growth mindset of learning by arguing and dialoguing.
2.4.1.4.Empowering Students to Develop Ownership of Their Writing The teacher could promote self-assessment regularly to empower students to develop their ownership of writing (Dickins, 2001). It can be implemented at three stages in multi-drafting. In the beginning, it is where students measure their goal, mind map, or outline. According to the shared success criteria, students could assess the content, organization, and language form during writing.
After writing, they can evaluate whether their beginning goal has been met with the result of their writing. It can be done in several ways—Portfolio, feedback, and questioning or learning log.
The teachers should encourage students to create metacognitive questions that increase their knowledge about the
accessible possibilities in their writing. It could be done by developing metacognitive awareness (Xie & Lei, 2019). Here are some metacognitive questions made by students in story writing. It relates to setting, character, story dialogue, beginning, and ending.
Table 4. Basic Metacognitive Questions in Story Writing Form
How can I grab the readers’ attention with the story opening?
What should I include in the setting?
How should I describe my characters?
What dialogue should be used to make my characters come to life?
How should I plan the climax of the story?
How can I impressively end the story?
This metacognition skill could be improved by giving the students the learning log task (William & Leahy, 2015). They keep track of their learning objectives and write down their strengths and weaknesses. Lee (2017) suggested that the teacher can ask the students to give individual feedback that comprehensively reflects their needs.
Table 6. The Example of Error Log by Lee (2017) Error type Total number of errors
Date Date Date Date Date Date Date
Verb (tense and form)
Articles Pronoun
Word choice Number
Spelling Preposition Word form
Subject-verb agreement
The learning log can benefit from several areas in writing. Here is the learning log that covers the accuracy of the writing. It is usually called an error log. This error log could inform the students and teachers of the development of writing daily (Lee, 2017).
Unconsciously, this form of error log could be used as the learning evidence summatively; for schools as a parents' reports form in the future. Moreover, it also became the students' reflection on their accuracy in writing. After knowing the error, students could also look at the ratio of mistakes they often made and set them as the priority weaknesses that need improvement. The teachers could suggest the error ratio template to the students (Lee, 2017).
Table 7. Error Analysis Ratio Example from (Lee, 2017)
No Error type Code Number of errors made
Error ratio
Error Ranking
1 Verb (tense and form)
V 3 0.1 4
2 Articles Art 2 0.07 5
3 Pronoun Pron 1 0.03 6
4 Word choice
Wc 5 0.17 3
5 Number Num 7 0.23 1
6 Spelling Sp 3 0.1 4
7 Preposition Prep 6 0.2 2
After analyzing the students' error ratio, they can focus on what they should do in the future. It is supported by Defianty (2018), who stated that students could see their weaknesses and strength so that they know what their next step and goal of learning would be. It promotes the ownership of learning (Farrag, 2020).
Figure 2. Students learning log of writing (Lee, 2017)
Therefore, a learning log in writing could read the students' strengths and weaknesses. Similar to their strength and weakness records, this learning log could also be seen as a self-reflection journal for students (Fautley & Savage, 2010a). This learning log can simplify and clearly describe feedback from many sources during the class. Therefore, it will guide the students about what they have achieved and what they should do next in a simple way
8 Word form Ef 1 0.03 6
9 Subject-verb agreement
Agr 2 0.07 5
Total number of errors 30
2.5. The factors creating challenges and opportunities for teachers in