Course blog for ENG 701, Composition Theory, Dr. Jeffrey Jablonski, UNLV Dept. of English, Spring 2010

Thursday, April 29, 2010

4/29 - Theories of Assessment

"The essence of reliability findings from the last two decades of research is that no single essay test will yield highly reliable results, no matter how careful the testing and scoring apparatus. If the essay test is to be used for important or irreversible decisions about students, a minimum of two separate writing samples must be obtained- or some other kind of measurement must be combined with the single writing score." (White 41)
"Directed self-placement is no panacea. It does not address the problem of how to teach, how to bring students in from the margins, or how to deal with all of the politics of institutional change. Soliday, Grego and Thompson, Bartholomae and others address many of these concerns that would take us far beyond the limited scope of placement alternatives. But our placement alternative does lay the ground work for much that these authors recommend." (Royer and Gilles 70)
LINKS
READINGS
Huot, Brian. “The Literature of Direct Writing Assessment: Major Concerns and Prevailing Trends.” (1990)
  • Direct vs. indirect assessment of writing
  • Three types of direct assessment: primary trait, analytic, holistic, (portfolio)
  • Topic development and task selection
  • Text and writing quality
  • Influences on rater judgement of writing quality
Royer, Daniel J., and Roger Gilles. “Directed Self-Placement: An Attitude of Orientation.” (1998)

  • What are traditional methods/measures for placing students in firstyear writing courses?
  • What are some of the problems with traditional methods?
  • What are the reasons given for directed self-placment?
White, Edward M. “An Apologia for the Timed Impromptu Essay Test.” (1995)
  • Multiple-choice vs. essay vs. portfolio
  • What the advantages of the timed essay assessment measure? What are its limitations?
  • Validity, reliability, cost-effectiveness 
White, Edward M. “The Scoring of Writing Portfolios: Phase 2.” (2005)


  • What are the advantages of portfolios?
  • What is the main problem with portfolios?
  • What are key components to "phase 2" scoring of writing portfolios?

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