Effectsof Formative Assessmenton Students" Autonomous Learning

劉蓯穎

Abstract：Nowadays， formative assessment has caused extensive concerns， because of its distinct features. Practice shows that formative assessment can overcome students' pressures， and it is good for developing students' self-confidence. Formative assessment also provide positive helps for cultivating students' awareness and abilities of autonomous learning， promoting to develop their good learning habits， and developing their learning autonomous abilities. Recently， people has made many practical works and effective researches about formative assessment， and made a lot of achievements. The experiment shows that： There was a significant differences between the EC's scores of pre-test and post-test. But CC's had not much change.

Key words： formative assessment； learner autonomy； teaching experiment； strategies

中圖分類號：G633.41文獻標識碼：B文章編號：1672-1578（2016）09-0166-02

1. Introduction

Many researchers have made a lot of work on the formative assessment in recent years. In 1967， Mr. Scriven raised the formative assessment. But many researchers usually pay more attention to general concept of formative assessment. Junior middle school English teaching should not only teach students knowledge and skills to meet the senior high school entrance examination， but also help students learn how to learning autonomously， and how to cooperate with classmates during the teaching process.

2. Research Design

This teaching experiment is held from September， 2015 to December， 2015. There is one English class （45 minutes） every day for these two classes. For the EC， formative assessment is employed in the whole process of English teaching. While the CC only received traditional English teaching without further assessment.

ECCCN6060Maximum129126Minimum7070Mean113.8106.3From the results of the two tests， we can find that there is no significant difference between the CC and the EC in the pre-test. However， in the post-test， for the CC， Mean=106.3； for the EC， Mean=113.8， which shows that there are apparent differences and statistical significance between the two classes. It strongly proves that the result of autonomous learning is more effective than traditional approaches in language learning.

3. The Impact on Students' Autonomous Learning

According to the statistics discussed above， the EC which applies the formative assessment intervention gets better learning achievement and performance than that of the CC which uses the traditional assessment methods， such as summative assessment methods.

In the EC， the students' English has also improved a lot. During the experiment， group discussions were often held， and class presentations were often showed in front of the teacher and classmates. Through these class-activities， the teacher assesses their in-class performances， and the peer assessments are also included in building the learning portfolio. Thus， the students' English learning motivation and enthusiasm have been improved and developed.

This research investigated the effect of formative assessment on students' learner autonomy in junior high school through conducting formative assessment. Generally speaking， the research went smoothly through the nice cooperation given by the subjects， and as a result， the aims of the research have been obtained. Thus， the major findings of the research can be summarized as follows.

4. Major Findings

Firstly， from the data of research， the situation of the EC students' learner autonomy has been improved， and their learning achievement also has been improved after the implementation of formative assessment in English teaching.

Secondly， most students have realized the importance of formative assessment because they have benefited from this kind of assessment. Students cannot plan， manage and reflect their learning well.

Thirdly， formative assessment as the effective assessment tool makes a great sense to both students and teachers. It gives students more opportunities to reflect themselves， give them more encouragement and confidence， monitor and recording their learning. It is helpful to cultivate learners' learning interests， and self-confidence， encourage their learning.

Fourthly， according to the data， the implementing and application situation of FA in junior high school should be strengthened. Although the positive results are received， many factors still influence the implementation of formative assessment because of concerning much about examination score. Thus， a more scientific evaluation system is expected to be constructed.

According to the research， it is not difficult to find that some students still pay much attention to their learning scores； they may think that formative assessment is not helpful for their improvement of English learning. It is in fact that it is wrong. Formative assessment can promote students' learning strategy when they take part in this activity positively. For example， students' portfolios include learning plans， journal， reading reports， revised homework， peer assessment， teacher assessment， self-assessment and the quizzes， etc. can encourage and help them learn effectively. Hence， they can improve their learning achievement through improving students' learning strategies.