The Effect of Computerized Dynamic Assessment on Working Memory Span of EFL Learners while Listening (original) (raw)
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Planning Future Instructional Programs through Computerized L2 Dynamic Assessment
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Dynamic Assessment (DA) is a postmodern notion in testing which sees instruction and assessment as inextricably mingled contending that learners will progress if provided with dynamic interactions. The main purpose of the study is to see if the scores generated by the computerized dynamic assessment (C-DA) which is grounded in Vygotsky’s theoretical framework in congruence with the concept of DA can lead to designing a syllabus which results in the participants’ reading comprehension development. In the present study, a total of 32 Iranian EFL undergraduates from a university in Iran were selected on the availability basis. The study made use of the interventionist approach (the same mediation for all individual learners) to DA due to a two-fold aim: being more economically-supported and owing to its feasibility in focusing on larger cohorts of individuals. Investigating the learners’ generated scoring profiles through CDA revealed that not only did the learners have varying problem...
Dynamic assessment which is originated in sociocultural theory of Vygotsky (1934) suggests the integration of assessment and instruction. Vygotsky proposed that cognitive ability can better develop in social and cultural context. This study aimed at investigating the effect of dynamic assessment on the reading comprehension and strategy awareness in EFL Iranian learners. Fifty intermediate female students from three English language institutes in Tehran were selected randomly, and divided into two groups: control and experimental. The design of study is experimental: pretest, treatment and posttest. At first, both groups were given a sample of TOEFL reading test and Survey of Reading Strategies Questionnaire (Mokhtari and Sheorey, 2002), and experimental group went on eighteen sessions of DA treatment in which students had one sample of reading test and interaction approaches were employed helping them to conduct the test, and then both groups were given posttests: reading comprehension and SORS questionnaire. The scores from tests calculated and compared, then t-test and paired t-test were run which showed that DA has significant effect on both reading comprehension and reading strategy awareness. INTRODUCTION Language teaching was always under influences of two schools of thought, namely linguistics and psychology. As new schools of thought emerged, the teaching methods and approaches to language changed. The era of language teaching and learning experienced these changes from behaviorist to socioculturalistic view, therefore the role of learners changed from passive to active one and also language achievements were interpreted in different terms from the product to process oriented. As a result, nowadays language achievement is not concerned with production rather process. One of the approaches that emerged from sociocltural view is Vygotsky's theory of mind named dynamic assessment which concerns with process. The purpose of DA is not mere assessment, but its purpose is helping the learners to reach to the higher level of development thus, it also has instructional and learning purpose. Hence teaching and testing which traditionally considered separated from each other; they are now viewed integrated in dynamic assessment. As Lidz (cited in Ajideh and Nourdad, 2012) noted, " DA offers a monistic view of assessment and instruction that focuses on developing abilities through the interactions ". So, DA has a significant implication: test to teach, contrary to the static assessment which is concerned with teach to test. DA can be better defined in contrast with traditionally non-dynamic assessment or static measurement. NON-DA assesses what has already learned and it is product oriented rather DA assesses the learners' potential ability; what he or she can learn with help of a mediator who intervenes in the process of learning; therefore, DA is formative and its purpose is learning. In fact, it integrates teaching and testing; however, NON-DA is summative and its purpose is measurement of what has been learned at end of program or learning process. DA is employed in classroom for giving feedback in order to assist the students' development and instructional process and raises students' awareness of instructional and learning objectives, " It has the potential to show important information about individual current strategies and process of learning " (Ajideh and Nourdad, 2012). On the other hand, reading has gained a more
Dynamic versus formative assessment
Elixir
Dynamism pumps the blood to the body of society; therefore, the dynamic and communicative nature of language can not only be considered integral in teaching, but also in assessing a language. Recently, all over the world traditional ways of assessment are trading place with more communicative ones. The primary purpose of this study was to investigate whether dynamic and formative assessment had significantly different impact on improving the listening skills of Iranian EFL Learners. To do so, 90 intermediate male and female learners from a language school in Tehran were elected. A piloted PET was administered as homogeneity test and 60 learners were selected as the participants and randomly assigned into two groups of thirty. To make sure that there is no statistically significant difference between the performances of the two groups in the beginning of the research a listening pretest of PET was administered in both experimental groups. In one group dynamic assessment, through teaching metacognitive strategies, was administered on learners' listening skills, while the other group's listening skill was assessed formatively. After fourteen sessions a posttest of PET was administered for both groups. The evaluation of the findings showed that the dynamically assessed group outperformed the formative one. © 2014 Elixir All rights reserved
Examining validity in computerized dynamic assessment
Computerized dynamic assessment (CDA) posits itself as a new type of assessment that includes mediation in the assessment process. Proponents of dynamic assessment (DA) in general and CDA in particular argue that the goals of DA are in congruence with the concept of validity that underscores the social consequences of test use and the integration of learning and assessment ). However, empirical research on CDA falls short in supporting such an argument. Empirical studies on CDA are riddled with ill-defined constructs and insufficient supporting evidence in regard to the aspects of validity postulated by . Due to the scarcity of research on CDA, this paper explores the potentials and the viability of this intervention-based assessment in computer assisted language testing context in light of its conformity with Messick's unitary view of validity. The paper begins with a discussion of the theoretical foundations and models of DA. It then proceeds to discuss the differences between DA and non-dynamic assessment (NDA) measures before critically appraising the empirical studies on CDA. The critical review of the findings in CDA literature aims at shedding light on some drawbacks in the design of CDA research and the compatibility of the concept of construct validity in CDA with unitary concept of validity. The review of CDA concludes with some recommendations for rectifying gaps to establish CDA in a more prominent position in computerized language testing.
The present study concentrated on the theoretical and methodological issues at the intersection of second language acquisition, language pedagogy and socio-cultural theory (SCT) which were proposed by Vygotsky (1978). One of the offsprings of SCT is dynamic assessment (DA) emanating from Vygotsky's socio-cultural theory which has a long history in applied linguistics but has been the hot topic of EFL studies recently. Dynamic assessment promotes language development; it assumes that mental activities are mediated by psychological instruments. Dynamic assessment has received considerable attention from researchers over the last three decades culminating in many studies which have been conducted on the effect of DA on language skills, but a few studies have focused on the effect of dynamic assessment on listening comprehension, and the unclear results have prompted the researchers to capitalize upon the impact of dynamic assessment on the listening comprehension. Therefore, the present study aimed to expand traditional understanding of listening assessment in foreign language contexts and pertain dynamic assessment to the development of learners' listening ability. To do so, thirty six elementary Iranian students studying English as a foreign language ranging in age from 12 to 17 took part in the present study. They were selected among the seventy students who participated in Oxford Quick Placement Test who were then divided into one dynamic group, one non-dynamic group, and one control group. The analysis of one-way ANOVA and Tukey test demonstrated that the dynamic group outperformed both non-dynamic and control groups, but the non-dynamic group did not have a better performance than the control group. Finally, according to the findings, language teachers are recommended to use the meditational strategies and also care about the learner's potential. Furthermore, teachers are suggested to apply more DA approaches in their classes in a more systematic way rather than the traditional kind of testing which concentrates only on the learning product.
Dynamic Assessment (DA) is theoretically framed within Vygotsky " s Socio-Cultural Theory (SCT) and relies on reunification of assessment and instruction. This process-oriented study of reading comprehension aims at investigating the impacts of applying computerized dynamic assessment (C-DA) which is an ongoing strand of DA on promoting at-risk advanced Iranian EFL students " reading skills. The sample of this study comprised of 32 advanced BA students selected based on convenience sampling from Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) undergraduates from a university in Iran. In this study, the DIALANG software and the Computerized Dynamic Reading Test (CDRT) were utilized to identify the individuals " proficiency level and to examine the effectiveness of the enrichment program (EP) in DA respectively. Upon completion of the CDRT, the learners were presented with two mediated and unmediated scores. The formula called Learning Potential Score (LPS) was also utilized in order to measure the students " potential for learning. Analysis of the results showed that a pretest (unmediated) score was a sufficient indication neither for measuring individuals " ability nor for preparing an effective lesson plan for them. The findings of this investigation may prove to be significantly useful for those who are concerned about individuals requiring a lot of attention, that is, at-risk or retarded learners within the realm of DA.
The Impact of Electronic-Based Dynamic Assessment on the Listening Skill of
2016
This study investigated the impact of electronic-based dynamic assessment on the listening skill of Iranian EFL learners to achieve this goal, a group of 40 female EFL upper-intermediate students(aged between 26 to 38 years old) from to language institutes were selected as the participants of the study after administering a Quick Placement Test(QPT)to a larger population of EFL learners (N=65).All of the selected to female EFL upper intermediate student were administered a Listening Test (IELTS Format) as the pretest and posttest to assess the participants' listening comprehension. Participants were divided in two control (N=20) and experimental (n=20) groups. The learners in experimental group were taught the listening skill via Dynamic Assessment through virtual electronic-based classroom and the learners in control group were taught listening skill via traditional dynamic assessment in a physical language classroom. A quasi-experimental pretest and post-test design was employ...
Grammar learning EFL Dynamic assessment (DA) is believed to have potentiality to affect EFL learners' language development; however, its different forms might be of varying types and size of washback effects on foreign language development. So far, it seems few studies have compared the effects of interactionist and interventionist models of DA on the grammar learning of EFL learners; moreover, whether DA procedures have different impacts on the learners in the contexts of official high schools and private language institutes has received scant attention. Against this backdrop, 96 intermediate EFL learners from a high school and a language institute were put into experimental groups of A and B and a single control group (C). During 12 treatment sessions, group A participants were taught and assessed through interactionist DA procedures, group B received interventionist DA practice and group C was assessed through conventional multiple choice assessment procedure. The results showed that both interactionist and interventionist DA practices had significant effects on grammar learning of EFL learners. However, interactionist DA was more effective in language institutes with limited number of learners while interventionist approach was of higher impacts in high schools with larger groups of learners. The findings imply that the validity of different DA forms is sensitive to the practicality of the procedure in the assessment context. ABSTRACT Dynamic assessment (DA) is an alternative new approach in language testing and assessment and is basically built upon Vygotskian socio-cultural theory and Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) as a salient concept of this theory. DA concentrates on learner's errors and the application of different forms of mediations to develop the learner's knowledge or skill. Grigorenko (2002, cited in Poehner and2) define dynamic assessment as a procedure in which the assessor "takes into account the result of intervention and teaches the examinee how to perform better on individual items or on the test as a whole." Williams and Burden (1997, p,42) believe that dynamic assessment is a process in which "assessment and learning are seen as inextricably linked and not separate processes" and the criterion concepts of test validity and reliability that are of vital importance for the so-called static tests need to be redefined to fit the scope of DA.