Chapter 4 Assessing Children’s Writing

Students absolutely need writing assessment in order to make better writers, so teachers regularly observe students’ writing process, and giving attention to the quality of their writing product. Davis (2010) states, “Portfolio assessment is important because it measures the progress of a student and examines the instructional process, not just the final product." Among various forms of writing assessment, the most impressive one to me is portfolio because teachers can apparently examine writing process and writing product after finishing writing. Also portfolio is more realistic than any other writing assessment form. Tompkins (2008) asserts, “It is a more authentic form of assessment because entire writing projects-rough drafts that have been revised and edited, prewriting notes and diagrams, and checklists and rubrics that have been marked-are included to document learning” (p. 91).

According to Jaeun Kim, children ought to grow the ability to assess their writing on their own. I am with her on that point. It is important to have others like teachers or classmates evaluate their writing, but assessing their writing by themselves is more important in that it can develop children’s autonomy. In addition, self-assessment can help children to grow metacognition.

References

Davis, S. (2010). Purposes of portfolio assessment. eHow, Inc. Retrieved from http://www.ehow.com/about_5103845_purposes-portfolio-assessment.html

Tomkins, G. E. (2008). Teaching writing: Balancing process and product. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.