An Ecological Approach to Understanding Assessment for Learning in Support of Student Writing Achievement

Abstract

In this paper, we report on a project conducted in a New Zealand primary school that aimed to enhance the writing achievement of primary school boys who were achieving just below the national standard for their age or level through the use of peer feedback and information and communication technologies (ICTs). The project involved a teacher collaborative inquiry approach where all seven teachers in the school and the school principal participated to achieve the project aim. We adopt an ecological approach as a lens to offer a holistic and comprehensive view of how peer assessment and use of ICTs can be facilitated to improve writing achievement. Data were collected through teacher interviews and written reflections of practice and student learning, teacher analysis of student work, team meeting notes, classroom observations, and student focus group interviews. Findings from the thematic analysis of textual data illustrate the potential of adopting an ecological approach to consider how teacher classroom practices are shaped by the school, community, and wider policy context. At the classroom level, our ecological analysis highlighted a productive synergy between commonplace writing pedagogy strategies and assessment for learning (AfL) practices as part of teacher orchestration of an ensemble of interdependent routines, tools, and activities. Diversity, redundancy, and local adaptations of resources to provide multiple pathways and opportunities-social and material and digital-emerged as important in fostering peer assessment and ICT use in support of writing achievement. Importantly, these practices were made explicit and taken up across the school and in the parent community because of whole staff involvement in the project. The wider policy context allowed for and supported teachers developing more effective pedagogy to impact student learning outcomes. We propose that an ecological orientation offers the field a productive insight into the contextual dynamics of AfL as classroom practice that is connected to the wider community and that has long-term value for developing student independence and learning outcomes.

Using Learning-Oriented Online Assessment to Foster Students’ Feedback Literacy in L2 Writing During COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case of Misalignment Between Micro- and Macro- Contexts

“…The less favorable opinions suggested a mismatch between the requirement of the sociocultural contexts (i.e., the government policy of mandatory online learning due to health risk) and the classroom context into which more learning resources (e.g., strategies of online engagement) should be integrated for students to draw on to enhance the aforementioned three aspects of their feedback literacy. The contrast between students’ positive perceptions of LOA-related resources/activities and their less positive views of the mandated online mode of learning indicated that the teacher should adopt a holistic systemic perspective (Cowie & Khoo, 2018 ) when facilitating student feedback literacy development. As a key agent in creating learning resources in the classroom ecosystem (Q. Liu & Chao, 2018 ), the teacher needs to not only foster synergy between different components of the classroom ecosystem, but also align classroom and sociocultural contexts, given the negative impact of misalignment identified in the study.…”

“…However, the misalignment between micro- and macro- contexts may aggravate the existing mismatch between learners and classroom eco-system, with such aggravated mismatch further constraining student feedback literacy development (see the elbow double arrows connecting learners and classroom ecosystem, which are thicker than the elbow double arrows connecting micro- and macro- contexts). Previous research from an ecological perspective either focused on the positive influence of the alignment between different levels of contexts in relation to student engagement with feedback (Cowie & Khoo, 2018 ) or emphasized the interplay between learners and contextual factors regarding student feedback literacy (Chong, 2020 ). This study contributed to research on student feedback literacy by revealing not only the negative impact of misalignment between different layers of contexts on student feedback literacy, but also how such misalignment may be connected to the interplay between learners and micro-level factors to shape individual differences in student feedback literacy development when LOA is employed online during COVID-19.…”

“…Teacher, as a key agent of the classroom ecosystem, creates learning resources that are likely to be used by students (Q. Liu & Chao, 2018 ) in each of the four levels. Moreover, an ecological perspective emphasizes the interplay among resources in the classroom ecosystem and the interaction between micro-level (e.g., classroom instruction), meso-level (e.g., school community), and macro-level contexts (e.g., wider sociocultural contexts) in a holistic–systemic manner (Bronfenbrenner, 1979 ; Cowie & Khoo, 2018 ). For example, the positive impact arising from the alignment among classroom, school, and wider policy contexts contributed to student engagement with peer assessment of writing in a New Zealand primary school.…”

“…For example, the positive impact arising from the alignment among classroom, school, and wider policy contexts contributed to student engagement with peer assessment of writing in a New Zealand primary school. That is, students’ experience with peer feedback was facilitated through teacher orchestration of classroom resources supported by school and educational policies (Cowie & Khoo, 2018 ). Research on student feedback literacy, however, needs to explore the contextual influence of not only alignment but also misalignment between levels of contexts.…”

“…Knowledge about the development of student feedback literacy, in turn, suggests the need to attend to the contextual dynamics among learners and multiple levels of contexts (see the arrow from student feedback literacy to the nested contexts). Research on student feedback literacy from an ecological perspective has explored the positive influence of the alignment between different levels of contexts in relation to student engagement with peer feedback (Cowie & Khoo, 2018 ) or focused on the interplay between learners and contextual factors regarding student feedback literacy (Chong, 2020 ). However, there is a need to explore both the (mis)alignment between multiple layers of contexts and how such (mis)alignment may be connected to the interplay between contextual and learner factors to shape student feedback literacy in different ways.…”