Young Language Learner Assessment: A Case for Using Assessment Portfolios
Young Language Learner Assessment: A Case for Using Assessment Portfolios
Keywords: approaches to learning, young learner (YL) differences, the use of assessment portfolios
Gerry Lassche
Miyagi Gakuin Women’s University, Japan
Bio Data
Mr. Gerry Lassche holds an MA (TESOL), and holds a Certificate for Teaching English to Children from David English House. He has given Korean MOE sponsored seminars for elementary school teachers on assessment, materials design and teaching reading, and taught intensive speaking upgrade seminars, and was an invited consultant on the English Village project (Paju, Korea), which targeted upper elementary school students. He has lectured on behalf of the Ajou University Graduate School of Education (Suwon, Korea) on Teaching English through English and Teaching Young Learners, and has delivered core courses on TESOL Methodology and TESOL Practicum on the Ajou-Wisconsin TESOL Certificate Program.
The introduction of English into the Japanese elementary school presents an important curriculum issue of suitability and accountability: how to ensure that teaching and learning is enjoyable, easy to understand, trustworthy, and can improve practices. The crucial consideration is that children differ in their rates of development and in their approaches to learning in many ways. This paper, a description of important young learner (YL) differences, will provide a rationale for the use of assessment portfolios to answer that issue. Various examples of portfolio content will be provided which demonstrate individual tailoring of testing and feedback over the entire course of learning, in a way that shows progress through observed skill development for all stakeholders.
See pages: 28-46
[/private]Category: Monthly Editions, Volume 35
