The Effects of Collaborative Assessment on Fostering EFL Writing Proficiency: A Sociocultural Perspective

Anchored in Vygotskian sociocultural perspective, this study attempted to investigate the role of collaborative assessment (CA) in developing EFL writing proficiency. To this aim, two intact groups of Iranian intermediate EFL learners were randomly assigned to experimental (n = 15) and control groups (n = 15). Both groups wrote a total of eight essays on eight identical topics, which the first and the last ones were considered as pre- and post-tests. However, in the experimental group, both learners and the teacher assessed the essays based on an analytic scale. Then, being engaged in collaborative dialogue, the learners were given the opportunity to discuss existing differences between their self-assessed scores and those assigned by the teacher in order to reach an agreed score. Moreover, all their dialogic interactions were audio-recorded for later transcription and microanalysis. The control group, however, was merely provided by the teacher’s scores. Results of the study demonstrated that the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group on the post-test. Besides, the micro-analytic analysis of the dialogic discussions in the experimental group portrayed how CA could help the learners gain a better insight into their strengths and weakness; further, it led to their metacognitive awareness about components of a good piece of writing.

Keywords:

Collaborative assessment , Sociocultural theory , EFL writing proficiency