Living Language: Self‐Assessment, Oral Production, and Domestic Immersion

Abstract

With 24 adolescent students enrolled in a French language summer camp, the present study examines the relationship between self‐assessment and oral production in French, interpreting results through a framework of individual learning variables. Participants were surrounded by French inside and outside the classroom. Self‐assessment was measured through a criterion‐referenced self‐assessment questionnaire (Brantmeier, Vanderplank, & Strube, 2012). Oral production was examined with a structured oral interview that involved recording students for four minutes while they described four images (Llanes & Muñoz, 2009). The recording was coded on measures including words per minute, silent pauses per minute, and longest fluent run (Llanes & Muñoz, 2009). Findings demonstrated significant improvement in oral production. Self‐assessment measures and performance on posttest measures for oral production were significantly correlated. Upon arrival at camp this was not true, which may indicate that students who were unable to assess their French abilities at the beginning of camp were better able to assess their abilities following the program. Results have strong pedagogical implications, as self‐assessment may serve as a metacognitive tool for students to learn to self‐diagnose strengths and weaknesses, which may help instructors account for individual learner differences. Implications suggest that self‐assessing such strengths and weaknesses may be easier after a multitude of real‐world and need‐based interactions.

Self‐assessment: How reliable is it in assessing oral proficiency over time?

“…Most researchers have, as observed by Fulcher, used correlations to investigate the validity and reliability of indirect tests like self‐assessment. Some researchers have found that indirect self‐assessment scores of oral skills correlate moderately to highly with direct measures of oral skills (Dolosic et al, ; Malabonga et al, ; Stansfield, Gao, & Rivers, ; Tigchelaar, ), even when the self‐assessment instrument is written in the first or native language or even in the language being learned, as long as the learners’ proficiency is rather high (Roever & Powers, ). Others, however, found weak correlations between direct and indirect measures of oral skills (Brantmeier, ; Brown et al, ; Lim, ; Peirce et al, ) or even negative ones, a rather surprising result found by Brantmeier and Vanderplank ().…”

“…In addition to examining the beneficial classroom and motivational aspects of self‐assessment, researchers have investigated the extent to which it is a reliable and valid tool. For example, a number of studies have addressed the reliability and validity of self‐assessment as a measure of language proficiency (Brown, Dewey, & Cox, ; Butler & Lee, ; Cardoso, ; Chen, ; Dolosic, Brantmeier, Strube, & Hogrebe, ; Kaderavek, Gillam, Ukrainetz, Justice, & Eisenberg, ; Malabonga, Kenyon, & Carpenter, ; Roever & Powers, ; Tigchelaar, ). These authors proposed that self‐assessments of oral skills can be seen as valid and reliable to the extent that the self‐assessment scores, which indirectly measure oral skills, are highly associated with scores from other direct measures, such as actual measures of speaking proficiency.…”

Examining the relationship between English language learners’ online self-regulation and their self-efficacy

“…Our study further verified this view in the context of online EFL learning. Self-evaluation serves as a metacognitive means for foreign language learners to self-diagnose their strengths and weaknesses (Dolosic, Brantmeier, Strube, & Hogrebe, 2016). Through effective self-evaluation, EFL learners can become more aware of their learning goals and expectations.…”

Engineering engagement: Perceived L2 development and short‐term service learning abroad

“…Although the research is not conclusive, a recent set of studies have found correlations between criterion-referenced self-assessments and actual language performance (Brantmeier & Vanderplank, 2008;Brantmeier, Vanderplank, & Strube, 2012;Brown, Dewey, & Cox, 2014;Dolosic, Brantmeier, Strube, & Hogrebe, 2016;Ma & Winke, 2019;Tigchelaar, Bowles, Winke, & Gass, 2017). Brantmeier et al (2012) examined 276 university Spanish students ranging from novice through intermediate to advanced levels of proficiency and compared data from a Can-Do self-assessment instrument with performance on an online examination.…”