The Forgotten Factors of Disciplinary Writing Assessments

Abstract

Three powerful affective factors often forgotten in today's writing assessments are students' general perceptions of writing, how they perceive themselves as writers, and their self-efficacy for completing specific writing tasks. The purpose of this chapter is to establish an argument for the inclusion of self-perceptions and self-efficacy measures in disciplinary writing assessment protocols. This chapter shares research on middle and high school students' perceptions of and self-efficacy for the writing they do in disciplinary subjects and provides an overview of current measures used in research that examine student perceptions of and self-efficacy for writing. Practical ways to adapt those measures for middle and high school classroom use are provided. The chapter concludes with some practical guidance for educators who teach adolescent students and are interested in including process-focused assessments that evaluate the forgotten, albeit important, affective factors known to influence writing outcomes.