vận dụng hồ sơ bài tập vào việc giảng dạy kỹ năng đọc cho sinh viên năm thứ hai không chuyên tiếng Anh tại trường Đại học Kinh tế - Đại học Quốc gia Hà Nội

1

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES



NGUYỄN QUỲNH HOA



USING PORTFOLIO IN TEACHING READING SKILL TO
SECOND-YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT
UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS –
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

(Vận dụng hồ sơ bài tập vào việc giảng dạy kỹ năng đọc cho
sinh viên năm thứ hai không chuyên Tiếng Anh tại trường Đại
học Kinh tế - Đại học Quốc gia Hà Nội)


M.A. Minor Programme Thesis


Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60 14 10
Cohort: MA 16

HANOI, 2010

2

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES



NGUYỄN QUỲNH HOA



USING PORTFOLIO IN TEACHING READING SKILL TO
SECOND-YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT
UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS –
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

(Vận dụng hồ sơ bài tập vào việc giảng dạy kỹ năng đọc cho
sinh viên năm thứ hai không chuyên Tiếng Anh tại trường Đại
học Kinh tế - Đại học Quốc gia Hà Nội)

M.A. Minor Programme Thesis



Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60 14 10
Cohort: MA 16
Supervisor: Đinh Hải Yến, M.Ed





HANOI, 2010


6
TABLE OF CONTENTS

RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS ………………………………….
i
ACKNOWLEDMENTS ……………………………………………………….
ii
ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………….
iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ……………………………………………………
iv
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES …………………………………………
vi
PART I: INTRODUCTION …………………………………………………

1
I.1. Rationale of the thesis ……………………………………………………
1
I.2. Objectives of the thesis …………………………………………………….
2
I.3. Scope of the thesis ………………………………………………………….
2
I.4. Method of the thesis ……………………………………………………….
3
I.5. Design of the thesis ………………………………………………………
3
PART II: DEVELOPMENT …………………………………………………
4
Chapter 1: Literature Review …………………………………………………
4
1.1. Reading skill ……………………………………………………………….
4
1.1.1. Definition of reading skill ………………………………………………………
4
1.1.2. Reading subskills …………………………………………………………………
5
1.1.3. Role of reading skill to non-English major students ………………………
6
1.1.4. Requirements for the teaching and learning of reading skill for non-
English major students ………………………………………………………………….
6
1.2. Portfolio …………………………………………………………………….
7
1.2.1. Definition of portfolio …………………………………………………………
7

1.2.2. Types of portfolio ………………………………………………………………
8
1.2.3. Characteristics of portfolio ……………………………………………………
9
1.3. Using portfolio in teaching reading skills ………………………………
10
1.3.1. Portfolio in practice ……………………………………………………………
10
1.3.2. Typical gains of using portfolio in teaching reading skill ………………….
11
1.3.3. Typical pitfalls of using portfolio in teaching reading skill ………………
13
Chapter 2: Methodology ……………………………………………………….
15
2.1. The course ………………………………………………………………….
15
2.2. Participants ………………………………………………………………
16

7
2.3. Research questions and data collection instruments ……………………
16
2.3.1. Survey questionnaires …………………………………………………………
16
2.3.1.1. Pre-portfolio questionnaire …………………………………………………
16
2.3.1.2. Post-portfolio questionnaire ………………………………………………….
17
2.3.2. Portfolio experiment ……………………………………………………………
17

2.4. Data analysis instruments ………………………………………………
23
Chapter 3: Data analysis and discussion of major findings …………………
24
3.1. The participants …………………………………………………………
24
3.2. The effectiveness of the reading portfolio ………………………………
27
3.2.1. The learning of the introduced reading subskills ……………………………
27
3.2.2. The teacher’s and learners’ gains through the reading portfolio …………
31
3.2.2.1. Gains for the learners …………………………………………………………
32
3.3.2.2. Gains for the teacher ………………………………………………………….
34
3.3. Difficulties in applying reading portfolio to non-English majors ………
35
3.4. A feasible portfolio model for non-English majors ……………………
37
PART III: CONCLUSION …………………………………………………….
39
III.1. Summary of previous parts ……………………………………………
39
III.2. Conclusions ………………………………………………………………
39
III.3. Implications for English teachers …………………
40
III.4. Recommendations for further study ……………………………………
40

REFERENCES …………………………………………………………………
42
APPENDIX 1: PRE-PORTFOLIO QUESTIONNAIRE ………
I
APPENDIX 2: PORTFOLIO INSTRUCTION ………………….
III
APPENDIX 3: TEACHER’S HANDOUTS ……………………
VII
APPENDIX 4: STUDENTS’ READING ENTRIES ……………………
XXXI
APPENDIX 5: PORTFOLIO COVER PAGE ………………….
XXXVII





8
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES


Table

Table 2.1. Criteria to assess students’ reading portfolio ………………………
20
Table 2.2. Introduced reading subskills and corresponding reading tasks …….
22
Figure

Figure 3.1. The participants’ frequency of reading in English ………………….

25
Figure 3.2. Reasons for difficulty in reading English texts ………………………
26






















9
PART I: INTRODUCTION

I.1. Rationale of the thesis
Not only recently, teachers and learners in higher education have complained about serious

shortcomings of traditional learning and testing, in which learning is only conceived as the
accumulation of stimulus-response association. Moreover, most testing systems used in
Vietnamese universities consist of only written tests, and mainly focus on checking
students‟ memorization of rules or concrete items of knowledge rather than assessing their
effort, real understanding or ability to apply knowledge in real situations. Meanwhile, the
modern society and the labour market are requiring graduates to have higher-order
cognitive skills such as problem solving, critical thinking, analyzing data, and being able to
present facts and opinions orally or in written form (Dochy, 2001; as cited in Birgin &
Baki, 2007). Those are practical skills that help employees fulfill their increasingly
demanding jobs in a competitive environment. In short, there seems to be a gap between
what the society requires and what the educational system offers.
To bridge the gap mentioned above, it is necessary for university education to provide
learners with realistic knowledge and practical skills. Moreover, assessment is required to
measure both on-going efforts and learning outcomes. More importantly, training students
to be active and independent learners should be the ultimate educational aim. In order to do
so, the only way is letting students take responsibility for their own learning, design their
own learning plan, seek out additional learning materials, assess their own progress, and
cooperate with others in learning. In this regard, portfolio is claimed to be a teaching and
learning tool that creates such activeness and autonomy in learners.
In the world, various kinds of portfolio have been used since the early of 1990s in
teaching foreign languages and have shown promising results. In Vietnam, portfolio has
gradually become a favourable teaching tool at many universities as it combines both
instruction and assessment. Moreover, portfolio focuses on various language and learning
skills not just concrete language items. However, this tool has been mainly applied to
English major students as it requires much time, effort and higher-order cognitive skills. As
for non-English majors, portfolio is assumed to be not feasible.
To check validity of such assumption, the writer has selected the topic “Using portfolio
to teach reading skill to second-year non-English major students at University of
Economics and Business, Vietnam National University, Hanoi” to conduct a study.

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I.2. Objectives of the thesis
This study aims at investigating the implementation of portfolio and examining its effects
on teaching reading skill to second-year non-English major students at University of
Economics and Business – Vietnam National University Hanoi (UEB). It is hoped to build
up a feasible portfolio model and offer suggestions for the teaching and learning of this
basic receptive skill. Specifically, answers to the following research questions are sought:
1. What are portfolio‟s effects on improving learners‟ reading skill?
2. What are the problems emerging in the implementation process?
3. What are possible adjustments to tailor the common portfolio design and make it
more suitable to non-English majors?
I.3. Scope of the thesis
Portfolio can be used for various reasons – assessing learners‟ performance, teaching
concrete language items, or assisting learners in improving their language skills. Within the
scope of this study, portfolio is manipulated mainly as a teaching tool to help students build
up and enhance their awareness of the importance of reading skill, as well as train them
how to apply basic reading subskills effectively in comprehending English texts.
Specifically, portfolio is intended for strengthening only the reading skill as such
concentration would ensure better results than conducting an unfocused research spreading
over all four skills.
As mentioned above, it has become common to apply portfolios to students of English
major. However, to their non-English major counterparts, this teaching tool is quite new.
Consequently, the study selects second-year non-English majors at UEB as the tentative
subjects. For these learners, English is not the top priority but still a necessity as their future
jobs majoring in Finance and Banking, International Economy, or Business Administration
all require good English proficiency. Furthermore, reading skill would be a useful tool for
these learners to develop other English skills as well as knowledge to widen other subject
areas.
Additionally, adjustments suggested in this thesis target at non-English major students
only. They can be altered to match specific teaching and learning conditions. Selection of

those adjustments is decided according to pedagogical theories of specialists and teaching
experience of the writer of this thesis.



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I.4. Method of the thesis
The study is carried out in form of an action research, conducted by the writer herself as a
practitioner in EFL teaching and concurrent with the teaching and learning process. Both
quantitative and qualitative data are collected in order to get a full view of the effects that
the designed portfolio brings to classroom practice.
To collect desired data, two research instruments are made use of, namely survey
questionnaire and portfolio analysis. As for the first instrument, there are two
questionnaires – the pre-portfolio questionnaire and its post-portfolio version. They were
manipulated to gather information to answer three research questions. In addition, teacher‟s
notes and informal talks between learners and the teacher – mostly occurring during break
time – are used to obtain detailed information about students‟ feedback and suggestions.
However, these data are merely students‟ opinions; thus, quite subjective. Accordingly, to
improve validity of the research results, submitted portfolios are analyzed from the
pedagogical standpoint to reveal effectiveness and feasibility of reading portfolio.
I.4. Design of the study
The study consists of three parts:
Part I: Introduction
This part introduces the objectives, scope, and organization of the study.
Part II: Development
This is the main part of the study. It is divided into three chapters.
Chapter I: Literature Review
Theoretical background relevant to the topic and critical survey of related articles,
books and other resources are presented.
Chapter 2: Methodology

This chapter presents the detailed procedure of the study: the ESP course, population
selection, and methodology for data collection and data analysis.
Chapter 3: Data analysis and discussion of major findings
This chapter deals with the findings drawn out from the analysis of data. The findings
and discussion are based on information gained through the two questionnaires, informal
conversations between participants and the researcher, as well as the students‟ portfolios.
Part III: Conclusion
Major findings of the study are summarized in this part. Besides, implications for
English teachers and recommendations for further research are presented.

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PART II: DEVELOPMENT

Chapter 1: Literature Review

As the study is centered on the use of reading portfolio to non-English majors, two key
terms are clearly defined, namely reading skill and portfolio. This chapter is wholly
distributed to review relating theories and practical studies so that these two terms are
understood precisely and applied successfully to non-English major learners.
1.1. Reading skill
1.1.1. Definition of reading skill
Reading is a common term but defining it is not easy. Most authors tend to define the term
by pointing out its characteristics rather than giving a concrete definition. According to
Nunan, reading is “essentially concerned with meaning, specifically with the transfer of
meaning from mind to mind: the transfer of a message from writer to reader” (2000, p.3).
As for Nuttall (1996), he views reading in relation with communication and as a process
with the ultimate aim of approaching the writer‟s underlying idea in the text. As such, these
authors consider reading as an interactive process in which reader and writer are key
participants. However, unlike face-to-face communication, the writer is not present; which
brings much challenge and even the risk of misunderstanding to the interaction.

Perhaps because of the writer‟s absence, Anderson focuses mainly on the interaction
between the reader and the text in building meaning. He further describes that:
A synergy occurs in reading which combines the words on the printed page with the
reader‟s background knowledge and experiences. Readers move through the printed
text with specific purposes in mind to accomplish specific goals.
Anderson (1999, p.1)
Similarly, in Silberstein‟s words (2002, p.12), reading is “a complex information
processing skill in which the reader interacts with text so as to (re)create meaningful
discourse.”
The mentioned viewpoints persuasively reject the old conception that reading is merely
a receptive process in which the reader passively absorbs the written text. In short, reading
is the integration of the direct interaction between the reader and the text, the indirect
interaction between the reader with his/her prior knowledge and experience and the writer.
Another way to understand a notion is looking into its components. As for reading, they
are its subskills. The part below will discuss major reading subskills.

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1.1.2. Reading subskills
Basing on application level, Nuttall (1996) suggests two groups of important reading
subskills that a learner should develop. They are word attack skills and text attack skills.
The first group, word attack skills, helps students deal with difficult vocabulary items
such as idioms, multi-meaning words, sub-technical vocabulary, text-structuring words and
pin-down words, i.e. words with abstract meaning that can only be inferred from textual
cohesion. This group of skills includes a number of subskills as following:
 Identifying key words and ignoring inessential words
 Assigning meaning to a word using structural clues like grammatical function,
morphology
 Guessing word meaning from the context
 Using a dictionary
The second group, text attack skills, deals with above-word level with the aim of getting

as closely as possible to the writer‟s message. Subskills belonging to this group include:
 Understanding syntax
 Recognizing and interpreting cohesive devices – i.e. pro-forms like it, our, this,
then, one, so and comparatives; elliptical expressions as in “They came although they were
asked not to (come)”; lexical cohesion including synonyms, hyponyms, and metaphor
 Interpreting discourse markers that signal the sequence of event, discourse
organization, or the writer‟s point of view
 Recognizing functional value: naming, explaining, evaluating
 Recognizing text organization
 Recognizing presuppositions underlying the text
 Recognizing implications and making inferences
The above list is quite thorough but sounds rather complicated to readers. Anderson
(1999) offers a simpler enumeration by just mentioning understanding main ideas, making
inferences, predicting outcomes, and guessing vocabulary from context; or skimming,
scanning, previewing and reviewing text as listed later in his book. In Harmer‟s opinion
(2003), important reading subskills consist of only skimming for the gist of a text and
scanning for particular bits of information. Sometimes, these two subskills are integrated
into two types of reading: extensive - reading a longer text, often for pleasure with
emphasis on overall meaning and intensive reading - reading a short text for details.

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In conclusion, such major reading subskills need to be fostered through practice so that
learners can cope with sophisticated unfamiliar texts and tasks, and deal with them
effectively, i.e. quickly and with appropriate strategies. After all, this is the ultimate, though
not easy to achieve, objective for English teachers in teaching reading.
1.1.3. Role of reading skill to non-English major students
It is commonly agreed that for non-English majors, reading is an important language skill
and is closely related to other skills. Specifically, reading texts composed by English
writers provides good models for students‟ writing. When reading, learners are exposed to
the standard use of vocabulary, grammar, punctuation, as well as the native way to

construct sentences, paragraphs and texts. Moreover, ideas and opinions from reading texts
will be a rich source of food for thought, which aids learners much in catching points when
listening or expressing their own views when speaking.
Furthermore, in Anderson‟s words (1999), this skill when strengthened may act as a
momentum pushing learners forward in their academic areas. In this era of information
boom; students have easy access to numerous reference sources, which are commonly
written in English. Reading texts from such sources, students can get information relevant
to their specialized academic fields. Hence, as commonly stated in the curriculum for non-
English majors, reading is the focus of the teaching and learning of English at universities.
1.1.4. Requirements for the teaching and learning of reading skill for non-English major
students
According to Nuttall (1996, p.31), the most general aim for teaching reading is
to enable students to enjoy (or at least feel comfortable with) reading in the foreign
language, and to read without help unfamiliar authentic texts, at appropriate speed,
silently and with adequate understanding.

Clearly, this is a challenging task, which needs strict requirements.
As for Anderson (1999), he claims that reading and the process to weave a tapestry are
somewhat similar. From this comparison, it seems obvious that learning to read is a process
that requires much time and practice. Because of the fact that the language proficiency of
most non-English majors is not very good, adequate practice is even more important.
Moreover, appropriate reading strategies are crucial, especially when difficulties are
created by both the foreign language itself and the complicatedness of specialized content.
This requirement results in a call for teacher‟s guidance or instruction. In Railton and
Watson‟s viewpoint (2005; as cited in Sert, 2006, p.192), teacher guidance is of great
importance even when learners study autonomously. They argue that:

15
Autonomous learning is as much a skill as learning to drive - it must be taught, it
requires practice, and it is assessed against specific criteria. Unless they are taught

how to take the wheel for themselves, students, like learner drivers, may be at risk.

For non-English major students, appropriate guidance and instruction from teachers are
inevitably significant since they often lack effective learning skills.
To sum up, students need to autonomously spend adequate time and effort to practise
and be given chances to practise to improve their reading skill. Teacher‟s instruction is also
of great importance to ensure that learners apply effective learning strategies. In this regard,
portfolio seems to meet all the given requirements as a teaching and learning tool. On the
one hand, learners have to practise their language skills frequently and put due effort into
learning. On the other hand, guidance from the teacher is integrated continuously into the
process. In the following part, the notion portfolio and its major issues will be discussed.
1.2. Portfolio
1.2.1. Definition of portfolio
The earliest definition may belong to Paulson, Paulson and Meyer (1991, p.60). According
to these authors,
A portfolio is a purposeful collection of student work that exhibits the student‟s
effort, progress, and achievements in one or more areas. The collection must include
student participation in selecting contents, the criteria for selection, the criteria for
judging merit, and evidence of student self-reflection.

In the article “The Use of Portfolio to Assess Student‟s Performance”, Birgin and Baki
(2007) provide various definitions of portfolio. Through their summary, it is revealed that
many authors such as Arter and Spandel, 1991; Collins, 1992; De Fina, 1992 agree with
Paulson, Paulson and Meyer when defining portfolio as collection of learners‟ work with
specific purpose(s) through which their learning effort can be revealed. However, differing
viewpoints do exist. Grace (1992) views portfolio as a means to understand students‟
learning process as a whole. Sharing the same standpoint, Winsor and Ellefson (1995) add
that portfolio provides information about not only the learning process but also what
learners can produce with language, i.e. their learning product. Other authors such as Simon
and Forgette-Giroux (2000); Birgin (2003), to name but a few, claim that this is an

assessing tool which teachers can apply to see how much their learners have progressed.
Those definitions not only clarify meaning of portfolio but also reveal its benefits. In
fact, both teachers and learners gain from portfolio as a useful teaching-learning activity.
However, it seems that these authors just mention three different kinds of portfolios,
namely collection, reflection and assessment portfolio as suggested by Zhenhui (2005).

16
In short, it is hard to decide on a perfect definition for portfolio as it has various
versions basing on purposes for which it is created. It is then advisable to classify different
types of portfolio. The next section will provide a brief review of major portfolio types.
1.2.2. Types of portfolio
Portfolios can be classified in accordance with a number of criteria. According to Haladyn
(1997), there are five types of portfolio namely ideal, showcase, documentation, evaluation,
and class portfolio.
 The ideal portfolio contains all students‟ works. The teacher does not assess this
portfolio. Students, instead, evaluate their own portfolios.
 The showcase portfolio consists only of the students‟ best works. It is important
for students to select and reflect their own works. Thus, this portfolio type is also not
suitable to be graded.
 The documentation portfolio involves a collection of works over time showing
growth and improvement of students' learning. This portfolio contains qualitative and
quantitative data.
 The evaluation portfolio includes a standardized collection of students‟ works
which is determined by the teacher or, in some cases, by the students. This portfolio is
suitable for grading students.
 The class portfolio contains student‟s grade, teacher‟s view and knowledge
about students in the classroom.
Such way of classification is based on the content of a portfolio, i.e., what is included in
it. Meanwhile, using the same criterion, Slater (1996) describes only there types of portfolio
as showcase, open-format and checklist portfolio. The first type is a limited portfolio where

a student is only allowed to present a few pieces of evidence to demonstrate mastery of
learning objectives. In an open-format portfolio, students are allowed to submit anything
they wish to be considered as evidence for mastery of a given list of learning objectives. As
for a checklist portfolio, it is composed of a predetermined number of items.
Another way of classification uses portfolio function as main criterion. For example,
Zhenhui (2005) introduces three main portfolio categories; namely Collection, Reflection,
and Assessment.
 Collection provides a chance for learners to explore portfolios, especially those
who have never fulfilled a portfolio task. It is also advisable that collections are confined to
one single area such as reading, or writing.

17
 The second category is used to gather data about students‟ metacognitive and
affective awareness in selected area and reveal their perceptions, interpretations, as well as
strategies used in acquiring knowledge.
 Assessment, as its name suggests, aims at assessing learner‟s work through
specified criteria.
In short, portfolios can be subdivided in various ways. However, content and function
are two main criteria for classification.
1.2.3. Characteristics of portfolio
Paulson, Paulson and Meyer (1991) view portfolio as a concept with various realization
depending on who creates it – the learner – as well as the environment in which it is created
– the classroom. However, all portfolios still possess a number of typical characteristics.
Following are three main features of a portfolio:
 Combining assessment and instruction: Hamps-Lyons (1994; as cited in Chen,
2006) considers portfolio both assessment and instruction tool through which teacher has a
repertoire of evaluation techniques to make use of. Thus, learners can feel at ease as they
have more chances to show their effort and improve the final scores. Besides, the fear of
being assessed may be reduced when assessment is interwoven into instruction. Meanwhile,
teacher guidance and instruction is undoubtedly necessary to avoid confusion for learners.

 Focusing on learners‟ learning effort and progress: Chen (2006) quotes Dudley
(2001) to argue that the real aim of portfolio is not assessing but revealing learners‟ effort
and progress as well as giving them a sense of achievement. Only in this sense, can
portfolio show its value and result in maximum benefits. In other words, portfolio is a
learning tool rather than an assessing tool. On the other hand, assessment – though not the
most important role of portfolio – functions as a considerable source of motivation. Thus,
assessment criteria must encourage students to make real effort in learning. Accordingly,
discussion among teachers and learners is essential to reach agreement on appropriate
criteria. Besides, these criteria should be clear and easy to understand. Normally, they are in
form of rubrics with detailed explanation.
 Putting students at the center: According to Birgin and Baki (2007), a portfolio
should be as student-centered as possible. The students are the portfolio‟s real owners in the
way that they select its components, contribute in deciding assessment criteria, and assess it
themselves. In this process, teacher facilitates guides, offers choices rather than informs,
directs, and predetermines priorities as in traditional teaching. Lynch and Shaw (2005) also

18
emphasize learners‟ active participation in selecting the portfolio components, showing
their reflection, and deciding evaluation criteria.
Besides, Barton and Collins (1997, as cited in Birgin & Baki, 2007) state that portfolios
of any kind should be multi-sourced; authentic; flexible in terms of assessment; explicitly
purposeful and multipurpose; corresponding to both the course and reality; and, most
importantly, encouraging to learners‟ ownership. Therefore, all portfolios should be
ongoing so that they show students‟ effort, progress, and achievement over a period of time.
With the descriptions stated above, portfolios are not either the arbitrary collections or
observation of student‟s works to be filled haphazardly. It is important that the portfolio
collections should be purposeful, systematic, with clearly determined evaluation criteria,
and are taken over a period of time.
Similarly, Lynch and Shaw (2005) propose seven key features that portfolios of any
type must demonstrate, among which is the requirement that portfolio evaluation procedure

must be thorough, i.e., both the final product and the process of creating the portfolio are
assessed; and is multi-dimensional and gathered from various channels including teacher,
peer, and self-assessment.
In short, portfolio must interweave instruction into assessment. The main purpose is to
facilitate students‟ learning so that they have chance to use and then improve their language
skills. Students also have the right to raise their opinions in how to compose their own
portfolios. It is crucial for the teacher to preserve these features of portfolio to ensure
maximum teaching and learning efficiency.
1.3. Using portfolio in teaching reading skills
The previous part covers the theoretical aspect of the term portfolio. In this part, further
discussion will deal with its practical aspect.
1.3.1. Portfolio in practice
Portfolio has been widely applied in teaching through both theoretical and empirical
studies.
Lynch and Shaw (2005) carried out a study on students in The Graduate School of
Language and Educational Linguistics, who are majored in TESOL and teaching foreign
languages. The two authors proposed the use of a portfolio to replace the written
comprehensive examination. Five years before that, Hsieh, Lu, and Yeh (2000)
implemented portfolio assessment on much younger learners – pupils in a sixth grade EFL

19
classroom. In the mentioned studies, portfolios are used with general purpose as an
alternative to traditional assessment.
Hoover and Taylor (1998) used portfolio with a different purpose – to teach about
Vietnam War. As for Roeder (2007), he applied portfolio to have students construct their
own meaning of the Bill of Rights. The purpose of applying portfolio there is to teach
specific knowledge items.
Besides, portfolio can also be used as a tool to develop and strengthen a particular skill.
For example, Frazier and Paulson (1992) established a portfolio focusing on writing – the
skill that the earliest portfolios focused on.

In conclusion, studies on the use of portfolio have been conducted since the early of
1990s. Moreover, researchers seem to explore this pedagogical tool from various aspects –
to replace traditional pencil-and-paper tests, to aid understanding of concrete language
issues, or to build up learners‟ language skills.
1.3.2. Typical gains of using portfolio in teaching reading skill
From practical research results, portfolio has been proved to be a promising teaching
technique. It brings about remarkable gains to teaching and learning process.
The first gain is portfolio‟s effect on learner autonomy. Discussing the feasibility of
using portfolio to enhance learner autonomy, Zhenhui (2005, p.23) claims:
By using portfolios, they [learners] can take an active control of their learning
process by using metacognitive strategies, for example, planning and organizing
learning, monitoring and observing learning, and reflecting on learning. There is no
doubt that using metacognitive strategies can alter students‟ view of the teacher‟s
and their own roles in ways that enhance autonomy.

Fourteen years earlier, Paulson, Paulson and Meyer already argued that portfolio had
the power to urge learners to take charge of their own learning. Then in Zhenhui‟s view
(2005, p.20), when learners are given control over their own learning in terms of both
content and method, they “are more likely to be able to set realistic goals, plan programs of
work, develop strategies for coping with new and unforeseen situations, and evaluate and
assess their own work.”
Meanwhile, autonomy is commonly agreed to be an influential factor contributing to
learners‟ success. Scharle and Szabó (2000) pose a common question “Why should you
[learners] develop responsibility and autonomy?” to raise awareness of necessity for this
capacity and attitude. The authors then point out that the answer lies in the nature of
language acquisition, that is learning only occurs when learners actually make their

20
contribution. Moreover, it is without doubt that learners will have to acquire further
knowledge by themselves all life long as their needs constantly change. The only way for

them to be prepared (with guidance from teacher) and/or to prepare themselves is being
autonomous and responsible learners. In other words, autonomy is a necessary and useful
capacity for not only learners‟ studying at the moment but also their life and work in the
future. Creating such capacity and attitude in learners may be the greatest gain from the use
of portfolio.
Moreover, in Roeder‟s words (2007), portfolio is “a form of constructivist learning, or
learning that students construct themselves”, which parallels the notion of autonomy above.
Furthermore, the author claims that learners have the chance to carry out such construction
process using the learning style that they find effective the most. Concerning this benefit,
Chen (2006, p.70) reviews a number of studies on the use of portfolio and concludes that
“in pedagogy, the assembly of a portfolio is regarded as conducive to students‟ multiple
intelligences, self-reflection, critical thought, learning responsibility, plus content area skills
and knowledge.” Roeder (2007) share the same viewpoint with Chen in claiming that
through portfolios, students can construct their own learning, thus increase their
understanding of both language items and their learning process.
Paulson, Paulson and Meyer once compared portfolio with “a window into the students‟
heads” (1991, p.61). In other words, portfolio gives reliable and dynamic data about
students for teachers and students themselves. With such useful information, learners can
know which areas need improvement, and teachers can plan their teaching toward better
results.
Different from these above authors, De Fina (1992, p.39; as cited in Birgin & Baki,
2007, p.83) looks at portfolios as an assessment tool and creates a table summarizing
advantages of portfolios over traditional testing system. Among mentioned benefits, the
following are the most prominent
Portfolios
Traditional testing
 Provide an opportunity for student to
demonstrate his/her strengths as well as
weaknesses
 Provide multiple opportunities for

observation and assessment
 Invite the learner to be reflective on
 Provide a summary of student‟s
performance on certain (thus limited) tasks

 Provide a temporary picture of each
learner‟s abilities on particular tasks
 Ask the learner to provide a singular

21
his/her work and knowledge, thus
encouraging him/her to become independent
and self-directed
 Encourage teacher-student conferencing

 Inform instruction and curriculum, place
learner at center of the educational process
desired response, which seemingly trains
him/her into an auto but passive learning
machine
 Force teacher-administration
conferencing
 Reinforce idea that the curriculum is
the center of the educational process

Sharing the same opinion, Hamp-Lyons (1994; as cited in Chen, 2006) favours the use
of portfolio as it can interweave assessment with instruction. He further explains that when
multi assessment methods are made use of, evaluation will be “less threatening and more
supportive” (p.54) to learners.
In short, with the given advantages, portfolio helps enhance learners‟ autonomy, and

reveals their strengths and weaknesses. Additionally, it gives students a good chance to
work out the most suitable learning method for themselves, and is a reliable assessing
instrument for teachers.
1.3.3. Typical pitfalls of using portfolio in teaching reading skill
Despite profound advantages as mentioned earlier, portfolio does have shortcomings which
require due consideration.
First, scoring a portfolio may be seen as less reliable or fair than multiple choices test
scores (Birgin & Baki, 2007 citing Cicmanec & Viecknicki, 1994) as it is often quite
subjective.
Another pitfall concerns anxiety about the validity and reliability of the portfolio
assessment. Birgin and Baki (2007) notes that when portfolio is applied as an assessment
method, questions about the real “owner” of the portfolio and learner self-dependence can
be raised. In other words, reliability and validity of this assessing method is doubted.
Unfortunately, this suspicion is reinforced through practical researches (Herman & Winters,
1994; Geathart & Herman, 1995; Koretz et al., 1994). Thus, the authors believe that
constant inspection and work presentation are necessary.
Furthermore, using portfolio is very time consuming for teachers to review, comment
and score students‟ works; to assess students‟ performance over time, especially in the
crowded classroom (Birgin, 2006b; as cited in Birgin & Baki, 2007). More time is also
required to create new materials and lessons. However, in reality, many teachers are
strained by heavy workload and limited time for class preparation. Others may feel

22
confused and not confident in conducting multidimensional teaching and assessment.
Consequently, they are very likely to fall back on the old but convenient way of teaching
and testing with pencil-and-paper tests. As for learners, they have diverse priority lists and
cannot devote themselves fully to English only. Hence, excessive time and effort required
by portfolio assignments may turn into a burden.
One of the problems of using portfolio is to store, to handle and to control learners‟
portfolios in crowded classrooms. As for students, they often have problems in

recordkeeping and information management.
For learners, another shortcoming is portfolio‟s limited effect on test performance.
Meanwhile, grade is still something important in Vietnam educational system.
Chen (2006, p.85) mentions difficulty when applying portfolio with a
heterogeneous/multilevel class. It is challenging to design suitable tasks and decide on
appropriate standards for learners of various language proficiency, to make them all
interested and motivated in learning.
In general, portfolio may bring about not only advantages but also pitfalls including the
problems of reliability, validity, time and effort consumed especially when applied to
multilevel classes. Record keeping is also a real challenge for the students‟ side, while slow
effort makes portfolio not very attractive to them. Thus, appropriate adaptation and
adjustment are crucial to maximize the educational gains and minimize unexpected effects
of this teaching and learning tool.
To conclude, fundamental notions including reading skill and its subskills; portfolio and
its various realizations, outstanding features and feasibility for application have been
reviewed in this chapter. All together set the theoretical framework for the study, which
will be presented in details in the following chapter.










23
Chapter 2: Methodology

In this chapter, methodology applied to conduct the action research is clarified. Most
important are information about the course in which the study was carried out, the
participants, and adjustments made to tailor a suitable reading portfolio for those
participants. Data collection and data analysis instruments are also presented.
2.1. The course
To understand the participants‟ background on English learning, it is necessary to describe
briefly the time allocated for this language in UEB in general and the specific course within
which the study was conducted in particular.
Altogether, learners have to fulfill four English courses while studying in this university
– three General English (GE) courses and one English for Specific Purposes (ESP) course.
The action research occurred within the most challenging course – ESP. This course
possesses three noticeable features:
 About course objectives, as stated in the syllabus, ESP aims at consolidating and
widening students‟ vocabulary as well as their knowledge of language usage relating to
business and economics field. Besides, the course focuses on developing learners‟ language
skills which have been built through previous GE courses. With an essential role to non-
English majors as discussed in Literature Review, reading is undoubtedly a focus.
 The course book is Market Leader Intermediate – New Edition (ML). This is a
book carefully and professionally designed by a prestigious publisher – Pearson Longman.
It has been widely acknowledged and adopted to teach English for Business and
Economics. However, a huge number of economic and business terminologies are included,
which creates much challenge for the participants.
 As for schedule, students learn four periods in a row every week during fifteen
weeks of the semester. Within this tight timetable, the workload is quite heavy as each unit
contains not only skills practice, vocabulary and language review but also a case study. As
a result, certain parts are turned into homework or self-study.
In short, the objectives set for the course are rather ambitious, whereas the time
allocated is not in parallelism. Consequently, both teachers and students are assumed to
work really hard to catch up with the schedule and to meet the course requirements. In
addition, guidance and instruction in combination with frequent practice are required.

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2.2. Participants
Fifty three students from two classes of which the writer is in charge in teaching ESP take
part in the study. Among them, twenty six students are majored in Finance and Banking,
while twenty seven other students are majored in Business Administration. They all have
finished three GE courses in previous semesters. However, these students are of various
language proficiency levels. Those who studied English as a compulsory subject for the
university entrance examination are much better at the language than their counterparts who
entered the university with subjects in natural science areas. The participants are coded
randomly from S1 to S53. Besides, the researcher plays the role of the teacher (coded as T)
in this study. She is qualified to be an English teacher and has four-year experience in
English language teaching.
2.3. Research questions and data collection instruments
This study is an action research as the teacher is also the researcher. Being aware of her
learners‟ difficulties in acquiring reading skill, she decided to use reading portfolio, which
is highly recommended by both researchers and experienced teachers, to improve the
teaching and learning results. Thus, the study is actually the way she applies theory into
practice and evaluates changes by the designed portfolio. In details, three research
questions are:
1. What are portfolio‟s effects on improving learners‟ reading skill?
2. What are the problems emerging in the implementation process?
3. What are possible adjustments to tailor the common portfolio design and make it
more suitable to non-English majors?
To achieve research objectives, two main data collection instruments are manipulated.
2.3.1. Survey questionnaires
2.3.1.1. Pre-portfolio questionnaire
The first research tool for data collection is a pre-portfolio questionnaire (see Appendix 1).
This questionnaire, which consists of 14 questions, was designed to get general information

about the participants, including:
 Participants‟ background: The first four questions target at getting such data as
English learning experience, purposes of learning the language, and extra effort outside
classroom to learn the language.
 Information concerning learners‟ understanding, opinion, difficulties, and needs
around the two key notions – reading skill and portfolio. In details, the first question in the

25
group was designed to know importance of English to individual learners. The next
question focuses on importance of only one skill – reading skill – in comparison with the
other three. Question number four and five identify the students‟ frequency of reading texts
written in English as well as kinds of texts they often read. The next two questions help
clarify whether reading is difficult to non-English majors and the main reasons for
difficulties. The rest of the questionnaire tackles learners‟ understanding of the term
portfolio, and its purposes. Besides, kinds of reading texts that learners find interesting and
reading subskills that they want to learn are two important pieces of information achieved
through question number nine and ten.
In short, the pre-portfolio questionnaire provides fundamental knowledge about the
participants so that appropriate adjustments may be made to design a suitable reading
portfolio for non-English major learners.
2.3.1.2. Post-portfolio questionnaire
At the end of the course, learners were required to write the cover page when submitting
their portfolio. In fact, this is a post-portfolio questionnaire with three questions:
 What can you gain from the reading portfolio?
 What difficulties you encountered when composing the reading portfolio?
 What do you suggest to make the portfolio more beneficial to your learning of
reading?
Besides, the teacher often had informal talks with her students during break time or after
class hours to get valuable feedback about their needs and challenges.
However, the main problem of the above questionnaires is that they are quite subjective

as the main source of data is the participants‟ opinions and comments. Furthermore, as
students have no pedagogical knowledge, their assessment about effectiveness of the
portfolio may be not of high reliability and validity level. As a result, the second instrument
must be applied, which is the portfolio itself.
2.3.2. Portfolio experiment
In the entire process, the participants‟ reading portfolios function as a backup data
collection instrument for the two questionnaires. In this part, the writer will describe in
details the experiment of using portfolio to non-English major students in practising reading
skill. All collected reading portfolios were analyzed to reveal the participants‟ acquisition
and improvement in reading. It is hoped that these instruments will gather thorough,
detailed, reliable and valid data for analysis.

26
Taking into consideration the features of the course and participants, especially the fact
that portfolio owners are non-English majors, a number of adjustments were implemented
during the semester. In details, the adjustment process consists of three main stages.
Stage 1: Pre-portfolio
In this stage, the researcher reviewed relating literature to outline the portfolio‟s content
and assessing criteria.
As for the portfolio‟s content, it was designed to be practical, concentrating on readings
from students‟ fields of study – business and economics – and avoiding demotivated
assignments. Hence, the Financial Times – the world business newspaper – was chosen to
be the major source of reading texts. Besides, four main reading subskills were intended to
include in the portfolio, namely skimming, scanning, guessing new words‟ meaning, and
distinguishing facts from assumptions and opinions. In fact, the two first subskills are
suggested by most linguists. Meanwhile, the third subskill was selected basing on the
researcher‟s teaching experience. Her students always claim that they find reading ESP
texts difficult as there are too many new terms. As for the last subskill, the researcher chose
it with an aim of improving the students‟ judgement skill. Since learners now have chance
to access to various sources of information, it would be very confusing if they could not

distinguish between concrete facts and personal assumptions or opinions which have not
been proved. A good judgement skill, thus, is needed to assess reliability and validity of
information.
In addition, to improve effectiveness of the reading portfolio, chances to recycle new
language skills as well as difficulty level of reading tasks were carefully considered.
Specifically, previously introduced subskills were integrated and recycled in the following
weeks. The rule of assigning tasks is from simple to complex and with an increasing
number so that non-English majors can absorb the knowledge and subskills better. The
participants would also be encouraged to put more effort in selecting reading texts about
economics and business themselves and to apply the introduced reading subskills to
comprehend the texts. The purpose is to create a frequent reading habit to the learners.
It was also decided that the participants would only have reading assignment every two
weeks, not weekly. In details, in one week, they were introduced a new reading subskill and
had home assignments to practise at home. The next week, they would practise the newly
introduced strategy or recycle the older ones. As a matter of fact, the odd weeks were

27
spared for writing tasks as all four skills are integrated in just one English course, and it is
impossible to spend too much time on reading.
More importantly, the procedure to compose the portfolio was adapted to the
participants who are inexperienced portfolio-composers. For the first two assignments,
students worked in small groups consisting of those with mixed language proficiency. This
is somehow a form of peer coaching, enabling learners of higher language proficiency to
help those of lower level. Besides, as group works often provide a comfortable and safe
context, learners may have a relaxing start-up. The logic is that clear model and tight
control are required at first, and then they can be gradually reduced when learners get
familiar to a new way of learning. In the fifth week, learners had no task. Instead, they had
a period to discuss their difficulties in composing the portfolio. Under the teacher‟s control
and facilitation, students would found out feasible solutions together so that they were
ready to work alone. For the next four assignments, students worked individually to create

their own portfolios. Then they had one week to complete and organize their portfolios into
the final product and handed in. The last week was scheduled for teacher‟s feedback and
comments with the aim of making learners realize their strengths and weaknesses.
 Moreover, criteria for assessment were outlined in the way that both learning effort
and learning outcome would be evaluated. The following table illustrates this principle:
Criteria
Requirement and assessment of fulfillment
Assigned
tasks
< 4 entries: 0
4-5 entries:
0.5
6-7 entries:
1
8-9 entries:
1.5
10 entries: 2
> 6 late
entries: 0
5-6 late
entries: 0.25
3-4 late
entries: 0.5
1-2 late
entries: 0.75
0 late entries:
1
No
vocabulary: 0
1/4 required

work: 0.5
1/2 required
work: 1
3/4 required
work: 1.5
All required
work: 2
No reading
exercises: 0
1/4 required
work: 0.5
1/2 required
work: 1
3/4 required
work: 1.5
All required
work: 2
Reflection on reading: difficulties you encountered when doing reading
assignments and strategies/solutions you applied
Extra
effort
Selecting texts of related topics and applying learned reading strategies to
comprehend the texts: 1
Cover
page
Briefly answer three questions: 1
1. What can you gain from the reading portfolio?

28
2. What difficulties you encountered when composing this reading

portfolio?
3. What do you suggest to make this portfolio more beneficial to your
learning of reading?
Note: Late entries are only accepted AFTER 1 WEEK
Late submission of the completed portfolio (week 14) is NOT accepted

Table 2.1. Criteria to assess students’ reading portfolio
 Finally, a pre-portfolio questionnaire was designed to get basic information about
the participants and identify learners‟ wants and needs. Moreover, students were
encouraged to select the content for their portfolio through this questionnaire. The kinds of
text that learners find interesting and reading subskills that they want to learn were
questioned. This questionnaire would be delivered in the first day of the semester.
Stage 2: While-portfolio
This is when the designed portfolio was brought into application.
As already scheduled, in the first period, the pre-portfolio questionnaire was given to
the participants to complete.
Because portfolio has not been applied in teaching English in UEB, portfolio instruction
was identified as vitally important and required due attention. Consequently, the rest of the
first day in the semester was made use of to introduce key issues of the portfolio. The
purpose is to make learners understand the benefits of spending time and effort on creating
portfolios. To achieve this purpose, both short and long-term objectives were emphasized
as portfolio does not often show clear and immediate effects. Besides, it is a good chance
for the teacher to express respect and willingness to regard learners as partners in working
towards the common aim of improving learners‟ language proficiency. Moreover, assessing
criteria were announced and negotiated with the participants. In general, the participating
students agreed with the teacher‟s criteria, so assessment was fixed as in the above table.
After that, the answers in the questionnaire were analyzed thoroughly. Most of the
learners‟ needs and wants matched the teacher‟s prediction. However, a supporting part
named Business Brief was added, for majority of the participants claimed that poor
vocabulary was their main problem. This part was created to increase the participants‟

vocabulary and also train them how to deal with new words. Three main tasks include
explaining the words already known in students‟ own words to revise relating terms,