Developing national standards for the assessment of writing. A tool for teaching and learning Professor Synnøve Matre, Sør-Trøndelag University College Professor Lars S. Evensen, NTNU

Background OECD  key competencies in knowledge societies 2005 writing tests: low reliability An interpretative community?  investigate teachers’ norms for assessment

Purposes To carry out in-depth research on specified assessment norms for writing: –study their effects on the quality of pupils’ writing and –study their effects on the quality of teachers’ rating

Empirical research questions which specified norms of assessment can sustainably serve as explicit standards for writing in an educational assessment environment? which specific effects do the educational integration of shared explicit standards have on the quality of teacher assessment? which specific effects do the educational integration of shared explicit standards have on the quality of pupils’ writing?

Establishing tentative norms: A 2010 pilot study Twelve schools – 5th and 8th grade On task think aloud interviews Derived norms of expectations

Writing construct Tentative norms organized with reference to a theoretical model  The Writing Wheel Acts of writing + purposes Semiotic tools for intentional writing

Wheel of writing

Cooperation Know- ledge organization Knowledge development Persuasion Writing acts Tools for Writing Semiotic Semiotic mediation mediation Purposes of writing Creation of textual worlds Identity formation To keep in contact To ponder To describ e To explore To imagine To convince Wheel of writing Focus on acts and purposes of writing Wheel of writing - work in progress - des. 2010

Semiotic tools Writtenmediation To keep in contact To ponder To explore To imagine Writing tools Text structure Sign systems Vocabulary and grammar Semioticmediation des Wheel of writing - work in progress - Focus on semiotic mediation Writing acts To describe To convince

Intervention – stage 1 Refining standards by implementing tentative standards in eight different local learning ecologies

Intervention - stage 2 Investigate local learning ecologies Qualitative dimensions: substudies B-D 24 schools

Intervention – stage 3 Compare results in terms of learning outcomes (student writing and teacher assessment) to –Similar results from the forthcoming national assessment of writing as a key competency, i.e. intervention schools compared to non-intervention schools Ouantitative dimensions: substudies E-F

Financial and organizational key info Participants –Eight scholars from five different Norwegian universities/colleges –An affiliated group in New Zealand, representing the assessment for learning group at the University of Auckland and the Educational Assessment Research Unit at University of Otago Funding –The research is funded by The Research Council of Norway and Sør-Trøndelag University College with support from co-operating institutions: NTNU, University of Oslo, University of Agder, Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences.

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