Writing Skill Analysis Of An EAL/D Learner | NAPLAN, 2016 - Report

Analysis of EAL/D Student's Writing Achievement

Dialect is a mean of verbal communication that linguistically varies from one region to another. All dialects follow its own rule for grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary, are established on specific logic and often associated with some social value (Clifford, Rhodes & Paxton, 2014). Thus, on the basis of this fact it can be stated that no dialect is superior to the other and the preference to use any particular dialect solely rests on the communicator’s ease of adopting and employing it.

The EAL/D Learners are those whose mother tongue or home language consists of a dialect other than English. From the survey reports of 2016, it had been observed that the subpopulation of Australia who spoke English at home consisted of only 40% (Dooley & May, 2013). The other communities who could be categorized under EAL/D were Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese, Spanish and the indigenous community of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders. The EAL/D Learner’s potential to perceive, comprehend and become efficient in communicating in English Language primarily depends on their level of education. Apart from this intrinsic factor, there are various extrinsic factors that influence the learning capacity of these learners. These are cultural, social and emotional support provided by the teachers and peers to understand the concept of classroom organisation, deadlines, subject-specific digital technologies aiding learning process and most importantly, patience and bilingual support (Davison & Michell, 2014).

The following report illustrates an analysis of Writing Skill of an EAL/D Learner, Student A studying in Great Western Sydney. The assessment carried out is based on National Assessment Program- Literacy and Numeracy or NAPLAN, 2016 (Leung & Lewkowicz, 2016).

The Band length achieved by Student A depicts a mid-level of 5. This is the student’s achievement in narrative writing. When compared to the national average scores as well as those of the school average it was observed that the result of Student A lies at a lower level than both, the national average being above band 5 and school average being above band 6. The achievement range of the middle 60% of students in Australia lie between Band 5 and Band 6. This indicates that the Band score achieved by Student A in writing skill is greater than few students within the same band but lesser than the majority of middle 60% students in Australia who took the same test.

The Band Length achieved by Student A helps in an overall assessment of his or her proficiency in narrative writing ability. The inference that could be drawn from evaluating his or her score was that the student was efficient in illustrating a plot with simple words and uncomplicated sentences (Angelo, 2013). The flow of writing was relatively lucid and formation of character and setting was also cohesive. However, the student lacked in consistency when it came to linking the subplots with further character development (French, 2016). At times, the writing style became ambiguous. The spelling, grammar and punctuations were relatively correct throughout his writing. The overall narrative was sophisticated and compact.

Part 2: Essay on Dialect

As per the narrative Marking Guide for Narrative Writing (NAP, 2010), the scores in writing skill achieved by Student A on ten different marking criteria are as follows:

The above scores reveal a systematic analysis of writing proficiency of Student A. Taking each of the ten different marking criteria into isolation, the observation drawn was as follows:

• Audience: The criteria delineates the capability of the writer to influence the reader by keeping him or her engaged and acclimatised throughout the literature. Student A was able to score 3 in a range between 0 and 6. Through the score it can be acknowledged that the student’s writing was detailed enough to cater to the ease of the reader’s understanding. The facts and figures were relevant to the context and consistent with the development of the story.
• Text Structure: It is the framework of the entire literature indicating its arrangement, compilation and the difficulty level. The student has managed to score 2 in a range between 0 and 4. It denotes the inconsistency of the problem or tension’s progression in the story thereby making it dull.
• Ideas: It forms the very essence from where the story originates. Student A was able to score 3 in a range between 0 and 5, which is indicative of the fact that his or her storyline was more or less consistent with the central context of the story. However, there were a few instances of unnecessary expansion.
• Character and Setting: It is a combination of two important aspects whereby the disposition and demeanour of the central character is portrayed with reference to the development of a physical backdrop. The student was able to acquire a score of 2 in a range between 0 and 4. It signifies that he or she was fairly able to create a character and setting through few meaningful descriptions of speech and feeling. However, the descriptions were not properly substantiated.
• Vocabulary: It is the range of words within the knowledge purview of the writer and his or her choice of application of such words based on the context. The student’s score of 2 in a range between 0 and 5 denotes the use of simple verbs and adjectives to define a situation.
• Cohesion: It is the firmness of plot exhibited through well-developed characters and the description of their relationships with each other as well as with the progression of the plot. The student was able to score 2 in a range between 0 and 4. It indicated that the links between different subplots was relatively ambiguous. However, lucidity of the flow of the plot helped the reader to gain some amount of understanding.
• Paragraphing: It denotes the segmentation of the entire narrative to aid the readers understanding of the subplots. The student had received a score of 0 that indicated the complete absence of paragraphs in his or her literature. The entire story was written in a single block without justified break ups.
• Sentence Structure: It refers to the technical correctness of a sentence with respect to grammar and meaning. The student had achieved a score of 3 in a range between o and 6 which signified that that student had fairly experimented with simple and complex sentences and had been able to explain their meaning properly.
• Punctuation: It is the use of full stop, comma, and semi-colon at proper places in the text to aid the reader’s understanding of the plot. The student had scored 2 in a range between 0 and 5 which indicates that the student had been able to punctuate the text fairly accurately.
• Spelling: It is the evaluation of the accuracy of words used in the text. The student’s score of 3 in a range between 0 and 6 denotes that he or she had mostly used simple form of words with correct suffixes and prefixes.

The above analysis provides a comprehensive overview of the implication of the Ten Marking Criteria aiding in the evaluation of a student’s ability and skill in narrative writing (Lingard, Thompson & Sellar, 2015). Each of the ten elements are core aspects of writing and therefore, the result provides an useful reference for the student’s further improvement as well as it brings about the strengths in his or her style of presenting the ideas in written narrative. However, there is a loophole in this marking criteria. It provides an overview rather than delving deeper into each of the aspects. This accounts for some level of difficulty for the teachers to take accurate pedagogical decisions (Hudson, Angelo & Ikeda, 2014).

Student A, being a part of the EAL/D community has limited literacy experience in English and needs to develop his or her skills in the written form of this language (Hammond, 2014). He or she has relatively more exposure in the oral version of this language owing to interaction with same-age peers in Australia. The student is examined by administering the standardize test of NAPLAN or the National Assessment Program- Literacy and Numeracy and is found to possess a relatively higher competence in Academic Language Skill than their corresponding social registers of English (Harris et al., 2013). The result of the evaluation of the student’s writing skills brought forth his or her strengths and weaknesses in this ability. The scores in Text Structure, Cohesion, Paragraphing and Character and Setting were comparatively lower indicating that he or she needs to focus more on maintaining a consistent pattern while developing the characters and setting with the need of the plot. The narrative had become inconclusive in parts with respect to establishing clear relations between the characters and the sub plots. Also, the entire narrative had been delivered in a single block without proper segmentation which lowered the quality of his or her anecdote. These are the few areas that Student A needs to work on for improving his or her writing skill.

Few recommendations that can be suggested towards improvement of an EAL/D learner, such as Student A’s writing skill would be implementation of the Mode Continuum (Liyanage, Singh & Walker, 2016). It is a useful technique that guides the learner to sequence activities such that he or she can make use of their oral ability to progress towards a more efficient written-like mode. It is considered to be one of the key features in improving written skills. Another useful practice that can be enforced by teachers to help Student A achieve the benchmark in writing skill is making use of the classroom observations to model a writing design which the student can use as a handbook for producing his or her own creative written texts (Turnbull, 2013).

Evaluation of Student A's Writing Skill

The difference in application of English as a written language and English as a spoken or oral language is considerably apparent (Adoniou, 2015). When an individual, whose home language is a dialect other than English, tries to communicate in the language orally, he or she does not have to acknowledge the conventions of spelling and punctuation. There is an appreciable amount of colloquial used which is expressed through hand gestures and paralanguage. However, in written English, the narrator needs to focus explicitly on the formal nature of the text. The sentences used are longer and more complex and the idea that drives the plot has to be straightforward, logical, cohesive and consistent to the context. In order to aid the EAL/D learners adapt higher efficiency in English written skill, teachers need to lend extensive support to them (Angelo, 2013).

The formative Assessment measures is a useful method directed towards overcoming the key concern of EAL/D learner, such as Student A, pertaining to written skill (Angelo, 2013). Formative Assessment refers to a diagnostic testing method, conceived by teachers, which seek to determine the progress of learners in a range of formal and informal educational activities. It helps in mapping that progression to see how soon the goal is reached. The recommendations for using such formative assessment methods include Classroom Ted Talk arranged by teachers wherein they can discuss elaborately on the specific issues in English writing skill faced by EAL/D Learners like Student A, create Multimedia Poster, Colour Cards, Sticky Note Annotation to encourage the students participate in interactive sessions on adaptability of Written English Skills (Bracken, Driver & Kadi-Hanifi, 2016). For Student A in particular, the issues faced concerned his or her ability to form clear links between the development of a character and a specific subplot. This problem of building comprehensive text structures can be overcome through compare and contrast feature of formative assessment (Clifford, Rhodes & Paxton, 2014). In this, the teacher offers a particular idea of a story to the student and the student is asked to identify another idea which has a stark contrast with that of the teacher’s and deliver the distinctly dissimilar aspects between the two ideas.

Conclusion

To conclude the above analytical description of an EAL/D learner’s ability of written English, it can be affirmed that such learners could be assisted in improving their competence with active support from their peers and teachers. Standardized tests like NAPLAN can be used to evaluate these learner’s level of proficiency in written English. With the scores thus achieved, the teachers can formulate guideline models, often based on formative assessment, to help student overcome their barriers and other areas of concern pertaining to acquiring skill in written English

References

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