Impact of Constructed Participation Assessment to Evaluate Student Participation

This manuscript explored the impact of using formative grade assessment for participation in university undergraduate basic EFL conversation course. Generally, teaching staff seldom create rubrics that assess students’ performance in order to grade their course participation. Most instructors rely solely on observations and subjective participation assessment and often link participation to attendance. This study explored the formative participation grading assessment rubric created by two instructors for a Korean university undergraduate basic EFL conversation course. For this purpose, a survey instrument was developed to investigate the impact on the individual learner and the overall effect of course participation and its assessment rubric. The study confirmed students’ view that participation is an essential aspect of course evaluation, and it offered insight for instructors into course engagement and assessment. It was found that students’ academic self-efficacy was closely correlated to course engagement both for in- and out-of-class activities, elimination of teacher bias could be largely resolved through negotiation and clarification, and that instructors should bear in mind attendance, especially the management of non-attendance when assessing course participation. Implications for future follow-up studies on course participation and participation assessment rubric were also detailed. (176 words)