Assessment and Autonomy in Language Learning

While assessment and autonomy are areas that have been extensively explored in relation to EFL and foreign language learning in general, the nature of the relationship between the two has not been given the coverage that one might expect. This book examines this contested relationship from a number of perspectives in a variety of Higher Education language-learning contexts in Europe and the Far East. The contributors to the book, all teacher-researchers with direct experience of the issues and challenges involved, describe research into assessment both for and as autonomy, as well as approaches to the assessment of autonomy itself. The chapters explore how assessment can be used to promote and increase autonomy through learner involvement in assessment processes. Addressing a range of challenges to both autonomy in assessment and the assessment of autonomy, the book also provides practical models, tools and techniques for putting these ideas into practice, which can be adapted to other teaching contexts beyond language learning.

Carol Everhard is an independent researcher and formerly a Teaching Fellow in the Department of Linguistics, School of English, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, where she coordinated and taught undergraduate Language Mastery and Self-access Language Learning courses. Her research interests include learner autonomy, self-access, learner-centred assessment and idiomatic language, areas in which she has published.
 

Linda Murphy is an independent researcher and formerly Senior Lecturer in the Department of Languages at the Open University, UK, where she is a part-time consultant for the OU Doctorate in Education. Her research and publications focus on learning and teaching strategies and teacher development to support motivation, self-direction and autonomy in the distance/blended language learning context.

Foreword; Phil Benson
Introduction; Carol J. Everhard and Linda Murphy
1.The Assessment-Autonomy Relationship; Carol J. Everhard
2.Measuring Language Learner Autonomy: Problems and possibilities; Fumiko Murase
3.Assessing Learner Autonomy: A Dynamic Model; Maria-Giovanna Tassinari
4.Assessment as Learner Autonomy; Lucy Cooker
5.Investigating Peer- and Self-assessment of Oral Skills as Stepping-stones to Autonomy in EFL Higher Education; Carol J. Everhard
6.Autonomy in Assessment: Bridging the Gap between Rhetoric and Reality in a Distance Language Learning Context; Linda Murphy
Epilogue; Sara Cotterall and Diane Malcolm