Uncovering content and designing for performance.

Abstract

World language teaching continues to derive from coverage and low level skills, long after the Standards. Instructors and students are overwhelmed with what is taught rather than focusing on what true performance should look like in real world contexts. In light of ongoing research on assessment design practices, this paper outlines a design model that looks at cultural perspectives as sustained inquiry and the purpose for performance assessment evidence and skills.

Introduction

The Standards for foreign language learning, or 5Cs (National Standards in Foreign Language Education project, 1999/2006) of Communication, Culture, Connections, Comparisons, and Communities, are widely regarded as the cornerstone in the profession, typically discussed in methods courses and appearing on chart paper and lesson plans in schools. What is often found when working with teachers is evidence of disconnect between acknowledging the standards and practicing them. Teachers attempt to cover large portions of content, plan a lot of activities that may not address a performance goal, and consider assessment last.

Language acquisition implies understanding of cultural perspectives, practices, and ideas with the ability to respond appropriately and flexibly in varying contexts (Doughty & Long, 2003). Curriculum materials often do not guide teachers and learners to explore recursive concepts on cultural practices, perspectives, attitudes, or cultural response to a given topic, thus reinforcing an already myopic view of a culture. Unfortunately most materials offer cliched situations, formulaic drills, and cultural facts, yielding possible misinterpretations of different cultural groups. Furthermore, they seem to fall short in explaining performance assessment and do not assist teachers in design. Teachers can recite the standards and write them on lesson plans, but they often do not understand what the implications are for assessment. Most materials do not enable teachers to make the paradigm shift the standards require to make effective curriculum and assessment decisions (Eddy, 2006a). The lack of shift is a key reason why many teachers do not embrace performance based assessment, because they do not have the materials or training on the design process that will move them to think like an assessor, rather than an activity planner (Wiggins, 2006). Indeed, many teachers see instruction and assessment as distinct, investing energies in isolated and predictable skill practice, rather than planning for real world scenarios that demand flexibility and cultural perspective. The result is the language class assessed and taught the way it was prior to standards and performance based goals: textbook driven, coverage oppressed, and activity laden with no cultural anchor to cohere knowledge and skills, which remain decontextualized and memorized in isolation. The literature is rife with studies and suggestions for practical applications (Adair-Hauck & Pierce, Glisan and Foltz, 1998; Sousa, 2000; Wiggins, 1998). The premise behind their dormancy is the absence of established need for the paradigm shift, the training or development for it, and materials to assist teachers in designing for performance.

Methods

To examine the need for the shift, subsequent training, and materials development, diverse types of evidence were collected. Combining research methods and sources of data offer a range of perspectives, enabling multiple triangulation, deeper inquiry and often innovative design models (Denzin, 1997; Flick, 1992; Wiggins, 1998). Research is ongoing and in three phases: 1) teachers submit their current assessment system and curricula, 2) they identify and address a problem or issue by responding to input on curriculum, coverage issues, cultural perspectives, and assessment, in the dialogic inquiry process of Problem Posing (Bailey, 1996; Freire, 1978; Schleppegrell & Bowman, 1995), 3) they complete a survey, exploring questions on assessment practices and what the standards imply for curriculum and assessment. This research provides the data to ascertain the need for the paradigm shift, where the gaps are, what kind of development is required, and where key stakeholders already are on their path to curriculum and assessment design.

Analysis

The assessment systems and curricula are categorized and coded, resulting in identification of recurring themes, as are responses to various input, statements, and representations of performance assessment design (Allwright & Bailey 1991; Chaudron 1988; Nunan, 1990; Richards and Lockhart 1994; van Lier 1984; Wallace 1991) Data revealed entire assessment systems of discrete-point items, low-level skills, isolated facts and a lack of critical concepts representing cultural response to a given unit or universal idea. Oral tasks repeated words or questions, not demonstrative of a learner's ability to negotiate meaning in a real life situation. The few performance tasks that did require transfer of knowledge and skills (McTighe & Wiggins, 2004) were not considered "real" assessment by the teachers and not used to inform and improve student progress. Dialogic inquiry and reflection revealed questions and comments on assessment and unit design that suggest a divide between what teachers know and are able to do with the standards in terms of curriculum and assessment design. Discussed were common themes of covering huge amounts of material and students repeating the same content next year. Survey results thus far of K-12 foreign language teachers show that barely 50% can explain the national standards and only 37% say they use them to develop units and lessons. One-third of teachers design performance based assessments. Open-ended comments largely admit to scant professional development on performance assessment and curriculum design. This kind of assessment, although recommended by the profession, is misunderstood, coupled with inadequate professional development to make the important paradigm shift from tests of rote memorization to assessments that require transfer of culturally embedded concepts and flexible application of a language repertoire for use in the real world.

There is a need for curriculum design tools for creating performance based units and assessments which demonstrate learner understanding of cultural perspectives and practices. This design model uncovers content by unpacking the Culture standard first, then using the Communication standard as the assessment piece next. Only then can a teacher determine the knowledge, skills, and strategies needed for that assessment.

Working backward to move forward

This model adapts the framework "Backward Design" (Mc Tighe & Wiggins, 2001/2005). With this framework, instructors can unpack the standards with reasonable and challenging expectations for our students, moving from coverage without pity to performance with a tangible outcome (Eddy, 2006b). Backward Design (Understanding by Design) is a well-known design framework, appearing in professional development for many disciplines, but its adaptation to foreign language curriculum design and alignment to the Standards has not been done, until now. The basic tenets of Backward Design require instructors to begin planning with the goals and the end result in mind. This may seem obvious, but the idea is the reverse of how most educators plan their class. The textbook in the driver's seat of the foreign language course, a litany of activities, and assessment last is a common scenario, but it often leaves the instructor and student not knowing what the desired results are and why all of it was even taught. Students are left to guess what is important for a test and are only comfortable with questions phrased in a predictable and rehearsed manner, an expectation that is unrealistic outside the classroom.

Backward Design suggests that curriculum be designed by 1) identifying desired results, with key understandings, and inquiry in mind first, 2) determining evidence or assessments students will perform to demonstrate those results, and then finally 3) the teaching and resources to guide students toward the performance goal (Me Tighe & Wiggins, 2004). Because the assessment evidence is responsive to and demonstrative of the desired results set forth initially, the teacher has an honest account of what learners are able to do. This further informs practice, defining content and sequencing for subsequent classes and levels. Applied to language teaching and learning, these tenets lead specifically to the understandings we want learners to have and continue to build across the lifespan, and to what authentic performance should look like.

Uncovering Content

The Standards (National Standards, 1999/2006) are presented as Communication, Culture, Connections, Comparisons, and Communities. The Communication standard tends to be misunderstood as content, with Culture limited to facts or products. This model states that Communication determines the mode of assessment evidence, and as such is treated in stage two of backward design when performance assessment comes into play.

In this model the Culture standard comes first. Culture drives the curriculum, providing the focus for uncovering content and is stage one: Identify desired results. The questions to ask are: What do you want the learner to remember about the culture and this unit theme? How does your culture respond to ideas on family life, school, leisure time, or meal taking? If the topic was a story the people of the culture were telling, what would be the moral of that story? (Eddy, 2006a)

Grossman (1991) speaks of cultural literacy as deep understanding of cultural groups, not limited to tangible products of the culture, music, foods, holidays, etc., but including values, norms, and patterns: the practices and perspectives of a culture. Effective design provides an in-depth, long-term, and integrated cultural understanding within the curriculum (King, 1983). Critical thinking skills (Walsh, 1988) are essential to widening the cultural lens, encouraging flexibility, tolerance of ambiguity, willingness to change one's mind, and asking the why, who, when, where, and how of a culture. Culture often receives scant treatment because often teachers do not know what to do with the standard (not their fault) or just use it as filler or for fun activities that do not connect to a performance goal. Using the Culture standard of products, practices and perspectives, develop Enduring Understandings and Essential Questions by examining the "must-haves" or non-negotiables of a unit theme. The Culture standard helps us uncover recursive themes throughout a program and along the life-span of the learner, such as family life, leisure, health, and house and home. The Culture standard drives the curriculum, in that to develop enduring understandings, one will always ask what the target culture thinks, feels, says or how it responds culturally to a unit theme or concept (Eddy, 2006a): Food and Meal taking for example: Food and meal taking is more than eating a meal; it is a social event and an art form that comes from many cultural traditions. These understandings transfer to other topics and real life, offer implication and purpose for basic skills, and are written as the moral of the story (Me Tighe & Wiggins, 2001/2005). By addressing the Culture standard first and designing understandings and essential questions about that theme, three important things occur:

* The learner assigns purpose and coherence to the knowledge and skills one will need later for the assessment, rather than asking for recall of skills in isolation. Learners will remember material when it is connected to a theme that recurs, allowing them to transfer more readily the knowledge and skills acquired.

* The learner automatically engages the Standards of Comparison, Communities, and Connections which demonstrate the cultural interpretation of the unit theme. Cultural practices, products, and perspectives are revealed as learners uncover recurring themes over time, allowing for comparisons with their own cultures and application of this interdisciplinary content to real life contexts encountered outside the classroom. This further facilitates the assessment system because the best evidence of learner understanding will be with tasks which require learners to use their repertoire of knowledge and skills in situations they are likely to encounter in the target culture (Eddy, 2006a).

* The teacher focuses on what is truly worthy of understanding, the concepts, the "moral" of the story or lesson learned about the culture vis-a-vis that unit theme, allowing for careful decisions on what assessment will demonstrate that understanding. The enduring understandings and essential questions have tremendous implications for assessment. Teachers become more selective in terms of what knowledge and skills are required for that assessment, thus reducing the amount of unrelated material. When the teacher uncovers cultural understandings over a unit, the pressure of burdensome coverage that is the bane of textbook driven classes with repetitive item testing is relieved. The content and skills are there, but they have been carefully chosen to move the learner closer to understanding the concept that created the item, addressing the standard, and realizing a performance goal (Eddy, 2006a).

Designing for performance

The Communication standard determines the assessment mode, the performance evidence. Therefore, it is treated in Stage two of the backward design framework: Determine acceptable evidence. The Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA) prototype (Glisan, et. al., 2003) aids in the shift from rote memorization and four skills in isolation to authentic performance, moving learners through the three modes via tasks that connect to a common theme. The three modes of the Standard are:

Interpretive communication between student and culturally authentic materials; to discover appropriate cultural and/or linguistic meaning by listening, reading, and viewing material made by and for the culture, making connections between existing knowledge and new information. These tasks are not synonymous with translation.

Interpersonal communication between pairs or groups of students; to engage in active negotiation of meaning by listening, speaking, and writing in unrehearsed, spontaneous exchanges, using information from the previous interpretive mode task. Activities where students know in advance how they will respond as well as oral Q&A with grammar forms are not examples of Interpersonal communication.

Presentational communication involving a single student or groups of students; to create and present a piece orally or written that has been refined, rehearsed, or planned with some anticipation, such as reports, essays, surveys, poems, songs, journals, or plays. This design model aligns the IPA with the concept of transfer (Eddy, 2006b) and trains teachers to design tasks for transfer: Use of knowledge and skills in new or unanticipated situations and contexts (Mc Tighe & Wiggins, 2001/2005). Transfer requires inference and negotiation of meaning; not just amassing of facts and completing a drill. Without transfer, the language learner forgets, misunderstands a concept, or only knows it in the rigid, predictable context in which it was taught. Exemplary assessment design engages the learner in transfer tasks stripped of cues or reliance on repeated drill. Using a language appropriately in a given culture requires high adaptability, tolerance of new situations, dealing with incomplete information, and problem-solving with minimal or no cues, echoing the challenges people face using language outside the classroom. Assessments that most closely meet these criteria will be the best evidence of performance.

Conclusion

This article outlines a design model for world language teacher training. By examining varied types of data on curriculum and assessment practices, teachers have the tools to make the paradigm shift from coverage and memorization, to uncovering cultural inquiry within performance assessment design. Through this design, learners can move from predictable drills to real life tasks requiring flexibility within the practices and perspectives of the culture.

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Jennifer Eddy, Queens College, City University of New York 

Eddy, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of World Language Education and Vice President of the National Association of District Supervisors of Foreign Languages.