A Review of Research in the Field of Writing Performance Assessment

Comparing Native and Non-native Speaker Teachers’ Evaluation

Abstract

Writing performance assessment, thought as an authentic approach to assess the ability of language learners, has been studied considerably in the field of language assessment. However, rater variation argued as a potential weakness of writing performance assessment, especially rater language background is a factor that needs to be considered. The aim of this paper is to review studies which examined the differences between native and non-native speaker teachers’ evaluation of students’ writing. These differences can be categorized into two major types: rater severity and rater assessment perspective. Prior studies found that non-native speaker teachers were more severe than native speaker teachers in rating the whole essays. Furthermore, the perspective of rhetorical patterns and content between native and non-native speaker teachers was also found to be different. With a focus on raters’ assessment perspective, it is necessary to clarify whether rating essays in Japanese as a second language differ between native and non-native speaker teachers, by a method such as Think-Aloud approach.