Disorderly Contexts: ELAC Conference 2024

In this session, participants will be given access to a scenario-based formative assessment platform we have designed to measure students' rhetorical problem-solving skills. The assessment platform is mapped onto a sociocognitive model of writing we have derived from a systematic review of more than 100 empirical studies on expertise and skills in writing and measures 7 domains of expertise in writing: metacognitive knowledge, critical discourse knowledge, discourse community knowledge, rhetorical aim knowledge, genre knowledge, communications task process knowledge, and substantive knowledge. Items in the platform focus on each of these 7 domains. This enables us to provide students with feedback on both the cognitive/metacognitive profile, and on their writing performance.  As students see the relationship between the two, they can gain an understanding of how gaining expertise in each of these domains can impact their success as writers.  After experiencing some of the modules in the platform, participants will be invited to discuss the ways in which this assessment is different from, and similar to, the assessments they use in their own classrooms. We will close with a discussion of the implications of this work for the teaching and assessment of writing.