The Conundrum of Classroom Writing Assessment

This article highlights the need for reliable, valid, and fair assessment of writing performance by classroom teachers to balance large- scale literacy assessment initiatives that have taken root in most jurisdictions across Canada. While these initiatives have established a focus on writing instruction and assessment, there is a notion that large-scale assessment may not, by itself, provide an accurate reflection of students’ writing performance. It is important, therefore, for teachers to use effective assessment instruments, such as rubrics, to reliably, validly, and fairly determine how well their students write. The grading of written compositions through the use of rubrics can be effectively implemented by teachers with sufficient training whilst providing detailed student feedback. Classroom assessment of writing must therefore be coupled with professional development and teacher collaboration, which should lead to an improvement in student writing proficiency.