THE USE OF STUDENTS’ SELF ASSESSMENT IN LEARNING MATHEMATICS

International Research Journal of Human Resources and Social Sciences Impact Factor- 2.561

Vol. 2, Issue 12, Dec 2015 ISSN(O): (2349-4085) ISSN(P): (2394-4218)

© Associated Asia Research Foundation (AARF)

THE USE OF STUDENTS’ SELF-ASSESSMENT IN LEARNING

MATHEMATICS

Cabasag Lota1, Garvida, Marc1, Zipagan Renante1

1

Faculty, Mathematics Department, College of Education-Laboratory High School,

Rizal Technological University

ABSTRACT

This research paper aimed to test the effectiveness of the use of students’

self-assessment in mathematics class. Two independent experiments were conducted to assess

whether the use of self-assessment as a form of formative assessment will be more effective in

terms of mathematics performance and mathematics attitude to the Grade eight students of

the Laboratory High School of Rizal Technological University during the school year

2014-2015. Two groups in each experiment were exposed to self-assessment while the other two

groups were exposed to an ordinary formative assessment method which is the conduct of

daily quizzes which is more of objective type.

It has been found that both formative assessment were equally effective in terms of the

mathematics performance but in terms of attitude level, the use of self-assessment is

statistically more effective. The performance of the students between the controlled and

experimental group is not significantly different due to attribution theory and the maturity

level of the respondents.

It is recommended to teachers to vary their assessment and consider self-assessment as part

of their formative assessment strategy in mathematics especially to a more mature group of

students. It is also important to develop more standardized self-assessment for teachers and

use more books that are rich in self-assessment exercises.

Keywords: Self-assessment, formative assessment, mathematics performance, mathematics

Introduction

Assessment practices have started to change over the last several years with teachers

building a larger repertoire of assessment tools and strategies. There is a greater

understanding of the importance of timely assessments for learning as well as regular

assessments of learning.

Assessment is commonly used as means to evaluate students’ performance and thus

students sometimes may likely to study only for the sake of passing the exam and not driven

by internal desire to learn it because it is a must.

One type of assessment that has been shown to raise students’ achievement

significantly is student self-assessment (Chappuis & Stiggins, 2002; Rolheiser & Ross, 2001).

A self-assessment is the process by which the student gathers information about and reflects

on his or her own learning. It is the student’s own assessment of personal progress in

knowledge, skills, processes, or attitudes. Self-assessment leads a student to a greater

awareness and understanding of himself or herself as a learner” (Ministry of Education, 2013,

p. 3).

That is why the authors of this paper prompted them to investigate the effectiveness of

the self-assessment to the grade eight students of the Laboratory High School.

Statement of the Problem

It is the purpose of this study to determine the effect of self-assessment in improving

the performance of the 8th grade students of the Laboratory High School

Specifically, the study sought to find answers to the following research questions:

1. What is the performance of the students in the pre and posttest?

2. Is there a significant difference between the performance of the controlled and

experimental groups?

3. What is the attitude level of the respondents in the pre and post test?

4. Is there a significant difference between the attitudes of the controlled and

experimental groups?

Hypotheses

The following hypotheses were tested:

1. There is no significant difference between the respondents’ performance of the

2. There is no significant difference between the respondents’ attitude of the controlled

and experimental groups

Scope and Delimitation of the Study

The respondents of this study were purposively chosen based on the results of the test

and a five-point-scale checklist administered to all the four blocks of grade eight students of

the Laboratory High School during the school year 2013-2014.

The result of this study is limited to the result of the validated pre and post test

administered as a primary basis for students’ performances prior and after the treatment.

Conceptual Framework

This study is backed by the theory of self-regulation. Under this theory, students tend

to be more productive and will likely to improve on their endeavor when they are personally

aware of their own strengths and limitations in learning. Thus, the assumption is through

self-assessment wherein students are given the opportunity to be self-aware of their own learning,

the outcome will likely to occur significantly positive in the both performance and in attitude

as illustrated in the foregoing model.

Figure 1

Conceptual Model

1.3 Studies of Self-Assessment and Rubric Use

Having examined the theoretical arguments, the question of empirical evidence arises.

Several studies of the effectiveness of student self-assessment have been undertaken. One

such study by Olina and Sullivan (2002) investigated the effect of teacher- and

self-evaluation on student learning and self-efficacy of 189 Latvian high school students and their

6 teachers in science classrooms. Using ratings of student projects, posttest scores, student

attitude surveys, and teacher attitude surveys, Olina and Sullivan compared the learning gains

Mathematics

Performance

Mathematics

Attitude

Formative Assessment



Self-assessment

of three groups of students: a teacher-evaluation condition, a self-plus-teacher evaluation

condition, and a no-evaluation condition. The results were interesting. Students in the

teacher- and self-plus-teacher-evaluation groups outperformed students in the no-evaluation

group, as expected. However, the effect produced on student attitudes provides great

evidence for the benefits of self-assessment. Although students in the no-evaluation group

reportedly enjoyed conducting experiments more than the other students, Olina and Sullivan

report that ―students in the self-plus-teacher evaluation group had greater confidence about their ability to independently conduct experiments in the future than the other two groups‖ (p.

19). This lends credibility to theories of assessment leading to greater student

self-efficacy.

Another notable study was conducted by Andrade, Wang, Du, and Akawi (2009) on

the relation between long- and short-term rubric use (including assessment) and

efficacy for writing by 268 elementary and middle school students. Although average

self-efficacy ratings of all condition groups increased over time, Andrade, et al. reported a greater

increase in self-efficacy of girls in the treatment group (using rubrics to check their work)

than in the control group. The effect of the rubrics on self-efficacy of boys appeared to be

statistically insignificant. To explain these results, the authors relied on research on

attribution theory stating:

[G]irls tend to be more concerned with mastering a writing task than do boys,

who, on average, tend to be more concerned with showing someone else that

they are capable. Our findings regarding the differences in increases in

self-efficacy after self-assessment may reflect these different achievement goals:

Girls may derive more satisfaction and confidence from self-generated

evidence of progress on a writing assignment than do boys, who seek

confirmation of progress from others, including perhaps their teachers and

peers. (Andrade, et al., 2009, p. 296)

Thus, the researchers concluded, self-assessment shielded female students from

―potentially debilitating effects of negative adult feedback‖ (p. 296). This may have led girls

to attribute shortcomings to effort, not inherent ability, which allowed them to see how they

could improve. This, in turn, led to increased self-efficacy ratings. ―The boys in the study,

however, might have been less influenced by the presence of the rubric because they placed

less value on their own feedback‖ (p. 296).

A quasi-experimental pre and posttest method of research with pre and posttest

matched group design was used in this study. In this design, two groups are pre tested and

matched in terms of certain variables and as in this study, gender and the performance in the

pre-test (Calderon, 2013). One group, called the treatment group, was exposed to the use of

self-assessment while the other group, called the control group, was exposed to the

conventional formative assessment which is the daily quizzes. After the experimental period

which covers the whole grading period, the two groups were given the same test covering the

subject matter studied during the period (post test). In this study, two experiments were

conducted by two different teachers. The four blocks of the grade eight students were handled

by two teachers with two blocks each. Two experiments were made so as to verify and

compares results for a more valid conclusions. In has been ensured that all other variables

except the independent variable were kept constant or equal during the experimental period.

The excess of the achievement of both groups between the pre and posttest will be attributed

to the assessment method and the excess of the achievement of the experimental group over

the achievement of the control group is attributed to the experimental factor. The matched

group experimental design was employed so as to eliminate one variable which is the

sectioning which was believed that may affect the result of the experiment.

Population and Sample Size

The following table shows the number of samples taken from this study.

Table1

Distribution of the Respondents of the Study

Groups No. of

Students

No. of

Samples

with match

Experiment A Section Amethyst Treatment 1 34 19

Section Tourmaline Controlled 1 34 19

Experiment B Section Opal Treatment 2 35 16

Section Onyx Controlled 2 34 16

Table 1 shows the distribution of the respondents. The numbers of students enrolled in

each section or blocks are almost the same, however, 19 pairs or 55.88% were obtained in

were in terms of gender and the pre-test performance of the students which was administered

prior to the experimentation.

Sampling Technique

The sampling technique used in this study was a purposive sampling technique. The

purposive sample is selected from a population by an arbitrary method. This method is

decided on the basis of available information thought to be representative of the total

population or by intuition on the basis of criteria deemed to be self-evident (Macaballug,

2009). This kind of sampling is a probability sampling and therefore subjected to a

non-parametric test.

Description of Respondents

The respondents of the study are grade 8 students of the Laboratory High School

during the school year 2013-2014. The grade 8 respondents with a matched in the experiment

were included in the study.

Research Instrument

The primary instruments used in this study are the assessment tools used by the

teachers in their day to day conduct of the lesson. Among which are the samples of questions

and rubrics which were used by the students to self-assess their own work which are

individual, pairs or groups.

Another instrument was the pre and posttest which were validated through item

analysis. The pre and posttest is parallel test covering the same content and level of difficulty.

The pretest was one of the researchers’ bases in matching the respondents while the posttest

served as basis for the performance of the respondents.

The attitude scale was used to determine the respondents’ attitude in math class.

Attitude scale is of five parts namely the: selecting a math class with five indicators; time and

place for studying with six indicators; study strategies for the class with eleven indicators;

math test with seven indicators; and anxiety with four indicators. Two equivalent set of this

scale was made which were also parallel one which was administered prior to the experiment

while the other one was administered after the experiment.

Statistical Treatment of Data

Since the data was obtained from a non-random sampling, the statistical tool used is a

whether significant difference exist between two independent groups, the Wilcox on

Rank-Sum Test will be used. This is a counterpart of a t-test in the parametric test. Also mean and

standard deviation were also used to describe the performance and attitude of the students.

The performance scale can be interpreted through the following arbitrary values:

Score Verbal interpretation

0-10 Unsatisfactory (US)

11-20 Fair Satisfactory (FS)

21-30 Satisfactory (S)

31-40 Very Satisfactory (VS)

41-50 Outstanding (O)

Also, the following arbitrary scale will be used to describe the attitude level of the

respondents.

Score Verbal interpretation

4.21-5.00 Strongly Agree -Very High

3.41-4.20 Agree - High

2.61-3.40 Fair - Average

1.81-2.60 Disagree -Low

1.0-1.80 Strongly Disagree - Very Low

Results and Discussions

Table 2

Mean Performance and Standard Deviations of the respondents in the Pre and Post

Test Groups Before Treatment After the Treatment Difference

Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD

Experiment A Treatment 1 20.87(FS) 3.79 27.13 (S) 6.41 6.26 -2.62 Controlled

1

20.87(FS) 3.79 28.6(S) 4.54 7.73 0.75

Experiment B Treatment 2

19.4(FS) 2.87 26.33(S) 6.33 6.93 -3.46

Controlled 2

19.2(FS) 2.83 24(S) 5.07 4.8 -2.24

Table 2 displays the mean and standard deviations of the two experiments conducted. In all of

the four groups, an increase in the mean are observed. Difference among the pre and posttest

are 6.26 and 7.73 in Experiment A while 6.33 and 5.07 in experiment B. This remarkable

increase in the mean implies that after the grading period in which the teacher discussed the

lesson, there is indeed a positive change in the performance whether or not a treatment was

made.

It implies that a traditional form of assessment and the self-assessment are both effective

assessment strategy. It is therefore undeniably claimed that the traditional assessment form is

by giving only quizzes is still indispensible.

Table 3

Difference between Performances of the Respondents in the Post Test

Groups

Mean Computed

t-value Critical Value Interpretation Experiment A

Treatment 1 27.13

166.5 123 No Difference

Controlled 1 28.6

Experiment

B

Treatment 2 26.33

96 83 No Difference

Controlled 2 24

Table 3 shows the corresponding computed and critical values of the two groups in each of

the experiment. The computed values of 166.5 and 96 are less than the critical value of 123

difference between the performance of students who are exposed to the use of

self-assessment and those that are not. It further implies that the use of self-self-assessment is better

than the traditional one.

Table 4

Difference between Respondents Attitude before and after the Treatment

Groups

Before

Treatment

After the

Treatment

Difference

WM Int. WM Int. Mean

Experiment A Treatment 1 3.41 High 4.8 V. High 1.39

Controlled 1 3.41 High 4.69 V. High 1.28

Experiment B Treatment 2 3.30 Average 3.99 High 0.69

Controlled 2 3.50 Average 3.87 High 0.37

Table 4 displays the students’ means and corresponding verbal interpretations of the

attitude level. Experiment A and B in both the controlled and experimental group mark a

significant change positively in their attitude as reflected from the mean difference of 1.39,

1.28, 0.69 and 0.37, respectively.

This change in the attitude might be the influence of the assessment employed by the

teacher.

Table 5

Difference between the Attitude of the Treatment and Controlled Group after the

Experiment

Groups

WM Computed

t-value

Critical

Value

Interpretation

Experiment

A

Treatment 1 4.67

119 123 There is a

difference Controlled 1 4.96

Experiment

B

Treatment 2 3.99

79.95 83 There is a

Table 5 shows the computed and critical values of the experiments. The computed

values are less than the critical values, thus rejection of the null hypothesis is rejected, and

therefore, there is a significant difference between the groups of students who are exposed to

the use of self assessment than those who are not.

This is the same with the findings of the other researcher (e.g. Olina and Sullivan

(2002)), wherein groups who were exposed to the use of self –assessment outperformed the

grouped which are not exposed.

Conclusions

1. Self-assessment and the traditional formative strategy such as giving daily quizzes are

both effective

2. The grade 8 students of the Laboratory High School improved their performance in

mathematics

3. The use of self – assessment does not directly increased mathematics performance

however it does affect in the attitude.

Recommendations

1. Encourage teachers to vary their assessment strategies and include self-assessment

strategy

2. Conduct trainings and seminars to teachers pertaining to the preparation of self

assessment , administering and scoring of self-assessment

3. Create modules, books and other instructional materials which are rich in

self-assessment activities.

References

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black box: Assessment for learning in the classroom. Phi Delta Kappan.

Ministry of Education, (2006) A guide to effective instruction in

Mathematics,k-8,volume 4. Toronto, Assessment and home connections. ON: Queen’s Printer for

Ontario.

Olina , Z & Sullivan, H.J. (2002) Effects of teacher and self assessment on student

performance. Paper presented atthe annual convention of the American

Education Research Association, April 1-5,2002, New Orleans ,LA.

Rolheiser, C., &Ross, J. (2001) Student self-evaluation : What research says and

what practice show. Retrieved December 28, 2014 from

http://www.cdl.org/resource-library/articles/selfeval.php.

Stiggins, R., & Chapuis, J (2006) What a difference a word makes: Assessmenmt

FOR learning Rather than assessment OF learning helps student succed.

Journal of Staff Development.

Stiggins, R. (2008). An introduction to student-involved assessment FOR learning.