その他

Peer and self evaluation in spoken English:
The views of first and second years in a nursing college
David Evans
National College of Nursing, Japan：1-2-1 Umezono, Kiyose-shi, Tokyo, 〒 204-8575, Japanevans@adm.ncn.ac.jp【Abstract】 This paper reports the views of ﬁrst and second year students at a nursing college on their experiences with peer and self evaluation.
The students were asked to award two grades to each student, one for a role play on nursing English with a partner chosen of their choosing, and one
for an unprepared dialogue on everyday English with a partner drawn by lots. Their views on the experience of peer and self-evaluation were
canvassed through an optional questionnaire. A brief review of previous testing styles and the relevant literature are discussed, before the studentsʼ
responses to the questionnaire are discussed. The students, on the whole, found peer evaluation to be enjoyable and helpful in developing theirEnglish speaking abilities. First years were less conﬁdent than second years both in their ability to evaluate and in performing before their peers, but
a signiﬁcant majority appreciated the experience. Self-evaluation was also viewed positively, and both will be amended and continued with in the
future.

【Keywords】 Peer evaluation，Self Evaluation，Student feedback
Introduction

between a teacher and a student（Bailey, 1998; Kormos, 1999）.
Furthermore, interviews also seemed to be too stressful for

Over the last nine years the author has been on a journey toweaker students.

reach the best way of evaluating spoken English at a JapaneseConsequently, this was then abandoned in favour of using

college. Direct testing, as recommended by Hughes（1989）has

groups of four as this should be sufficient for more natural

been central to all the testing performed, and as Heaton

dialogue（Underhill, 1987; Hughes, 2002）and students were（1988:89）says ʻoral tests can have an excellent backwash effectable to choose the topic for discussion from a wide selection,on the teaching that takes placeʼ as the teacher strives to improve

which should also have beneﬁtted students（Jennings et al.,1999）.

on how the students learn. Furthermore, if the aim is to test

It was certainly less intimidating for weaker students, students

communication, the pressure of time that comes when speaking

did need to interact more and were required to ask questions, but（Brazil, 1995）can not be replicated in a written test.

the main failing was that it enabled weaker students to do theInitially students were evaluated in face to face individualinterviews with the teacher. There were some advantages to thisbare minimum, and stronger students were more reluctant tospeak for fear of exposing the shortcomings of classmates.

style, ﬁrst and foremost being that the best students excelled as

The next change was to have students in pairs and to pairbeing on their own enabled them to display the full range ofthem according to ability, so that they would be of similar levels.

their abilities; something which is not the case in paired or group

Again this worked well for those who were accomplished atinterviews as the better students then feel they must speak in

speaking English, but it felt as though putting the weakersimple English for their peers. It is also the easiest speaking test

students together stigmatised them and became self-fulfilling.

in which to replicate the same conditions as a teacher can control

The following year students were allowed to choose partners andwhat they ask and say, making it as consistent as such a test canthough this eased the problem of compatibility, it meant that thebe. The weaknesses were that an interview can become astronger individual would do the majority of the speaking, and it

question and answer session as Madsen（1983）warns, and that

became too easy for the weaker students. It also became

the usual dynamics of a conversation（Cornbleet and Carter,

apparent that some students would memorize chunks of dialogue2001）cannot be achieved because of the power difference

and shoe-horn them into any topic thus defeating the purpose of

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the test, so the following year paired interviews were performed

Both courses involve a large amount of speaking practice.

to prevent memorization. In the same year, a new fourth year

Pair-work is the most common method of practice, thoughelective class began and peer and self evaluation werestudents do also work in groups of three and in larger groups on

experimented with（Evans, 2008）and as it seemed to be aoccasion.
As all the students have studied English at high school for 6

success it has been gradually introduced with younger students
in compulsory English courses.

years, the main goal of the class is to get the students to turn

The attempt at self-evaluation by using grades was soon

their passive knowledge into active usage so that the students

abandoned as the 4th year students conspicuously under-marked

speak. As Richards（1993）notes, speaking is generally the poor

and an early trial with 2 years showed some doing the same

relation in English study, though this is being graduallyand others over-marking, so it was replaced with self-evaluation

addressed through the use of a listening test in the centre exam.

in written comments rather than as part of the grade. Peer

One of the most common activities is for students to practice a

evaluation was continued with, but unlike the 4th year students

particular topic or function by walking around the room talking

who evaluated each otherʼs class work and a presentation, theseto as many different students as possible in the time allowed.

students evaluated a role-play between a nurse and patient andThis is unmonitored so that students can experiment with thean unprepared timed dialogue. The studentsʼ grades accounted

English language. By changing the partner students can becomefor 50% of the ﬁnal grade, the remainder being determined bymore fluent in saying what they have said once already but

the teacher, who as Underhill（1987）points out, will know thewithout the same person having to hear it twice. The otherstudentʼs English level better than anyone, save for the student.

person in the pair also hears two different voices and answers, asndThis paper examines the opinions of the students towards peer
and self-evaluation as any problem areas will be improved next

well as interacting with someone new, which keeps the practiceinteresting.

year so that the experience of the test-takers is enhanced（Alderson et al.,1995; Boud, 1995）.

The activities are relatively straightforward, such as asking
your partner about the weekend, plans for the holidays, andother common topics. Students might be given some preparation

Methods

time if the task is particularly challenging, but usually they are
not as the aim is to improve fluency. Students associate thisThe students and the classes

activity with peer assessment, when in fact it is only a teaching

The students who responded to the questionnaire are ﬁrst andtechnique.

second years at a nursing college. There are 100 students in eachStudents will do more conventional pair work with the person

year, and the classes are divided into 4 classes of 25 whensitting next to them, and though the teacher does request

college begins. They are not streamed, but divided according tostudents not to always work with the same person, most of thisthe starting letter of the surname. The classes will be referred towork is done with a friend. They are encouraged to be ambitious

as 1:1 and 1:2 for the ﬁrst years, and 2:1 and 2:2 for the secondin what they say and not to worry about making mistakes.

years. There are two teachers, the author, an English native and aStudents can be ʻfrightenedʼ of speaking English as in their

Japanese native. Each teacher has two classes of 25 in the ﬁrst

previous experiences; English is ʻrightʼ or ʻwrongʼ, rather thanyear, and this is repeated in the second year, except that thesimply a means of communication. The teacher will occasionallyclasses are swapped.

point out a class mistake but individual correction is postponed

The first year students study general English from a regular

until English becomes an elective subject.

English textbook（Helgesen et al.1995）with some nursing

As all the students are training to be nurses, testing nursing

English added in the form of handouts, whereas the second years

English and the technical language involved is important andstudy nursing English from a nursing English textbook（Chinen,

real for the students（Douglas, 2000）.

2001）, with some everyday English added in the form ofhandouts. The focus of all classes is on communicative spoken

Test preparation

English.

At the end of the summer term, and a week before the realClasses are 90 minutes in length and in both semesters there

test, students did practice tests in both years. In addition to this,are 7 classes. The classes within each year are as near asﬁrst years had dummy tests mid-way through each term. This is

identical as is possible, as the book, the lesson plan and theimportant as without practice, such an exam would be tooteacher are the same. The students are predominantly female.

demanding（Angelo & Cross, 1993; Cohen, 1994）. The teacher− 29 −J Nurs Studies NCNJ Vol. 9 No. 1 2010

also took in the practice grading sheets from students to see thatthey could opt out of having their comments used in research.

they had correctly understood what to do. The most common

Seven ﬁrst year students did so, but no second years, althoughproblems were that students did not use a sufficiently widesome second years did not return the questionnaire.

range, rendering the grades redundant and did not make subtle
Resultsenough distinctions between students; using 0 and 5 as in 80, 85
and not those in between. Students also ﬁlled in self-evaluation

1 Have you enjoyed doing peer evaluation?

forms during the year.
The exam
The exam format was the same for both 1st and 2nd years. It
was a spoken exam taken in pairs and consisting of a preparednursing dialogue of up to 3 minutes in length, and an unprepared2 minute conversation. For the nursing dialogue students roleplayed a nurse-patient interaction. They chose their partner forthis dialogue. The teacher had hoped that students would agree

NO
1
（
1:1
2 8%）
（
1:2
1 4%）
Total 3
（6%）
（
2:1
0 0%）
（
2:2
2 8%）
Total （
2 5%）
All
（
5 5%）

YES
2
3
4
5
（
3 12%） （4 17%） （9 38%） （6 25%）（
4 17%） （9 39%） （7 31%） （2 9%）7（15%） 13（28%） 16（34%） 8（17%）（
6 32%） （5 26%） （8 42%） （0 0%）（（ 42%） （3 12%） （5 21%） 10
4 17%）（21%） 109（23%） 18（42%） 4（9%）16（18%） 23（26%）34（38%）12（13%）

on an outline for their dialogue and then trust themselves toTaken as a whole the ﬁrst years are broadly in favour of peer

improvise but most did learn the dialogues by heart. The

evaluation, though not overwhelmingly so. An interesting

students drew lots to determine the order.

difference emerges between the two classes, with more students

Each pair performed their dialogue to the class, and each pairin 1:1 class awarding peer evaluation a rating of 4 or 5. Thiswas evaluated by both the teacher and the watching students. As

might well be due to the ʻmood makerʼ impact of particularly

well as entering a grade, students wrote comments. Once the last

positive students which seems to influence others（Norcini,pair ﬁnished, the students handed in their assessment sheet to the

2003）
.

teacher and had a ﬁfteen minute break.

As with the ﬁrst years, the second years are broadly in favour

For the second dialogue the first question to begin theof peer evaluation, and similarly, there is a noticeably moredialogue was written on the blackboard 5 minutes before the test

positive response from one class, class 2:2. Again, this can bebegan so that students could have an idea of what they would

attributed to ʻmood makersʼ who positively inﬂuence their peers.

talk about but not be able to learn it by heart. The pairs were2 What did you enjoy or not enjoy about it?

drawn at random from a bag.
Before the test began, the students were advised to judge the

The first years most commonly mentioned ʻlistening toﬁrst few pairs more sympathetically as they were disadvantaged

classmatesʼ, ʻgetting to know classmatesʼ, and ʻtalking to myby going first. The students were also reminded not to see thefriendsʼ. These have been grouped together as they all involve

students as a pair but as individuals. They were encouraged to

the notion of bonding. There were 22 mentions of this by ﬁrst

try and differentiate in their grading as much as possible. The

year students in comparison with only 8 by second years. The

aim of the questionnaire was to find out how the students felt

following are quotes from students.

about self and peer evaluation and to identify any problems so

I could listen to many friends’ opinions and conversation, so I

that they could be addressed in future years. There are 12

enjoyed it.

questions in total which are a mixture of Likert scale selections

I could make friends with people I wouldn’t normally speak（percentages, where given, have been rounded up）and guided

with.

responses in which students could write what they wished in
response to a question.

Listening to classmates is something that the students always
excel at, and for ﬁrst years peer evaluation gave them an early
opportunity to know about their peers.

Ethical considerations

It was interesting to hear my friend’s English –it was very

Approval from the ethics committee was obtained in 2008. At

beneficial to me.

the beginning of the year the students were told that there wouldThis comment illustrates not only the positive effect ofbe peer evaluation（50% of the final grade comes from peer

listening to peers but also how it allows students to learn from

evaluation and 50% from the teacher）. The students were asked

each other（Luoma, 2004）and to rank themselves within a

to ﬁll in the questionnaire after the grading was completed butclass. For more competitive students this can be beneﬁcial.

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I enjoy dialogues they’re very interesting- I could get to know

objective when grading close friends.

my friends well.

Peer evaluation is difficult for me, because everyone is good,but I am not good. I found making the range difficult.

There were some other isolated comments which wereencouraging about the beneﬁts peer evaluation.

This is a perennial problem with peer evaluation, and one thatAt first I was very shy but finally I could speak before otheris difficult to overcome. Weak students, if they are evaluating

students.

other students, can not know if their inability to understand is

Making conversations in public is difficult but enjoyable.

due to the high level of the speakers or not.

These comments show that by being exposed to public
speaking students gradually overcome their fears and reticence.

The other most commented on problem was that of writing in
English.

This is beneﬁcial not just for their English but for their general

It was a bother. I don’t have the vocabulary, so don’t write thedevelopment.

things I think.

I enjoyed speaking to many friends but in public, I was very

I don’t have English knowledge, so I couldn’t enjoy speaking

nervous.

English and writing comments.

Making dialogues was interesting, but talking in class wasThis is a minor problem of not having sufficient English tonerve-wracking.

write comments, but it is problematic for weaker students. Some

The above comments show that it needs to be approachedstudents are remarkably adept at pinpointing a strength or

sensitively, and for the atmosphere in the class to be as non-weakness, and some also felt that writing in English improved

threatening as possible.

their ability.

The most common difﬁculties for ﬁrst years all related to the

One interesting dissenting opinion is written below.

assessing of other students. Some felt that placing students

I didn’t enjoy being compared with my classmates.

within a range was difﬁcult, others felt grading friends was, andIn peer evaluation, as opposed to individual interviews, it issome felt unprepared for writing comments.

much more obvious that a student is being compared to his or

Making a score is very difficult. I don’t know a lot of words, so

her peers whereas in an individual interview this is not apparent

I hardly comment, but I listen intently to the dialogues.

to the test-taker, even though the interviewer will be doing so.

Difficult to judge because I put scores just by my impression

For the second years the most common response was that theyof the speaker-I’m not sure if it’s reliable or not. Basically I

had enjoyed the speaking aspect of the test. Some were pleased

enjoyed being like the teacher.

that it was a spoken test rather than a written one, others that

The students award an impressionistic grade, and thethey could do ʻfree talkingʼ（the non-prepared test）and others

comments they write reveal the criteria they adopt. This means

because they learnt about their friends. There were 16 comments

they use those measures they feel comfortable using. As Luoma

in total along these lines.

（2004）says, students are not able to evaluate linguistic criteria

Thinking in a conversation is interesting.

reliably so it is best if they chose areas in which they feelAbove is one of the more encouraging comments, which

competent.

shows a student who is beginning to make a break through in

One other important beneﬁt of peer evaluation is hinted at inconversation, and has reached a stage where talking without

the last comment. By ʻbeing teacherʼ students begin to develop

preparation is no longer intimidating but enjoyable. The

their critical faculties, and this should lead to them becomingcomment below is less effusive, but gives cause for hope.

more efﬁcient learners of English（Race et al., 2005）. Not only

I don’t like speaking English, but it was a good experience.

do they analyse what makes one student successful or

That a student who is not an English enthusiast should see theunsuccessful, but they also, if they practice giving feedback,beneﬁts of peer evaluation is very encouraging.

develop the skills necessary for their future lives as leaders, intelling others how they need to improve.

Another comment highlighted a different beneﬁt of doing peer
evaluation.
I talked about many things and I could become confident.

A further benefit is that they can actually use what otherstudents say. If one says ʻBy the wayʼ to change the topic, they
can copy it.

As with many things, ʻpractice makes perfectʼ or at least it
takes away the fear factor and develops the studentsʼ conﬁdence.

I enjoy speaking to my friends in English in this class on many

The comment below shows that such a way of testing also can

topics, but I didn’t enjoy scoring my friends in a test.

appeal to high achievers and competitive students.

Only two students mentioned this, but for some it is hard to be− 31 −

I could listen to many original dialogues.

J Nurs Studies NCNJ Vol. 9 No. 1 2010

Both for the nursing dialogue and the unprepared dialogue

This comment shows the difﬁculty in doing peer evaluation,

each interaction is unique, and so holds the interest of the

but also shows the evolving thought processes that peer

audience.

evaluation triggers. Students are advised to listen to the ﬁrst 3

As for the negative points, eight students said they lacked thepairs before awarding a grade so that they can have someskill to do peer evaluation. As with the first years, this is acontext into which to decide the marks. The ﬁrst marks that you

deﬁnite problem with peer evaluation.

award ʻframeʼ the range that you will use, so it is important toI have no ability to evaluate other people-I didn’t enjoy it.

become skilled at this. By doing frequent practices throughout

Another comment similar to one from the ﬁrst years is that it

the year, students should ﬁnd this less difﬁcult（Dudley-Evansis all too much effort. Certainly, a more uniformed, positive& St. John, 1998）.

reaction is likely from an elective class, but some dissent is

The difficult thing is scoring precisely.

inevitable.

To make the difference between 1 or 2 points. Sometimes I was

I thought to talk to all my classmates is a bother.

confused-who is better than whom.
As the comments here show, it is very difficult to make a
distinction of 1 or 2 points in a hundred, but the process of doing

3 Did you feel able to do peer evaluation reasonably well?
NO
1

2

3

4

YES

so makes the students think carefully as to what they think5

makes a good speaker. In terms of the final grade such ast

1 years （2 4%）（ 24%） 20（ 41%） 14（ 29%） （12
1 2%）

difference for one marker is insignificant when there are 24

2 years （1 2%）（（ 38%） 14（ 33%） （6 14%） 16
5 12%）

others, but the process is important.

3（3%）

18（20%） 36（40%） 28（31%） （
6 6%）

nd

All

I think evaluating grammar is difficult.

Not surprisingly, the first years are not convinced by theirThis is obviously very difficult for students with poor

ability to do peer evaluation well. In fact the results show angrammar, but the choice of what to evaluate was left to thealmost mirror image with 15 students choosing a rating above 3

individual students, so it is not necessary for all students toand 14 choosing a rating below it. Evaluating spoken English is

attempt to do so. With the next cohort, students are

difﬁcult, and will be more daunting the younger you are.

experimenting with evaluating a different aspect of speech in

The second years are more conﬁdent in their ability to do peer
evaluation, with 19 feeling they could do it very well and only 7

practice evaluations which should make them more confident
when deciding what to evaluate in the ﬁnal exam.
When everyone prepares students deserve almost the same

feeling they were poor. It might be the case that peer evaluation
is more suited to older, more mature and conﬁdent students, or it

evaluation.

might be that first years need more practice before they feelThis comment has highlighted a common feature of thestudentʼs grade sheets, which is the reluctance to differentiate

conﬁdent enough to do it.
If the two years are taken as a whole, the students are more in

between those in a pair in the nursing dialogue. In many ways

favour of peer evaluation than they are against it. Thirty-seven

the nursing dialogue is a way of measuring effort, as after thepercent gave a rating of 4 or 5 as opposed to the 23 percent who

course there is no reason why even the weakest students shouldgave it a 1 or 2. As mentioned earlier, this is more a cautious

not be able to deliver a strong dialogue. As students cooperate inapproval than a whole-hearted one and indicates that nearly aits preparation, the reasoning goes; the students should receive

quarter of students are not in favour of peer evaluation.

the same grade. Certainly, in cases where the division of
speaking is the same, and when studentsʼ pronunciation is

4 What did you find most difficult in doing peer evaluation?

similar it is difﬁcult to fault the logic.
I thought every pair was good and the same, but I had to

For this question ﬁrst and second years could write what they
wished. About half the students in both years mentioned either

evaluate.

awarding a grade or difﬁculty in writing comments.

When everyone prepares students deserve almost the sameevaluation.

Awarding a grade is very difﬁcult even for those with years of

The above comments also add credence to the notion that theexperience. The problems are alluded to in the following

prepared dialogue is the easier of the two to perform but thecomments.
When I decided the score I couldn’t decide it easily! I usuallyharder to evaluate as effort in preparation can erode thegive a high score to the first pair. After that I had to change

advantage of better speakers of English. As the teacher, thethe first decision.

concept of one test measuring hard work and the other

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measuring the English proﬁciency is acceptable, as the main aim

There was only one negative comment, ʻI was stressed so it wasof the test is to evaluate what students have achieved in the 14

not enjoyableʼ. As mentioned before, performance anxiety is

lessons rather than their proficiency in many cases would be

unavoidable when speaking a foreign language, but is should

excellent regardless of whether they had attended class or not.

lessen with greater practice.

The format for the unprepared dialogue is practiced prior to

Enjoyable thing was listening practice, not enjoyable was

the exam, but it is inevitable that this will measure actual

conversation, because it’s very difficult, but it’s good for ourstudies.

communicative ability due to the fact that it is unprepared.
It isn’t always good English to use difficult words.

The second years, as might be expected, made less of ﬁnding

This is a very interesting observation and shows that thestudent is becoming more aware of how language is used. If theout about classmates, but made more of the challenges it
presented.

audience does not know a ʻdifficultʼ word, there is no point in

I could listen to many original dialogues.

using it.

Everybody has a different set and characters. It’s very

One of the better students wrote the following commentenjoyable.

Many students aren’t good at English, so evaluation is very

These comments show both an appreciation of theirdifficult. I think we can do them in a list of contents, e.g.

classmatesʼ efforts, but also highlight the variety that emerges

intonation 1, 2, 3 etc.

when students are free to script their own dialogues in the

What is pleasing here for the teacher is that the student isnursing practice, which in turn keeps the listening fresh andidentifying a problem and proposing a solution to it.

interesting. One student commented on the unprepared dialoguethat she liked, ʻThe effort to try and keep speaking.ʼ A comment

5 Did you find it enjoyable to see your classmates do theirsuch as this reveals that the student will become a very

dialogues?

accomplished speaker.

NO
1

YES
2

3

4

1st years （
0 0%）

（
1 2%）

（
4 8%）

（ 43%） 23（ 47%）
21

2 years （
0 0%）

（
1 2%）

（
2 5%）

（ 42%） 22（ 51%）
18

（
0 0%）

2（2%）

6（7%）

39（42%） 45
（49%）

nd

All

5

7 Did you find it helpful to your performance to see otherstudents?
NO
1

YES
2

3

4

5

（
2 4%）

（
（ 43%） 17（ 35%）
9 18%） 21

percent of the students gave a mark of 4 or 5 to this question.

2nd years （4 10%） （2 5%）（（ 40%）
9 23%） （9 23%） 16

Students listen to each other more carefully than to anything else

All

（4%）
4

18
（20%） 30（34%） 33
（37%）

and this not only improves their listening ability but it acts as aThis is another encouraging result with the vast majority ofbond within the class as they all ʻendureʼ or ʻenjoyʼ theboth 1st and 2nd years giving a 4 or 5 to the question. Anotherexperience together.

advantage of peer evaluation is that students learn from eachThis is perhaps the most favourable result of all. Ninetyst

1 years 0（4%）
4other（Luoma, 2004）. Even in the test, it is not too late to learn
6 What was enjoyable/not enjoyable?

something from a fellow student. When peer evaluation works

The answers to this question, in terms of what was enjoyable,

effectively students both teach and learn.

were different between 1st and 2nd years. For first years themost enjoyable aspect was that they made friends with, and

8 Please give any examples.

found out about classmates that they did not know. This

Again there is a slight difference between the two years in

illustrates both the benefit of changing partners regularly,

what they focus on. The ﬁrst years are much more aware of how

especially in the first term when relationships are in flux, andthe dialogue is presented and the demeanour of the speakeragain emphasises the importance of shared performance.

whereas second years concentrate more on the content and theIt was very enjoyable. To talk about many things is verykind of English used. The following are comments from firstinteresting and I can know my friends.

years.

Listening to classmates I hardly speak to is interesting, but

I was aware of other students’ reactions, questions, subject

sometimes I can’t hear what they say.

and so on.

I enjoyed their unique ideas and different backgrounds.

I know how to speak fluently, how to gesture, to smile and so

The comments above are a small sample of the sentiment.

on.

− 33 −J Nurs Studies NCNJ Vol. 9 No. 1 2010

First year students were also impressed by the help that was

but were not asked to suggest ways of improving.

given by partners.

An interesting ﬁnding in the scores above is that it is the two

I often forget words but my partner helps me.

weaker classes in each year that more highly valued self-

Today’s exam, when one student couldn’t speak, her partner

assessment. Although this might initially seem surprising, it is inhelped her. There were many cases like this.

fact quite logical. Students who ﬁnd English difﬁcult are more

Students are encouraged to help their partners in the nursing

likely to benefit from thinking about their performance thandialogue when they become unsure of what to say as the exam isthose who are already accomplished.

not meant to be an ordeal or a memory test. More importantly, inthe unprepared dialogue, being able to help out a floundering

10 In what way?

partner is a very important conversational skill even in oneʼs

There were no great differences in response between ﬁrst andown language, and students that can do this in a foreign

second years and nothing particularly interesting or surprising.

language are displaying excellent language ability.

Samples from both years are below.
I could use what I wrote for my self evaluation for my next

Some students did also comment upon the language that they

performance.

learnt from others.
Other students’ performance gave me ideas for vocabulary.

Not only in my speaking, but also in thinking about my

I found many ways of English expression

dialogue.

Yet others made interesting discoveries of their own.

We can understand are own tendencies and this helps us toI learned how to keep speaking.

improve our skills.

When one person speaks too much, it’s not a conversation it’s

By doing that I can know my lacking point and try to make ita speech. A conversation is one short phrase and changing thegood.

speaker often.

The one comment that will change next yearʼs approach is this;I became courageous speaking to many people.

Self-evaluation is good for remembering my mistakes and the

The second yearsʼ comments were more connected to the nuts

points that I need to improve but I don’t know how to do that!
That’s the big problem for me.

and bolts of conversation.
I could learn accurate grammar.

As the student correctly points out it is one thing to know

The timing of the changing of the topic.

what the problem is, but quite another to correct it. A section on

When students use good phrases I copied them and improved

how any deﬁciencies can be overcome will be included in next

my English level!

yearʼs self-evaluation sheets.

One other important facet of conversation was noted by
11 Do you think peer evaluation should be continued withanother student.
We knew what kind of attitude is good for the audience tonext year?
YES

enjoy.

NO（ 76%） 11（ 24%）
1 years 34
st（ 86%） （2nd years* 32
5 14%）*one student wrote “ donʼ t know”

9 Did you find doing self-evaluation helped you?
Students were asked to fill in an evaluation form of theirAll

66（80%） 16（20%）

performance at various stages throughout the year. They were

Overall 80% of all students feel that peer evaluation should

asked to write down things they had done well and things that

continue so it does seem worthwhile to persevere and reﬁne it.

they could improve upon for their next performance.

An interesting difference is that the second years are noticeably

NO
1

2

3

4

YES

more in favour of peer evaluation than the ﬁrst years. Maturity

5

would seem to be an important factor in appreciating peerst

1 years （1 2%）（（ 31%） 18（ 40%） （5 11%） 14
7 16%）

2 years （2 5%）（（ 39%） （（ 24%）
5 12%） 16
8 20%） 10

3（3%）

10（12%） 30（35%） 26（30%） 17（20%）

nd

All

evaluation so this difference is not so surprising.
12 Why?

These ﬁgures are not an overwhelming vote of conﬁdence inA vast array of answers was given by both first and second

self-evaluation, but this is probably because the way of doing it

years and a combined selection of the most interesting is given

is not as effective as it might be. Students were asked to self

below.

evaluate what they had done well and what could be improved,

国立看護大学校研究紀要

第9巻

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2010 年− 34 −

It is a good chance for students to speak in the presence ofothers.

prepared it）, ʻa conﬁdent mannerʼ might show one student to be

Because it makes us try and use words or sentences

better than her partner.

appropriate for the occasion.

The unprepared dialogue is beneﬁcial in the wash back effect

Can think of the next sentence by oneself.

it has on students in that it means all talking activities are useful

It was very stressful for me but it helped my English speaking

for the exam. There is an element of luck in this section as you

ability.

might draw a student who is non-communicative or very slow

If there is no evaluation some students will not look at theirthinking, but this is a challenge that peer evaluation presents

performance carefully.

and, as students have complete autonomy in the grading, it is up

Because it makes us listen to English and to pay attention toto each individual as to how to respond. As the teacher, thethe way it is used.

challenges like this are a beneﬁt of peer evaluation as they makeIn the future we need to have the evaluation skill in nursing

the students think for themselves. Students could, for example,

practice.

use their knowledge of the studentʼs usual performance from

There are many positive comments above and show that peerclass, and such use of continual assessment would mitigate too

and self evaluation can continue to beneﬁt students in speaking

against a student underperforming due to anxiety.

English. Those who were not in favour of wrote simply that it

Although some students were concerned about their lack ofwas ʻhardʼ or that they did not have enough time to write

ability in writing comments the aim of the comments is to makecomments.

the students think rather than just writing down a grade, and assuch it is not so important if they can not express themselves
Conclusion

perfectly. Rather than provide students with stock expressions,the current system enables students to say exactly what they

The students were predominantly positive about theexperience of doing peer and self evaluation, and they do thinkwant. The problem is more a lack of time than ability, soallowing more time would seem to be a better solution.

that it should be continued. The first years were particularly

The use of self-evaluation is a potentially fertile area for

appreciative of the bonding that it promoted whereas second

beneﬁtting studentsʼ English. Having abandoned the awarding ayears were more appreciative of how they were able to learn

grade and substituting it with comments（submitted to thefrom each other. For some students in both years peer evaluationteacher）, it means students are forced to think about how they

provided them with motivation by being able to rank oneʼs own

can improve. By making students think about this it should

performance in comparison with others. Practice reduces theencourage learner autonomy and for some it might evenanxiety factor in both performance and in grading, and, notencourage them to apply this thinking to areas other thansurprisingly, ﬁrst years would seem to need more opportunities

language.

than second years.
Grading remains the most difﬁcult feature for students, and as■ References

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採用決定日 2009 年 11 月 26 日