The Effect of Assessment Type (self vs. peer vs. teacher) on Iranian University EFL Students' Course Achievement

Abstract

Abstract This research investigated the effect of self-, peer-, and teacher-assessment on Iranian undergraduate EFL students' course achievement. Four intact classes, including 82 students from Urmia, Tabriz, and Tabriz Islamic Azad universities were randomly assigned into one of the self-, peer-, teacher-assessment, or control groups. The students were pretested on their current Teaching Methods knowledge. After receiving relevant instruction and training, the first experimental group (N = 21) were involved in self-assessment activities, the second one (N = 23) were engaged with peer-assessment tasks, and the third one (N = 21) were subjected to teacher-assessment; however, the control group (N = 19) received no assessment-related treatment. The application of ANCOVA on the results of the achievement posttest indicated differences in the performances of peer-, self-, teacher-assessment, and the control groups F (3, 77) = 23.15, p = .05, in favour of peer-assessment. A medium effect size was found between the independent and dependent variables (partial eta squared= .47); however, the covariate, albeit significant (.03), had a small effect size (partial eta squared= .05). Further findings and implications are discussed in the paper.