Trait Based Assessment on Teaching Writing Skill for EFL Learners

This study examines the impact of trait based assessment on teaching writing skill for EFL learners. Conducted as pre-experimental study with one group pretest and posttest structure. The test was conducted to 11 candidates of the second trail of a language course in an institute in Erbil in 2019. Purposive sampling procedure was used in highlighting the samples. Writing test and analytical scoring rubric were the tools that have been used to gather the data. After that the data were broken down to descriptive statistics and paired sample t-test to analyze the assumption. The consequence of descriptive statistics analysis uncovered that trait-based assessment has great impact on teaching writing skill for EFL learners as the mean score of posttest 65 was higher than mean score of pretest 42. While for hypothesis testing by using paired sample t-test at significance (2-tailed) value level, it


I. INTRODUCTION
Writing is the least mainstream of language skill and it is considered as the least helpful or fundamental by the students to be mastered. This is because of their supposition that writing has less of advantage for them in daily life. Even though, they may omit that the ability of writing has unique status in language expertise. It is by means writing an individual can convey various kinds of massages to anyone, known or unknown (Murcia, 2001).
Most EFL students would possibly concur when we state that writing is the most troublesome abilities for them to be mastered. The trouble is not only in producing and sorting out thoughts but also in making an interpretation of these thoughts into readable content and understandable. The competencies associated with writing are exceptionally complex. Darker (2001) and Hatta (2009) see that EFL writers need to focus on higher level skills of arranging and sorting out just as well as lesser skills of spelling, punctuation, word choice, accuracy, that's to say the usage of the correct forms of language. Writing precisely includes correct spelling, shaping letters accurately, writing legibly, and correct punctuation, the usage of correct layouts, picking the right vocabulary, using grammar effectively, joining sentences effectively and using paragraphs effectively.
The trouble at that point turns out to be increasingly pronounced if their language proficiency is not strong. Nevertheless, the requirement for hard work recorded in writing ought not be basically regarded that increasingly more practice is additionally expected since a great deal of practices recorded in writing with no feedback don't constantly guarantee effective results (Gere, 876 1992876 & McCrimmon, 1984. This view is confirmed by the outcome of the study held by Latief (1990) that demonstrated the students' low paragraph quality, in spite of the various activities and exercises in writing must be completed with the thought that writing ought to be thought and surveyed in a proficient manner.
According to the perception that writing is a tough skill to be controlled, the outcomes of the early observation were applied to the students who take writing for general communication class in a language center in Erbil city demonstrated that they had poor abilities in writing recount text. Their problems involve the below aspects; 1. Punctuations, 2. Supporting sentences, 3. Grammar, 4. Vocabulary, 5. Linking compound and complex sentences, 6. Conclusion.
In addition, the candidates were seen to have poor propensities of writing, as they were not used to writing routinely as opposed to satisfying the assignments given by the Instructor. They were understood as that they didn't consider truly what to write and how to compose the thoughts as they concerned most on finishing up their papers. Moreover, they were likewise seen to have poor cooperation and unconfident to their composition.
Through the initial observation, it was additionally found that the writing practice was emphasized on the final result or item-based writing with no remark to the students actual writing. During the writing practice, the lecturer initially presented the idea pattern of writing that was going to be practiced inside the class. After the ideas became clear, he gave the candidates a model paragraph to be studied generally in regard of the development and organization

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of the concepts, the change of the ideas, grammar and mechanics. At that point, the teacher requested the students to compose their own paragraphs from a similar sort of pattern. At the end, the paragraphs were collected for reviewing. These exercises did not help in improving the students' capacity in writing skill.
In all cases, in order to enhance student's ability in writing, some solutions may be recommended. One of the solutions is by applying an assessment. Assessment is a significant and essential element in teaching writing. Here, to improve the quality of the candidates' writing capacity that could be reached not only through enhancing the teaching quality but also through the assessment quality. Assessment should be done expertly and appropriately in writing, with the goal that the instructor is capable to detect the shortcomings and strengths of the students in writing. Therefore, the outcome of writing assessment can be viewed as a basis for making decisions in the teaching process so as to have the optimal teaching and learning process. This is the plan to advance by trait-based assessment that attempts to dissect and analyze the detail of the candidates' weakness and strengths in their writing. In this way, it is anticipated that they can enhance their writing skill after finding and offering solutions regarding their weakness and build up their strengths. Dahl and Farnan (1998) quote that as an assessment, trait based assessment provides the most complete information since each component in writing is assessed independently by every characteristic marked with scales that displays how well the texts are produced. At that point, trait based assessment helps objective measurement and assist instructors to choose which part of the candidates' writing have to be improved (Steineger, 1996). In addition, by evaluating the candidates' writing independently, an instructor could give positive remark or feedback to the parts which the candidates comprehend (Isernhagen and Kozisek, 2000).
Based on the complicated hardship faced by the learner in learning writing skill, this study tries to explore the impact of trait based assessment on the teaching

Vol. (5), No (3), Summer 2020 ISSN 2518-6566 (Online) -ISSN 2518-6558 (Print)
878 writing skill. Depending on the above illustration, the researcher beliefs that trait based assessment can address the difficulties and weakness of EFL learners' writing skill and may improve it. Thus, the findings of this study offers that: (1) the description of the model of trait based assessment that can improve the candidates' abilities in recount text writing, (2) the depictions of the candidates' presentation after the implying of trait based assessment and (3) the descriptions of the students' response to the implementation of trait based assessment the execution of characteristic based appraisal.

Method
This study applied pre-experimental with pretest-posttest format as this study involves with examining the affectivity of trait based assessment with respect to teaching writing skill for EFL learners. Despite the fact that there were 102 students totally in the writing for general communication class in a language center in Erbil city in 2019, but only twenty of them were chosen as the sample of the study. This choice was taken so as to enable the researcher to make a detailed remark and assessment on the students' performance and on the process of teaching and learning, which constantly enable them to make a precise analysis of the outcome of the observation and assessment. In addition, the twenty chosen students were the individuals who were considered to play out the weakest in the writing class, especially in composing recount text. To achieve the data, the researcher applied writing test in form of essay test and the scoring system was settled by an analytical scoring rubric. The criteria of assessment applied the scale (1-5) by Brown (2007) in which composing capacity was valued from 5 variables, and they are: content, organization, grammar, vocabulary, and mechanics.
At that point, the data acquired from pretest and posttest were studied using descriptive statistics and paired -sample t-test to test the hypothesis. In light of the outcome of data analysis, the highest score on pre-test was 65 and the lowest score was 42. At the same time while, on post-test, the highest score was

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879 87 and the lowest score recorded as 54. Moreover, the mean score of pre-test was 42 and total errors was of the pre-test %7.07, at the same time the mean score of post-test was 344 and total errors of the post-test was %3.44.

Findings
The initial remark on pretest affirmed that a majority of the candidates had issues in writing recount texts in regard of punctuations, supporting sentences, grammar, vocabulary and linking compound and complex sentences. From 6 aspects examined, the outcome of pre-test demonstrated that they have issues in writing skill. The data indicated that their writing capacity before accepted treatment was at level of "extremely poor" it could be seen from the mean score acquired (42) that was classified into "extremely poor". The statistics on students' accomplishment in pre-test can be appeared as follows: 4 out of 11 candidates (%14) fall into class of "extremely poor", and 6 candidates (15.84%) were classified as "sufficient", and one of the candidates accomplished category of "good". In this manner, from the former data it is concluded that the entire population (86%) despite of various scores still have issues in writing ability and they should be helped to develop their writing skill.
The outcome of the candidates' writing offers that precise description of the issues faced by the candidates in recount text writing. Furthermore, it was additionally seen that they didn't have great composing habits and were not very much inspired to do their writing exercises.
The discoveries indicated that the assessing activity applying trait based assessment was generally good and smooth, because the researchers perform the writing practice based on the already developed plans. With keeping on the practice, the researchers embraced the steps, for instance (1) Prewriting, which gives a full discussion of the idea of recount text, the idea of trait based assessment, choosing a liable subject to write, figuring out the audience and figuring out the purpose. (2) Planning, which is through brainstorming (3) Drafting, which covers drafting a scratch outline, the hypothesis, a discovery draft, a descriptive outline and the formal outline; (4) Revising, which covers the

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sharing for worldwide and editing for local revision (5) Writing the passage; and (6) Evaluation.
Furthermore, the post-test results additionally showed that their composing capacity improved essentially, it may be proved with a complete mean score 54 that arranged into "average". Definite data on students in the posttest can be shown as follows: 0 candidate (0%) that goes into the class of " extremely poor", 5 candidates (15.05%) acquired a score of 54-65 and classified into "average", 2 candidates (2.88%) got a score of 71-73 and classified in the "good", and 4 candidates (13.44%) classified into "very good". In this way, from the above data it tends to be concluded that almost of the candidates progressed in their writing potential.

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The subjects' skills demonstrated improvement in the post test as appeared on their assessed writing papers. They could choose the subjects to compose, choose their audience, highlight their aim, draft their passages, revise them and finally rewrite them. Table 02 confirmed that their compositions improved in terms of punctuations, supporting sentences, grammar, vocabulary, linking compound and complex sentences, and conclusion.
The candidates' responses in educating and learning exercises were certain and positive, as they took part in the teaching and learning exercises well, focused on the instructor-researcher's clarification intently and did the instructions given to them eagerly. They likewise confirmed that they were glad in joining the class.

Discussion
The result of this study disclosed that trait based assessment has importantly effect on teaching writing skill for EFL learners. This kind of assessment is essentially effective in light of the fact that the data on learning progress was gathered in detail and extensively in a pleasant atmosphere, and constantly offer open door for candidates to show not just what they know, comprehend and

Vol. (5), No (3), Summer 2020 ISSN 2518-6566 (Online) -ISSN 2518-6558 (Print)
882 what they can do yet in addition the issues and troubles which they regularly face in learning writing. In writing skill, students are demanded to have ability to discover and to inspire themselves to push their ability in responding, and taking care of all issues they found by using trait based assessment, those things are recommended to be DONE because the students and teacher directly discuss about the texts. In discussion process, an instructor can give suggestion and motivation on students' writing detail and comprehensively.
Furthermore, by using trait based assessment, a candidate's learning accomplishment was not to be compared with the group progress, yet it was compared with the earlier capacity, so the candidates were inspired to revise their mistakes and improve their composing quality. In other sense, trait based assessment was very helpful for the candidates to accomplish what they wanted, rather than judging them. Trait based assessment was likewise exceptionally successful to decide whether there was learning progress or not and whether arranged and ongoing help was required or not, depending on exact facts or evidences. Moreover, by using trait based assessment the instructors could improve learning system dependent on candidates' need because during learning process with trait based assessment, an instructor could know well what the students need to improve their composition. Having applied trait based assessment, scoring and discussion result by the candidates provided suggestion for the teachers to improve learning program in the study hall.

Conclusions and Recommendations
Based on former discussions, it can be concluded that: (1) the compelling model of trait based assessment that can improve students' skills in writing argumentative paragraphs comprised of six primary activities described in the discussion section; (2) the candidates presentation in writing argumentative paragraphs can be improved, as they can compose with completeness, great and powerful formulation of claim, good coherence appropriate diction, and correct grammar and mechanics; and (3) the candidates were glad and joined the

Vol. (5), No (3), Summer 2020 ISSN 2518-6566 (Online) -ISSN 2518-6558 (Print)
883 writing class actively, as they could control and master process approach and get genuinely associated in the teaching and learning process.
At last, it is recommended to (1) the instructor-researcher and the other composition teachers in the language centers to embrace and consider using the trait based assessment model which is developed in this study so as to improve the writing skills of the learners. (2) other instructors-researchers who may be keen in the outcome of this study to see trait based assessment to teaching writing and the model of trait based assessment applied in this study as another probability or replacement that requires deep consideration in leading their examination.