Viljo Kohonen was placed in charge of the Assessment Worm when it became apparent that the original keeper, Hanne Thomsen, would be unable to join us in Aberdeen.  Viljo gave a thorough overview of agency and autonomy through reflection and self and peer-assessment in language education.  He told us about Hanne’s work in Copenhagen with primary students learning English assessing themselves with “can do” statements which goes a long way to assist the learners in developing autonomy for language learning from a very young age.



He went on to tell us about Sanja Wagner’s 6 year research project following one group of learners. Sanja was in the audience so was available for further clarification after Viljo’s talk. How often do we read about long term projects like that?  Sanja’s students negotiated their own work plans. The students, in general, felt proud of their progress and were confident and autonomous language learners.



Viljo also had a 3 year project of his own conducted in Tampere in Finland to discuss.  The results were mixed: some students embraced the opportunity to do peer assessment, others rejected it.



Some of Viljo’s conclusions were that reflection and self-assessment were intertwined. Self-assessment fits within a new learning culture and that all of the participants have new roles.  He went on to elaborate on what is reflection is, experiential learning and the properties that authentic assessment should have.  Reference was of course made to the Common European Framework and the English Language Portfolio (ELP) which is a tool  (a kind of logbook?) to promote reflection, ownership and autonomy.