ABSTRACT
Over the last decade, the relationship between classroom assessment and student motivation has received more and more attention (Archer & Scevak, 1998; Black & Wiliam, 1998; Brookhart, 1997; Brookhart & DeVoge, 1999, 2000; Crooks, 1988; Maslovaty & Kuzi, 2002; Stiggins, 2002). Traditionally, the role of classroom assessment in motivating students was typically to provide a basis for the use of rewards or punishments so as to entice or intimidate students to put more effort into learning (Stiggins, 2002). However, research in the fi eld of academic motivation in schools has demonstrated that external contextual factors such as rewards or punishments do not infl uence motivation directly. Rather, such contextual factors affect one’s cognitions, selfperceptions, beliefs, and expectations for success, and these in turn infl uence motivation (e.g., Bandura, 1997; Brookhart, 1997; Dweck, 1986; Weiner, 1986). Therefore, in order to arrive at a better understanding of the relationship between classroom assessment and student motivation, this study used goal orientation theory, and investigated the relationship between students’ perceptions of their classroom assessment environment
and their goal orientations in the English as a foreign language (EFL) context in China (see Chapter 4 for more context information).
