Abstract:

In teaching and education environment, alternative methods or methods that are called supplementary assessment can also be used apart from traditional testing and assessment methods. Portfolio is one of the most commonly used methods among them. Portfolio, which can be used at any level and class, is also used for improving writing skills in foreign language teaching. Portfolio is a method of assessment which is based on assessing process rather than result, the whole rather than the part, change and developments occuring in a long period of time rather than those happening in a short time. In this method, the student is not in the assessed position but in the participant position for the assessment. In foreign language teaching, writing is regarded as a skill which students have most difficulty in and which they don’t like much for that reason. Considering the fact that writing in the native language with the constituents such as grammar, vocabulary, form, planning, language use, spelling and punctuation is not so easy, difficulty in writing in a foreign language may be better understood. This study examines the effect of writing portfolios on the writing success of students learning Turkish as a foreign language. To this end, quasi-experimental design, which includes pretest and post-test groups, was applied at Gazi University Turkish Language Learning, Research and Application Centre (TOMER). After applying the pretest at the end of A2 level, writing portfolios were used in the experimental group in B1 and B2 levels. B2 level exit exam was used as the post-test. Writing assessment forms were used to collect data. The results of the analysis revealed that there was a meaningful difference in the pretest and post-test scores of the experimental group, and that there was no meaningful difference in the pretest and post-test scores of the control group, on the contrary, that there was a decline. In line with the results of the study it can be suggested that writing portfolio is an effective method in enhancing the success of students learning Turkish as a foreign language. This method can be used as an effective method in improving writing skills of the students learning Turkish as a foreign language.

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