ASSESSING STUDENTS’ ACADEMIC WRITING SKILLS

The article focuses on the assessment of the productive skill of writing in the classes of academic writing at the Faculty of Informatics and Management of the University of Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic. Firstly, it briefly describes an optional, one-semestr course of academic writing and its specifics. For example, the course is run as a blended course, which means that students attend classes only once in two weeks for 90 minutes and the second week they do their assignments and study on-line. This course is particularly aimed at the first-year students of Management of Tourism. Secondly, the article provides a definition of the assessment and its categories for the purpose of understanding different assessment practices. Thirdly, it lists the most common assessment methods used in the course with their detail description. Moreover, specific examples of each assessment method are explored in the article. Finally, the benefits and drawbacks of assessing students’ formal writing skills are discussed. In addition to that, students’ reflections on their writing achievements are introduced.