Teaching English as an International Language Elementary EFL Students’ Practice of Peer Assessment of Oral Classroom Activities YU-JU HUNG R.O.C. Air Force Academy, Taiwan SHU-CHENG CHEN Sianbei Elementary School BETH LEWIS SAMUELSON Indiana University Role-play is an oral classroom activity that has been promoted to provide young learners with opportunities to practice English in meaningful contexts. To familiarize elementary students with this group task, to encourage them to pay attention to their peers’ performances, and to replace traditional paper-and-pencil modes of evaluating speaking tasks, an alternative group peer assessment (PA) was proposed in this action research imple- mented with 114 fourth-grade and fifth-grade students in four classes in an elementary school in southern Taiwan. Analyses of ratings and written comments of the teacher and peer groups, student survey, and teacher reflection showed PA served a pos- sible approach to evaluate English learners’ speaking perfor- mance. Students enjoyed and benefited from being empowered in their learning. Suggestions for future practice include empha- sizing rationale for practicing PA, facilitating group discussions, explaining explicitly how to give and accept constructive com- ments, clarifying evaluation rubrics, and taking into account students’ language abilities and learning styles. doi: 10.1002/tesj.245 Communicating orally in English is still a big challenge for many students in Asian countries. In Taiwan, the Ministry of Education has issued a national policy mandating English classes TESOL Journal 7.2, June 2016 449 © 2016 TESOL International Association