1. Introduction
Languages for Specific Purposes (LSP) courses have become increasingly popular in the United States during the last few decades, particularly for health, business, social work, education, and legal professions (Doyle, 2018; Ruggiero, 2022; Sánchez-López et al., 2017). This growth stems from the urgency to diversify course offerings in language programs; to foster interdisciplinary work between language programs and other academic disciplines; to fulfill the social responsibility of colleges and universities towards the communities they serve; and, more recently, to address the downward trend in language enrollments (Grosse & Voght, 2012; Ruggiero, 2022).
There is a growing body of literature on LSP courses, focused on topics such as teacher and student readiness, course and curriculum development and implementation, community partnerships (Ruggiero, 2022), intercultural competence, and project-based learning. Scant in the research, however, are empirical studies centered upon assessment in LSP courses. Ruggiero (2022) and Sánchez-López et al. (2017) note this gap in the research, and O’Sullivan (2012) calls for more theory-based LSP research to address it.
In recent years, Integrated Performance Assessments (IPAs) have gained increasing attention in language programs that aspire to a more proficiency-based curriculum. IPAs were first developed as an innovative assessment intended to resemble real-life situations, to meet the content areas of the World-Readiness Standards, and to measure progress according to the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, 2012). Research has shown IPAs to be effective in connecting instruction to assessment and facilitating learner development of communicative abilities. Learner and instructor attitudes toward IPAs have been overwhelmingly positive (e.g., Adair-Hauck et al., 2006; Darhower & Smith-Sherwood, 2021; Martel, 2018; Zapata, 2016). Given the demonstrated effectiveness of IPAs in language courses and the dearth of research on assessments for LSP courses, this study intends to fill a gap in the literature by showcasing the use of IPAs in a second-year university Spanish course for legal professions in a large research-intensive university in the Southeastern United States and presenting learners’ perceptions on the use of IPAs in their Spanish for Legal Professions course.
2. Literature Review
2.1. Languages for Specific Purposes (LSP)
LSP courses have been broadly defined as courses "in which the methodology, the content, the objectives, the materials, the teaching, and the assessment practices all stem from specific, target language uses based on an identified set of specialized needs’’ (Trace et al., 2015, p. 2). In this interpretation, learners in an introductory- or intermediate- level course develop their language competence in order to function in specialized areas such as medicine, business, or law enforcement with specific materials and methodologies. Grosse and Vough (1991) differentiate LSP and non-LSP courses from traditional language courses through the contextualization of the language learned. The meaning of different activities and discourses to which learners would be exposed to and participate in would be drawn from professional fields such as medicine, business, or law. Ruggiero (2022) advocated for a more comprehensible approach to LSP, whereby World Languages for Specific Purposes (WLSP) is informed by and contributes to other fields such as linguistics and cultural studies. WLSP is nonetheless interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, and transdisciplinary in that it transcends the frontiers of any specific discipline or field, not only in the courses per se, but also in the research, teaching, and learning. Ruggiero (2022) suggests a conceptualization beyond language departments, in which WLSP includes and serves local communities, community-based projects, and intercultural and translingual competency.
The field of LSP can be traced back to post World War II, when world trade became increasingly important in the U.S. and language courses for business started to emerge for the most commonly taught languages: Spanish, French, and German (Fryer, 2012; Ruggiero, 2022). At the same time, LSP courses gained attention in the United Kingdom with English for Specific Purposes (ESP). However, it was not until the 1980s that Spanish for specific purposes entered academic institutions in the U.S. Interest, materials, and research have steadily increased since then (Sánchez-López, 2019). The current surge of LSP courses, at least in the U.S., stems from the necessity of bringing language departments into the 21st century, to break the traditional language-literature divide, to incorporate language, literature, and culture into a continuum, and to offer interdisciplinary work that appeals to learners, as outlined by the MLA 2007 Report. Furthermore, globalization has also driven current trends due to more interconnected industries like business and hospitality, academic exchanges, and international curricula (Grosse & Voght, 2012). Simultaneously, immigration has resulted in the formation of new multilingual communities, creating demand for bilingual and multilingual professionals to serve these communities in different areas such as education, healthcare, business, the justice system, and more (Grosse & Voght, 2012; Sánchez-López, 2019).
Although the field has steadily grown, it has also faced challenges. For instance, LSP courses have historically been undervalued by some language faculty (Fryer, 2012). Some might not recognize LSP courses as legitimate academic interdisciplinary work due to their applied nature, while others may have little desire to collaborate with other units in their universities (Fryer, 2012; Grosse & Voght, 2012). An additional challenge is the relative paucity of pedagogical materials available for the specialized LSP context.
Not surprisingly, a large portion of existing LSP courses in the United States are in Spanish (Long & Uscinski, 2012), which has led to a growing body of LSP research in Spanish. The primary foci have been on course development and student attitudes. Altstaedter (2017), for example, provides a detailed account of the benefits and challenges involved in implementing a Spanish for Health Professions course. Others such as Lear (2021), Mason (1992), and Ruggiero (2022) provide practical and theoretical guides to the application of LSP courses. In the Spanish for legal professions context, a number of researchers shed light on course development and evaluation (Blandino et al., 2010; González-Lloret & Nielson, 2015; Huempfner, 2020; Lear, 2021). Gonzalez-Lloret & Nielson (2015), for example, conducted a comparative study between task-based instruction and grammar instruction in a Spanish course for patrol officers and surveyed learners’ perspectives on both courses. The results suggest that the task-based model prepared learners to complete critical job tasks in L2 Spanish and helped learners to improve their overall Spanish proficiency. Lear (2021) conducted a domain analysis study in a course for legal professions. An interesting finding in this study was that backward design and “Can Do” statements, proposed by ACTFL, are effective framework to apply to LSP courses just as they are for mainstream Spanish classes.
Student perceptions about Spanish for legal professions courses have been positive. Huempfner (2020), for example, surveyed students in an intermediate level Spanish course for legal professionals. Learners found the course useful for their future careers, particularly the components in which they interacted with professionals working in the field.
Despite the growing body of research in Spanish LSP courses, Sánchez-López et. al (2017) noted that there was considerably less interest in assessment research. O’Sullivan (2012) made a similar observation and called for more theory- based research to complement the abundant studies of a practical nature. Those who mention assessment agree that assessments in LSP courses must be directly connected not only to instruction, but also to real-life situations. Furthermore, generalized and standard language assessments (such as exams) may not be ideal for the LSP classroom (King de Ramírez & Lafford, 2013; O’Sullivan, 2012; Sánchez-López, 2019).
The need for additional research on assessment in LSP Spanish courses is coupled with a dramatically increasing need to onboard Spanish speakers in various legal professions throughout the Southeastern United States (Keaton, 2020: Kirby et al., 2010, Alderster, 2017). In North Carolina, for example, the Hispanic population increased from 75,000 in 1990 to 1.1 million in 2020. An estimated 40% of that population have Limited English Proficiency (LEP) (Migration Policy Institute, 2021). This has provoked a number of disparities and barriers for the LEP population. Examples are the improper and non-standardized delivery of Miranda rights, and courts of law not being able to provide sufficient interpreters. Against this backdrop, the current study will address the gap in research on assessment in LSP Spanish courses. Integrated Performance Assessments (IPAs) are uniquely positioned to help bridge this gap.
2.2. IPAs
IPAs are a cluster assessment linked to the “Five Cs” of the World Readiness Standards for Language Learning (Communication, Cultures, Connections, Communities, and Comparisons), most prominently the three modes of the Communication standard: interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational (The National Standards Collaborative Board, 2015). IPAs were developed in the late 1990s as an assessment tool to measure learners’ progress in achieving the goals of the newly formed Standards (Troyan et al., 2023). The integrality of communicative modes in IPAs is meant to reflect the natural means by which learners acquire language, and how people use language. A unique feature of IPAs is that they seamlessly unite instruction and assessment. Daily classroom activities implement the same modes of communication that are later assessed in IPAs.
A defining feature of IPAs is their relation to backward design (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). The first stage of backward design is to identify desired results. In the IPA framework, desired results take the shape of learning outcomes worded as “Can-Do” statements developed for each textbook chapter or unit (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages). The Can-Do statements guide the second stage, determination of acceptable evidence. The evidence in this case consists of performance in the three components of an IPA cycle (interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational). The final stage is to plan learning activities that will lead students to success in the IPA assessments. It should be noted that backward design and IPAs stands in stark contrast to traditional assessments (i.e., exams), in which chapter content is typically “covered” and then chapter-final exams are designed to assess mastery of the material covered.
The IPA framework is dynamic in that it can be adapted to diverse classroom environments and learner proficiency levels. Troyan et al. (2023), commonly referred to as the “IPA Manual”, provide evaluation rubrics for learners at levels of the ACTFL Proficiency Scale, including Novice High, Intermediate, Intermediate High, and Advanced. The IPA cycle has built-in opportunities to provide feedback between tasks, allowing learners to reflect in their performance and advance in their language development.
The IPA cycle begins with an authentic text (written, audio, video, or multimodal), which learners interpret using a comprehension guide adapted from Troyan et al. (2023). As seen in Appendix A, the comprehension guide includes literal interpretation sections such as identification of key words, main ideas, supporting details, and organizational features of the text. Later learners might focus on more open-ended interpretation, such as cultural perspectives, the author’s perspective, and the learners’ personal perspective. The interpersonal task begins with a scenario that presents a potential real-life situation in which learners will need to communicate to achieve functional goals. The task should be text-dependent, meaning that learners must have interpreted the text in order to carry out the interpersonal task. Lastly, the presentational task has learners create a text, which is dependent on the previous phases of the IPA cycle.
Learners receive feedback after each task, allowing their performance on one task to inform the next. Research suggests that co-constructive feedback sessions between teacher and learner allow learners to empower themselves and to improve future performance; in addition, learners find them effective (Darhower & Smith-Sherwood, 2021; Troyan et al., 2023). Besides co-constructive feedback sessions, learners also receive feedback through the respective rubrics used for each task. These rubrics are different for each mode of communication, but interpersonal and presentational generally assess learners’ text type, comprehensibility, language control, and communication strategies or impact of the presentation, depending if the task is interpersonal or presentational. Similarly, the interpretive rubric assesses how effective learners’ literal comprehension and interpretation of a text is. Overall, rubrics also function as a preview of performance expectations because they contain performance objectives, range of performance, and an indicator of the learners’ progress. Lastly, rubrics have been designed to suit different proficiency levels (as represented by the ACTFL proficiency levels- Novice High, Intermediate, Intermediate High, and Advanced levels for the interpersonal and presentational tasks) (Adair-Hauck et al., 2006; Troyan et al., 2023).
The implementation of IPAs has been researched since the first pilot study addressing learners’ and instructors’ attitudes towards the use of IPA as a major assessment type in the world language classroom (Adair-Hauck et al., 2006; Altstaedter & Krosi, 2018; Darhower & Smith-Sherwood, 2021; Martel, 2018; Zapata, 2016). In recent years, there has been increasing interest in eliciting learners’ and instructors’ perceptions at the post-secondary level. This interest in attitudes likely stems from major pedagogical overhauls that many colleges and universities undergo when they transition from traditional grammar and vocabulary exams to performance- and proficiency-based assessments (Altstaedter & Krosi, 2018; Zapata, 2016). For instance, Zapata (2016) surveyed 1236 Novice, Intermediate-Low, and Intermediate undergraduate learners on the use of IPAs in lower-level Spanish courses. Overall, learners’ perceptions were positive. Similarly, Altstaedter and Krosi (2018) conducted a smaller-scale investigation of learners’ perspectives on IPAs. Focusing on evaluation, Martel (2018) found mixed perceptions on the use of IPAs by instructor and learners in a summer program with multiple languages: Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, and Spanish; the author suggests considering limitations due to the context being a summer program instead of semester-long courses. Moreover, aside from their use in traditional language courses, IPAs have also been researched in other related fields. In their study, Darhower & Smith-Sherwood (2021) examined the implementation of an IPA-informed literature course and how it could improve learners’ interpersonal speaking performance. They also examined learners’ attitudes towards the interpersonal component of the IPA. Results were positive, showcasing an improvement in learners’ interpersonal oral skills and positive perceptions of the use of IPAs were also reported.
When non-positive perceptions were found in any of previous studies, specifically Zapata (2016) and Martel (2018), external factors such as learners’ previous experiences with instruction and assessments, instructors’ openness and attitudes towards IPAs in the classroom, and instructional material’s (textbooks) connection to the IPA framework were noted as affecting learners’ and instructors’ perceptions. Nevertheless, most studies have found that learners have had a positive perception of and experience with IPAs. Furthermore, findings showed that IPAs can be applicable to other areas of language learning, such as literature classes (Altstaedter & Krosi, 2018; Darhower & Smith-Sherwood, 2021; Martel, 2018; Zapata, 2016).
IPAs are dynamic, meaning that tasks can be adapted to any real-life situation, including those present in a specific profession. IPAs effortlessly integrate into the assessment guidelines proposed by King de Ramirez & Lafford (2013) whereby assessments have to be “ecologically valid, localized, and require students to integrate linguistic skills and cultural knowledge to complete various tasks within natural or simulated professional contexts” (p. 35). IPAs require learners to interact with and interpret an authentic text: a reading, a video, or an audio recording. Learners have to complete an interpersonal communicative task and a presentational task. All these tasks require students to use their linguistic abilities, to critically analyze texts, to make cultural comparisons, and to reflect on their own communities. To this end, learners also have to create language (either in interpersonal or presentational tasks) that they could potentially encounter or use in their jobs.
In the LSP context, Ruggiero (2022) suggests that summative assessments must require students to critically solve problems and to reflect on their learning. IPAs can provide students with the opportunity to solve situations in a given context and to reflect on their learning through feedback. Based on authentic texts, often taken from the local community, IPAs can also serve as a link between the classroom and the community. The current study will illuminate the role of IPAs in a Spanish for Legal Professions class, particularly in terms of learner perceptions.
3. The Study
3.1. Research Question
This study is driven by the following research question: What are the perceptions of second-year college learners about the use of IPAs in their Spanish for legal professions courses?
3.2. Participants and Context
The research context was an intact third semester Spanish for Legal Professions course at a large research-intensive university in the Southeastern United States, with 15 students enrolled. Twelve students responded to the end-of-semester survey. Table 1 provides details about the participants’ background.
In the Fall 2023 semester, a major pedagogical overhaul was launched in the first-year Spanish curriculum, moving from a “communicative”, but still somewhat grammar-based pedagogy to an approach centered upon proficiency as defined by the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines (2012) and the World Readiness Standards for Language Learning (reference). The new approach was piloted in one first-semester class and the current third-semester Spanish Legal Professions class, before launching the approach across all first-year and third semester Spanish for Special Purposes courses.
During the summer of 2023, the Spanish for Legal Professions instructor (one of the current authors) adopted the textbook Intermediate Spanish for Criminal Justice for Second-year College Spanish (Dominguez et al.), which was developed by the World Language Departments at California State University, Sacramento and San Bernardino. The textbook consists of ten chapters which include content related to legal systems in the U.S., such as policing, crime, court hearings, and corrections. The first five of these chapters would be implemented in the current class. The context and content that were specific to California were supplemented and adapted to reflect Southeastern communities and their legal systems. Once the textbook was determined, the course was developed using backward design. The first stage of backward design is to identify desired results. These took the shape of learning outcomes worded as “Can-Do” statements developed for each chapter (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages). The statements would guide the second stage, determination of acceptable evidence. Such evidence would consist of performance in the three components of an IPA cycle (interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational). The final stage was to plan learning activities that would lead students to success in the IPA assessments.
The class met twice per week for 75 minutes each class period. The IPAs were developed prior to beginning each chapter of the book, some during the summer and some during the early part of the semester. The evaluation rubrics came from The Integrated Performance Assessment Twenty Years and Counting (Troyan et al., 2023). While the interpretive communication rubric is the same across all levels (what changes is the complexity of the texts employed), the interpersonal and presentational rubrics have versions for Novice High, Intermediate, Intermediate High, and Advanced on the ACTFL Proficiency Scale. In the first half of the semester, Novice High rubrics were used, then at mid semester Intermediate rubrics were employed in keeping with learners’ evolving performance throughout the semester.
There were five IPA cycles during the semester, one at the end of each textbook chapter. (See a sample IPA in Appendix A). The interpretive task was implemented in one class session. Since the class only met twice per week, the interpersonal and presentational tasks were carried out in the subsequent class period, as opposed to the recommended implementation of one mode per class period. Students received feedback after completing each task through a rubric and collective feedback administered in class. Due to time constraints, it was not possible to implement individual co-constructive feedback sessions between each mode of the IPA cycle. One co-constructed feedback sessions occurred after the end of the second IPA cycle, so that students could at least experience that recommended part of the IPA cycle (Troyan et al., 2023) at least once during the semester.
3.3. Data Collection
Learner perceptions about their IPA experience were collected via an end-of-semester survey. The instrument was based on Darhower and Smith-Sherwood’s (2021) and Altstaedter and Krosi’s (2018) studies on learners’ attitudes toward IPAs. There were 14, four-point Likert scale items (4 = strongly agree; 3 = agree; 2 = disagree; 1 = strongly disagree). No neutral/undecided point was included in the scale in order to avoid a tendency to gravitate toward the middle and thus produce more decided results. The survey also included three open-ended questions regarding what learners liked the most about IPAs; what they liked the least; and any additional comments that they had.
4. Results
4.1. Likert Statements
The overall analysis revealed a positive perception on the use of IPAs in a course for LSP in the context of legal and justice professions. Table 2 shows the ratings learners assigned to each statement. A mean closer to 4 and above 2 reveals agreement with the statement (items 1,3, and 5-14), while a score less than 2 indicates disagreement (item 4). The highest rated statements, meaning more agreement, with a 3.75 mean were The time allowed for each part of the IPA tasks was reasonable and The IPA provided me an opportunity for real-life language use related to legal (criminology) professions, followed by other statements with a mean of 3.67 and 3.58. The only mean below 2 is The IPA instructions and expectations were not very clear, but this is expected due to the construction of the statement.
Other areas in which students reported positive attitudes towards the use of IPAs are implementation, feedback, and their relationship to legal, criminology and justice professions. Regarding implementation, generally, learners agreed that the time allowed and the amount of work was reasonable. With respect to feedback, learners agreed that the feedback that they received was supportive and non-judgemental, specific and individualized. Learners reported stronger agreement when asked if feedback helped them identify their strengths and weaknesses in their interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational proficiency in Spanish. About the applicability of IPAs and professions related to legal and criminology professions, learners reported that IPAs provided them with an opportunity for real-life language use. Moreover, the data show that they would take other courses for legal professions with IPAs and that they would recommend a course for legal professions with IPAs. However, the only statement with a more varied response, but not negative, was that IPAs should be an integral part of courses for legal professions, signaling a possible desire on the part of students for the inclusion of other assessment types.
The only statement that raises concern given the ambivalence in learners’ responses was Participating in the IPAs was stressful for me. With the current data, it is difficult to determine if the IPAs themselves were stressful or if the nature of an assessment is stressful for students. The open-ended questionnaire items shed some light on this, but this is also an area where further research is needed.
4.2. Open-ended Questionnaire Items
After the Likert section of the survey, learners were asked to respond to two open-ended questions regarding what they had liked and disliked about IPAs. Responses were categorized by themes, resulting in the following categories for the assessment aspects that they liked: language improvement, real-life application, and opportunities to show knowledge. Learners highlighted their overall improvement of language skills, specifically interpersonal speaking: "I became a lot better at speaking", similarly another learner reported: "Gaining more and improving Spanish speaking experience". As per real-life application, learners specifically saw IPAs as a more viable means of producing language: "How it was a prompt so it made it feel more applied to real life scenarios". Yet, another learner reported perceiving IPAs as a more applicable assessment form than traditional exams: "I liked that it was more applicable to real life rather than a standardized test." This category aligns with Altstaedter and Krosi’s (2018) results, where students also appreciated the real-life application of IPAs. Still, the most prominent category was IPAs as different opportunities for learners to show their knowledge; "It gave me 3 separate opportunities to show my knowledge of the chapter [..]" Another learner reported on the three modes of communication: “I enjoyed how the IPAS were broken up. It gave me time to [be] prepared for each type of IPA like speaking, reading and writing, separately which allowed me to understand each section more.” Lastly, students also mentioned the connection between instruction and assessment, being allowed to be creative, and their ability to use language.
The aspects reported as concerns by certain learners were directly connected to the aspects others had reported as being the most enjoyable: the interpersonal section of the IPA and the multimodality of this assessment type. Regarding the interpersonal section, learners reported stress and concern because of the nature of the interpersonal task, where speakers communicate spontaneously and without a script (Troyan et al., 2023): “Having to speak with another student and ask and answer questions on the spot was very stressful.” Furthermore, some students’ concerns referenced the logistics of the interpersonal section or the time allotted to the task, which consisted of students recording their conversation themselves in the classroom for a few minutes to complete the interpersonal task: “Sometimes it could be stressful going into the speaking IPAs because of recording ourselves” and also, “The short time period to complete the oral one.” Contrasting with previously mentioned positive opinions on IPAs, some learners reported disliking taking the IPAs over multiple days: “The exams took multiple days” and “Having 2 days to worry about getting everything completed”. In additional comments, learners also expressed that “the IPA [was] harder than some "exams’’ but more useful” and another student indicated that “Not knowing exactly what to study - no true study guide but after all , I don’t know how much it would’ve increased my score”. It is clear that for some learners the IPA seemed like an exam rather than an integrated assessment and this result is also reflected in the ambivalent responses to the statement: Participating in the IPA was stressful for me. However, learners did not report any concerns about content related to legal professions or a lack of connection between assessment and instruction, which is reflected as positive in responses to the survey items.
5. Discussion
The present study investigated the perceptions of college learners enrolled in a second-year Spanish for Legal Professions, focusing on the IPA as the primary mode of assessment. Results indicate an overall positive attitude towards the use of IPAs in the course, positioning it as a potential viable form of assessment in the LSP classroom and contributing to the research gap in the field of LSP courses (O’Sullivan, 2012; Ruggiero, 2022). Moreover, these positive results regarding the use of IPAs at the undergraduate level support the findings of other semester-long studies like in Altstaedter and Krosi (2018) and Zapata (2016). Although this is a novel study on the use of IPAs in LSP courses, these results may encourage LSP instructors to integrate IPAs in their courses.
It is important to highlight that IPAs were reported as providing opportunities for real-life language use in their field. Furthermore, IPAs provided a strong connection with instruction and assessment. Foremost, learners’ responses on real-life language use is directly linked to the purpose of the IPA as assessments rooted in real-world communicative situations (Adair-Hauck et al., 2006). In terms of LSP courses, IPAs not only introduced real-life situations and authentic texts, but also provided learners with opportunities to reflect on real-life situations affecting their local communities through the lens of the criminal justice system. Additionally, students had the opportunity to reflect, as Ruggiero (2022) suggests, by drawing inferences from the text, making cultural comparisons, and providing their own opinion through personal reactions.
Regarding assessment and instruction, learners highly rated the link between the two, signaling an effective connection between IPAs and instruction. This result contrasts with that of Zapata (2016), where students at the intermediate level expressed less favorable attitudes to instruction and IPAs, reporting a considerable difference between instructors who effectively integrated IPAs into instruction and those who did not. To foster positive learner attitudes towards this type of assessment, Troyan et al. (2023) suggest to effectively embrace the IPA and to implement backward design.
In contrast, learners’ comments and responses to the IPA as being stressful, raise awareness on clear communications regarding the introduction and implementation of IPAs. First, the interpersonal speaking task can be challenging for students even if they have plenty of in-class practice. Moreover, regarding logistics and perceptions of IPAs as an exam, this can be the result of having two components of the IPA cycle on the same day, as opposed to one task per day. This can be most likely mitigated by implementing all three IPA components on different days or in different formats, such as online or as homework, or by reducing the total number of IPAs per semester from five to four. However, in their comments, many learners seemed to equate IPAs to traditional exams because this is their only point of reference from the previous year/s of study where they took traditional vocabulary and grammar tests. This finding coincides with Zapata (2016) where intermediate-level learners reported less favorable attitudes towards IPAs than those in introductory courses due to their previous experiences. Additionally, Martel (2018) also found that both instructors and learners deemed IPAs as a difficult assessment to study for. A similar comment was voiced by one of the students in the current study. This suggests that students with previous experiences with traditional exams who are used to memorization may be more likely to have concerns about this type of proficiency- and performance-based assessment.
This study has limitations, as previously discussed, due to the total number of class sessions and number of sessions per week. As a result, most cycles had two components of the IPA on a single day, typically the interpersonal and presentational formats. This prevented the instructor from providing appropriate feedback before students continued with the subsequent task, going against recommendations in Trace et al. (2015). This could potentially contribute to learners equating an IPA day with an exam day. Additionally, the principal researcher was also the instructor of record, which could have influenced learners’ responses on the questionnaire. Further research should address these limitations by, first, implementing four or less IPA cycles per semester, carrying out one task per class session, and having a different instructor, other than the researcher, teach the course.
6. Conclusion
This preliminary study on the use of IPAs in LSP courses and learner perspectives provides a positive outlook on the use of this approach in LSP courses. Learners’ perceptions were overwhelmingly positive in a third semester Spanish course for legal professions. These findings coincide with those of previous studies on the use of IPAs at the undergraduate level (Altstaedter & Krosi, 2018; Darhower & Smith-Sherwood, 2021; Zapata, 2016). Although the number of participants in this study is small, efforts are being made to expand this research in subsequent semesters with data from a fourth semester course in legal professions. Nonetheless, future studies could probe learners’ perspectives on the use of IPAs in other fields of LSP such as healthcare, business, and education professions. Complementary students could be instructor-facing, examining the perceptions of experienced LSP instructors and their perception on the use of IPAs. Finally, this study contributes to the extant research on IPAs and LSP courses, but more importantly, it further contributes to the minimal research that has already been conducted on assessment in the LSP classroom.