Assessment in the Affective Domain: A Personal Viewpoint

Background:
Think back to your pre-service education. We learned then that curriculum study begins with some assumptions about the nature of the subject that we are going to teach. Usually, we learned that a subject comprised a content which had to be learned, skills and processes which had to be mastered and values or ideals which had to be absorbed as part of the learning process. Sometimes these dimensions of content, skills and values [or feeling about the subject] were presented as a hierarchy or a learning spiral. One couldnt move to develop skills until one had acquired the content of a subject; the values of the subject were a kind of perspective or controlling framework that comes with immersion or experience in the subject.

Imagine, for example, that a student is learning chemistry as part of a science program. The student needs to learn a basic content about elements, compounds, reactions and molecular structure. The student also learns laboratory skills and recording procedures and how to balance chemical equations. Above all this, the student is learning habits of mind, attitudes and values which might best be described as the Scientific Method. In the classroom or the laboratory, of course, the student does not learn content, process, skills and values in isolation and no matter at what level the student is engaged, these dimensions work together.

And all three dimensions are assessed not in every test instrument, certainly, and in a way that is age and stage appropriate. It would be a strange kind of science examination in which only content were examined or which attempted to test skills and processes in a way completely free of content. It would be a strange kind of science program that did not hope that students were actually beginning to think and act critically as they engaged with a content and skill.

In Religious Education, teachers usually begin with a content focus even if they quickly move to the area of process and skill. We are never far in our thinking, however, from the wider purposes of Religious Education the hope that we will make our students alert to and respectful of the spiritual in their own experience. An Anglican Religious Education program may not explicitly state that it aims to produce students who are believing and observant Anglicans but it is appropriate that our programs:

proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God through:

Vocation: Educating students to value themselves and each other as gifted parts of Gods creation. Helping students to develop their God given gifts, talents and opportunities to live out that vocation.

Service: Enabling students to develop skills and values to live in peace and harmony, seeking justice for all with a priority for the poor, powerless and persecuted and marginalised.1

While these are wide school aims they are also the aims of our own Religious Education programs. They speak of values and feelings which are described in the curriculum literature as affective goals. The question is not whether these are important goals; they obviously are very important they are intrinsic to what we do. The question is rather whether it is possible to assess and report in this area.

Just from the quotation above, we might identify a number of affective areas in which we want students to grow through the Religious education program:

Our students will feel themselves to be a part of creation in the hands of God.

Vision Statement for Anglican Schools in the Diocese of Brisbane May 2009

Our students will develop a sense that their talents and abilities are gifts equipping them to serve others.

Our students will experience a sense of vocation to a service beyond our own ego or personal needs.

Our students will experience a call to work for social justice, peace and harmony.

Our students will fell that the poor and marginalised of this world have a special claim on our compassion.

Is it Possible to Assess in the Affective Area? This is a vexed issue and draws forth different responses from very competent and effective teachers. There are two main viewpoints and a host of positions between the two poles:

Position 1: We acknowledge the important of learning in the affective domain. Of course we want students to learn much more than facts and skills from Religious Education programs. But that does not mean that we should ask for responses from students which may be manipulate or inauthentic. We cannot mandate the emotional and spiritual responses which students have to our work in class not can we even mandate their engagement in the process. If we have genuine responses from students which are negative, how are we to assess that response? Assessment in the affective domain is too much like reinforcing and rewarding a convergent response. Anyway, who are we to make assessments of a students feelings and responses anyway? Leave the assessment in the cognitive area at least we can be sure about what we are testing there.

Position 2: Yes, some assessment in the affective domain can be inauthentic, contrived, convergent and manipulative just as some assessment in the cognitive domain can be boring, repetitive, unimaginative and banal. It seems to make little sense to have great hopes for our RE programs and then to make no attempt to

assess in the most important dimensions of religious learning. In the hands of the respectful, sensitive and imaginative teacher, assessment in the affective area can be inclusive and growth promoting. It will not be the only assessment form used, of course, but it will be an important one.

Acknowledging the limitations and dangers of this area, I believe that it is both possible an appropriate to assess in the affective area. Some examples of such assessment follow. Some Models or Examples: Here are three sample assessment pieces, framed largely in the cognitive area:

Unit 1: Junior School unit on the Parables.

Original assessment task: Using your own words and photographs you have collected, make a slide show on Powerpoint telling one of the parables of Jesus. In the last slide of the show, try to tell us the message that Jesus was trying to share with his friends. Revised assessment task: Choose one of the parables of Jesus we have read in class in this unit. Now imagine how the story could be told from the point of view of one of the characters in the story. Using your own words and photographs you have collected, make a slide show on Powerpoint telling the parable from the point of view of the person you have chosen. You could choose the story of the Prodigal Son and tell the story from the point of view of the father, of the older or the younger brother, for example. Ot you could tell the story of the Good Samaritan from the point of view of the victim of the attack or of one of the people who passed by. In your last slide, try to tell us how this person felt in the story and what the student learned about his or her own life from the story.

Unit 2: Middle School unit on some foundational stories from the book of Genesis.
Original assessment task: Choose one of the stories you have studied in this unit. Using quotations from the text, explain why this is a significant or important story for the Hebrew people. What important learning is there in the story? Revised assessment task: Choose one of the stories you have studied in this unit. Using quotations from the text, explain why this is a significant or important story for the Hebrew people. For the story you have chosen, explain what the story has to say to you personally. If there isnt a story that speaks to you personally, choose a story and explain why it might have had great power for the original listener or audience.

Unit 3: Senior School unit on Christianity and Science.

Original assessment task: What scientific discoveries in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries challenged the faith of Christians and forced them to reconsider their faith? How do Anglican Christians respond today to the suggestion that scientists have made it impossible for us to continue to believe in the God of the Bible?

Revised assessment task: Think about your own faith and where you are on your journey. What makes it difficult for young people in your generation to believe as your grandparents might have believed? Interview three people from different generations and try to determine what they think is really important in life their absolute core values. You should try to make sure that the people you choose have some difference in background, education or culture. Share your findings in a slide show using some of your own feelings and ideas on this important topic of Science and Faith .