Assessment in School

Formative - Summative

What is Assessment?

Schools are to undertake assessment to collect information about students learning. This will occur through both formal and informal activities

Assessment is the process of identifying, gathering and interpreting information about students' learning. The central purpose of assessment is to provide information on student achievement and progress and set the direction for ongoing teaching and learning.

Formative Summative
Role of formative assessment indicates to student and teacher the progress in learning: feedback
Role of summative assessment how effective was the instruction?

Formative assessment often called assessment for learning

Summative assessment often called assessment of learning

Formative Assessment

This is classroom assessment which focuses on the learning as it is taking place and its function is to bring about improvement
Characterised by Teacher-Pupil and Pupil-Pupil interactions, self-assessment, diagnosis, and contingency.

Summative Assessment
Purposes

Decisions about teaching sets Information for the next teacher Reporting to Senior Management Team Reporting to Parents Target setting

Assessment for Learning acknowledges that assessment should occur as a regular part of teaching and learning and that the information gained from assessment activities can be used to shape the teaching and learning process. the curriculum is designed to enhance teaching and improve learning. It gives students opportunities to produce the work that leads to development of their knowledge, skills and understanding.

Assessment for Learning

Assessment for learning involves teachers in deciding how and when to assess student achievement, as they plan the work students will do, using a range of appropriate assessment strategies including self-assessment and peer assessment. Teachers will provide students with opportunities in the context of everyday classroom activities, as well as planned assessment events, to demonstrate their learning.

Assessment for learning

Driving force: signals to studentswhat they should be learning and how they should be learning it (Biggs, 2003)

Context: assessment component of teaching contextual-qualitative

Students Role: likely to be participatory

Assessment of learning
Driving force: grading or ranking; selecting; reporting Context: separate from teaching (you dont tell the kid the answers until review, if it occurs!) psychometric-quantitative (you need the numbers)

Students role: Put up take the punishment / bask in the glory

Improving learning through assessment

Dependent on five key factors: effective feedback to students active involvement of students in their own learning adjust teaching to take account of the results of assessment a recognition of the profound influence assessment has on the motivation and self-esteem of students the need for students to be able to self-assess and understand how to improve.

Why assessment for learning is critical

Greater recognition of how people learn best constructivist approach: people create meaning, using Why assessment for learning is critical prior knowledge, from what they do knowledge is created by the students learning activities active learning, discovery learning learning as and for conceptual change challenging conceptions

Why assessment for learning

Recognition of the benefits of peer-and selfassessment brings students into the loop; selfreflection more authentic need to create lifelong learners

Why assessment for learning

Greater recognition of: how strongly assessment influences student behaviour assessment as the strongest determinant of what students learn

Student view on learning

What is the syllabus?

Students arent experts on education teachers are! (metalanguage of teaching)

The assessment determines what I learn more than the syllabus

If its not an assessment task Im not doing it Is this assessable? Will this be in the exam?
Student view on learning

the assessment IS the syllabus

and why not?

Teacher view on learning

Syllabus driven

Today we are covering dot point. Todays lesson is aimed at outcome. This assessment task is assessing outcomes..

External exam driven Assessment task driven Student responsibility

This was an exam question in 2002 In the 2004 SC

Thats in the assessment task so Id better teach that well and make sure they know it

I taught it, I know I did. You did that as an assignment That was covered in the homework Kids always get that wrong

Qualities of the assessment for learning feedback

Sufficient feedback is provided, often enough & in enough detail The feedback is provided quickly enough to be useful to students Feedback focuses on learning rather than on marks or students Feedback is linked to the purpose of the assessment and to criteria Feedback is understandable to students

What students must do to advance their learning

Feedback is received by students and attended to they do something with it

Feedback is acted upon by students to improve their work or their learning

In practice, this means Clear evidence is gained about how to drive up individual attainment (for both teacher and student) Therefore Students know what they need to improve and how best they can do so A clear link between student learning and lesson planning occurs

Assessment for Learning occurs when evidence* and dialogue identify where kids are in their learning, where they need to go and how best for them to get there and this information is conveyed to the kid.

Should programming indicate what that evidence could look like?

Effective assessment for learning:

is embedded in the teaching and learning as an essential component involves sharing learning goals with pupils aims to help pupils know and recognise the standards they are aiming for

Effective assessment

involves pupils in self-assessment provides feedback that empowers students to recognise their next steps and then to take them is underpinned by a confidence that every student can improve has both teacher and student reviewing and reflecting on assessment data.

Assessment for learning

Consider the key questions: What do the students need to learn? Why does that learning matter? What do the students need to do to and demonstrate to show they have done that learning? How well do they have to do it? Where is it taking them? Plan the teaching learning program and assessment to answer these questions.

Assessment of learning
Driving force: grading or ranking; selecting; reporting
Context: separate from teaching (you dont tell the kid the answers until review, if it occurs!) psychometric-quantitative (you need the numbers) Students role: Put up take the punishment / bask in the glory

Assessment of Learning

Assessment for learning informs assessment of learning

Enables teachers to report on the status of student learning at various points in the teaching and learning program. Involves teachers making holistic professional judgements of student achievement, based on evidence collected from both formal and informal measures of each students performance against defined criteria, collected over time from a number of assessment for learning activities.

Quality assessment

Assessment promotes learning/ diagnostic Assessed tasks capture sufficient student time and effort Assessment tasks distribute student effort evenly across topics & weeks Assessment tasks engage students in productive learning activity Assessment communicates clear and high expectations to students Assessment is planned as part of programming and feeds into progamme revision

Collaborative planning and quality assessment processes

What kind of assessment can I use to provide students with the opportunity to: show what they have learnt address significant scientific content provide quality feedback to the student on their learning?

Assessment must be valid and reliable.

Collaborative planning and quality assessment processes

In practice, effective assessment is characterised by tasks which:

connect to prior learning engage students, are relevant and are valued by them allow students to demonstrate their language skills in context allow students to show what they know and can do.