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Understanding assessment in education
Describe the characteristics of different methods of assessment in education and training
Techniques of Authentic assessment
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Recommended: Understanding assessment in education
Authentic assessment can be referred to as assessment tasks that epitomise actual reading and writing in school and in the real world. The key aim of authentic assessment is to evaluate various kinds of literacy abilities in contexts similar to actual situations whereby the alleged abilities are employed. It also aims at assessing the abilities of students in real-world. In other words it is a form of assessment that requires students to apply their skills to authentic projects and tasks (Chapman & King, 2005; Roberts & Inman, 2007). For instance, authentic assessment may require students to read actual texts, write meaningful topics for real purposes and take part in authentic literacy tasks such as writing letters, keeping journals, editing pieces of writing until it becomes suitable for readers and discussing books (Wiggins, 1989; Pearson & Valencia, 1987). According to Aiken (1996), authentic assessment was developed due to criticism directed towards multiple-choice tests which in most cases provide superficial ideas of a student’s knowledge and understanding in a particular subject area and the application of the knowledge acquired by the students
A critical look at the developed authentic assessment strategy shows that this assessment strategy is reliable and valid mainly because it provides a genuine accountability of knowledge and understanding of students. These assessments can be represented numerically or put on a scale so as to make it possible to integrate individual results and meet federal and state requirements for equivalent quantitative data (National Center for Fair and Open Testing, 1992). For instance, the performance of students in the various tasks that they are required to complete, can be quan...
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...ts, with learning support teachers and with parents to help the students acquire proficiency and maintain the recording devices availed by the school.
Case 3: For students with difficulty in writing
a. Students with difficulty in writing due to health or other circumstances will be assessed in their explanation and prediction mainly through speech recording or verbal explanations. The mark weights will be adjusted to accord more marks for verbal explanation.
b. The assessment strategy will be modified by allowing them to record their explanations and predictions of the water cycle experiments and by noting their verbal responses when specifically asked.
c. This would require collaboration with learning support officers and year level coordinator to provide the recording equipment such as tape recorders and to record their observations for assessment.
Students dread the time of the year when they stop with their course material and begin to prepare for test. Everyone is in agreement that some type of revolution is needed when it comes to education; eliminating standardized test will aid the reform. The need for standardized testing has proven to be ineffective and outdated; some leading educationalist also believe this because the tests do not measure a student’s true potential. This will save money, stop labeling, and alleviate stress in students and teachers.
Current educational policy and practice asserts that increased standardized student testing is the key to improving student learning and is the most appropriate means for holding individual schools and teachers accountable for student learning. Instead, it has become a tool solely for summarizing what students have learned and for ranking students and schools. The problem is standardized tests cannot provide the information about student achievement that teachers and students need day-to-day. Classroom assessment can provide this kind of information.
Assessment is defined in the Merriam – Webster Dictionary as “the act of making a judgement about something” and thus connotes a worthwhile activity based on sound, careful thought. In Education, assessment has been variously defined as “any systematic method for obtaining information from tests and other sources, used to draw inferences about characteristics of people, objects or programs” (AERA, APA, & NCME, 1999, p.172); “any purported and formal action to obtain information about the competence and performance of a candidate’ (Schuwirth & van der Vleuten, 2014. p.243). Generally, assessment has three purposes. First, to determine what students do and do not know,
This paper explores a few of the many alternatives to standardized testing within the education system. Also, this research helps the reader understand what standardized exams are, why they are used, and how educators can use other ways of assessing to “test” the children’s/students’ abilities throughout the year. Some of these substitutions may include personal portfolios, developmental benchmarks, and a variety of analyses on comprehension by recording different sessions. Furthermore, this exposition uses research from many different resources to support the importance, credibility, and objectivity of other assessment tools besides standardized test. By reading this composition, one will learn the pros and cons of uniform evaluation implementations and why it is important for everyone’s individual learning and development that standardized testing are no longer required.
Assessments are an important part of teaching. Assessments are a good way for teachers to monitor students’ learning and understanding. Knowing students’ level of understanding can help teachers improve students’ learning and guide their instructions. In the future, I plan to continue assessing students in multiple ways such as, asking questions, illustrations and writing to adjust my instruction. I also plan to encourage students to assess their own work so they are involved in their own learning as well as look for ways to “employ technology to support assessment
Assessment templates and documents – Most centers will have a certain format that has been agreed and put in place for Assessors to use. For example, when planning assessment, there will be standardised forms for you to use to record assessment planning as well as feedbacks.
This contribute to the assessment because this information can be use to improve and enhance future performance. 6.5 Record the outcomes of assessments to meet the internal and external requirements In my teaching practices, I always record assessments outcomes as it helps me to follow my students progression and at the same time I can monitor learners' achievement. All information concerning their assessments are recorded, I use them to compare each assessments to the other. I can see which assessment was successful and which assessment has not been done properly.
Zumwalt, C. (2012). Authentic assessment and early childhood education—an update and Resources. Little Prints, 6(1), 1-15.
A key characteristic is that the assessment information used by both teacher and pupils to modify their work in order to make it more effective”. In a similar vein, Tunstall and Gipps (1996) wrote “formative assessment means teachers using their judgments of children knowledge or understanding to feedback into the teaching process and to determine for individual children whether to re-explain the task/concept, to give further practice on it or move on the next stage”. (cited in Harry Torrance and John Pryor, 1998, p389). In addition, Black & Wiliam (1998) adopted a more restrictive definition by limiting the term to assessment conducted while learning was taking place. They defined formative assessment as a concept that teachers use information from activities to determine the next steps in learning and teaching. In their viewpoints, the information from a formative assessment actually is used to adjust instruction ‘to meet students’ needs”. In other words, these adjustments were not only to be made in the instruction but they needed to work. Likewise, Brown (2004) also stated this point in his definition. He defines formative assessment as “evaluating students in the process of ‘forming’ their competencies and skills with the goal of helping them to continue that growth process”, (p
In the past, assessments were popularly conducted for the purpose of accreditation, but with the growing change in the quality of education, it has become evident that assessments aren’t just products to qualification but as Sieborger (1998) identifies, is that assessment is the process of gathering and interpreting knowledge to make valid and justifiable judgements about the learners performance and the assessors ability to transfer and establish knowledge to the learners.
So what’s the big issue with traditional testing methods? They’ve been instituted for years and no one seemed to have a problem before now. Well, in the past decade, the nation’s citizens have become increasingly compassionate towards students and their individual needs. President George W. Bush has gotten generous praise for his No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 as a result of popular concerns among communities across the country. While the act may still have areas in need of improvement, it illustrates that educators, parents, and students alike have been desirous of reform within school systems. “The number of calls complaining about high-stakes exams coming from parents...are increasing, and is a reason for concern” (Report, 2001). The recent act caters to the actualization that students are different from one another, and in order for teaching and learning to take place in a non-discriminatory manner, adjustments must be made. According to the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), “Alternative assessment is any form of measuring what students know and are able to do other than traditional standardized tests. Alternative forms of assessment include portfolios that are collections of students' work over time, performance-based assessments, and other means of testing students such as open-ended essays with no single correct answer, and project work that involves collaboration with peers” (2000). Students learn in many ways. Some learn by listening to lessons and may prefer an environment with the aid of music and rhythm. Others may be visual learners who gather information by looking at photographs or watching videos. There are still others that learn kinesthetic...
Newmann, F. M. & Archbald, D. A. (1992). The nature of authentic academic achievement. Toward a New Science of Educational Testing and Assessment. State University of New York Press, Albany New York. 71-84.
In spite of the importance of assessment in education, few teachers receive proper training on how to design or analyze assessments. Due to this, when teachers are not provided with suitable assessments from their textbooks or instructional resources, teachers construct their own in an unsystematic manner. They create questions and essay prompts comparable to the ones that their teachers used, and they treat them as evaluations to administer when instructional activities are completed predominantly for allocating students' grades. In order to use assessments to improve instruction and student learning, teachers need to change their approach to assessments by making sure that they create sound assessments. To ensure that their assessments are sound they need include five basic indicators that can be used as steps to follow when creating assessments. The first of these indicators and the first step a teacher must take when creating a sound assessme...
Through assessment students and teachers are able to determine the level of mastery a student has achieved with standards taught. Both formative and summative assessment should be purposeful and targeted to gain the most accurate data to drive further instruction (Ainsworth, 2010). While this syllabus does a good job of identifying the need for both formal and informal assessments, the way in which this is communicated does not provide enough detail for understanding. Simply listing assessment types does not give any insight into how these assessments fit in the learning process of this course. While some of the assessments mentioned could be common assessments chosen by the school or district to gain insight into the effectiveness of instruction, the inclusion of authentic assessments is most beneficial to students and demonstrates learning in a context closer to that of a work environment (Rovai, 2004). Unfortunately, this particular course, according to this syllabus, relies heavily on quizzes and traditional tests and essays to form the bulk of assessment opportunities. While other activities, such as formative assessments, journaling and discussions are mentioned as possible avenues for scoring, they are given a very low percentage of the overall grade. This shows that they are not valued for their ability to show progression and mastery. If this is indeed the case, this puts the students as a
As I reflect on my past assessment process, I realized how much my assessments have changed over the years. In my early years, I used tests for informational recall as my assessments. I felt these were appropriate guidelines in which I needed to follow in order to substantiate a student’s grade. Every assignment or tests was given a point value and then based on the amount of points, a grade was given. Every student’s assessment was exactly the same, and the assessments did not contain any subjectivity. I felt confident in giving the grade based on a valid point system. However reflecting back, I see that I did not include any performance-based assessments or individual learning styles in my early assessment. I also did not take into consideration the individual needs of my students. My assessment approach was awful. I am embarrassed that I use to assess students in this manner.