First, spend a few minutes thinking about the purpose of assessment

and the characteristics of good assessment.

Purpose assess student understanding; assess teachers methods of

teaching
Characteristics-fair; reasonable; aligns with achievable expectations

Youtubehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=TibnESb7xbM&list=PLa0gX9zTFeXt8A-E8haB6-3kpE4Xg_V8m

Good assessment gives students the best possible opportunity in their

learning; the best opportunity to grow their knowledge, understanding and
skills
Assessment is the purposeful collection of evidence of student learning
Assessment can be AS; FOR and OF learning (context)
Students will be able to see the point & engage with it
Students master the skills and strategies & monitor their own learning
Good assessment is valid, fair and clear
It should look like the curriculum; reflect the skills and strategies of the
learning areas
Valid assessment invites students to demonstrate the breadth, depth &
range of what they know
Provides evidence for teachers to make judgements about how well
students show what they know and can do
Good assessment in not gender biased

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF GOOD ASSESSMENT YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giPne1PP0rw&list=PL11177732AD902F96

Assessment can drive learning

Dont assess because you have to, but because theres a reasonAlign the assessment with your learning outcomes & learning activities

CHAPTER 1: contexts for assessment

and reporting

Assessment is the process that monitors students learning progress

Reporting makes the results available to a variety of audiences p 1
Assessment requires us to make judgements p 2
Can provide the basis for further action p 2
In the classroom, assessments relate to:
o The school curriculum
o To teaching
o To what students learn p 2

These might be formal & include the marking of essays,

teacher-devised tests or assessment of a portfolio of
completed work
They might be very formal and include standardised tests,
high stakes exams or international surveys of student
knowledge
Educational objectives of assessment-concerns gathering info on student
progress in such a way that it can be used by teachers (& parents) to help
students improve their learning. E.g. providing feedback to students so
they can better understand what they need to do to improve their
performance p 2
Instrumental objectives-relate to sifting and sorting e.g. provide cut off
scores that will help unis decide who will get a place and who will not.
Within schools, the results of a teacher made test might be to group
students into different ability classes Blackmore p 2
Technical terms relating to assessment- p 3
o Norm-referenced assessment rank orders the performance of
individual students-enables comparison of different levels of
performance & groups in terms of age, gender, ethnicity or
socioeconomic status
o Criterion-referenced assessment- individual students performance
compared with predefined criteria or goal used to demonstrate
what students know; are able to do does NOT seek to compare
students
o Standards-based assessment criterion referencing to show a
students performance in relation to expected levels of achievement
@ specific grade/stage levels
o Standardised test-developed; administers; scored & interpreted
according to a common set of procedures often used with large
samples of students-such tests may be norm-referenced or criterion
referenced
o Traditional assessment-paper and pencil tests with multiple choice;
T or F; fill in the blanks; matching exercises
o Alternative assessment-students demonstrate their level of
achievement by creating a response or a product e.g, essay;
painting; oral presentation; open ended question; group projects
o Performance-based assessment alternative form that engages
students in role play; debate; playing musical instruments; group
work; drama. Judgements are made through direct observation of
performance
o Authentic assessment real world activities and assessment of
these p 4
o Portfolio assessment-a collection of student work samples or
products collected over time to demonstrate progress in learningessential to clearly state the criteria for including work samples; the
criteria or standards for judging performance need to be agreed
o Formative assessment students receive feedback about the
progress they are making in learning new concepts, skills or

attitudes. Can occur during teaching/learning process, or as

structured feedback on work samples submitted by students.
Students can improve their learning, and teachers can use it to
develop new and more effective ways of teaching
o Summative assessment-takes place at the end of a unit of work, a
subject or a course-indicates whether expected learning outcomes
have been achieved
o Reliability-assessments consistency and stability-assessment result
should be the same irrespective of when, where and how the
assessment was taken, who marked it and when it was marked
o Validity-the extent to which an assessment task accurately reflects
the knowledge, skills and values being assessed. Tasks linked to
curriculum objectives & outcome statements should have a high
degree of validity. Tasks must be fair to all students so that the
content of the task does not favour one group of students over
another
OUTCOMES OF SCHOOLING-p 5
o Everyone has a stake in the outcomes of schooling-students;
parents; business and industry; governments and society
o Concern with the outcomes of schooling is deeply embedded in the
social, economic and political contexts of the modern nation
ECONOMIC CONTEXTS P 6 the knowledge economy & information
revolution
o Assessment and reporting is the way society monitors the
development of its skills and knowledge base. p 7
o Assessment and reporting informs society about the progress young
people make @ school p 7
o Assessment provides some measure of that progress/reporting
makes that measure publicly available and capable of being
contested p 7
o A crucial function for schools has always been to provide the
economy with workers and professionals who can contribute
productively to economic activity p 7
o National assessment of numeracy & literacy allows students
learning progress to be monitored on a regular basis and for reports
to be made to students, their parents and the community p 7
EQUITY AND SOCIAL CONTEXTS- p 7
o To meet the needs of all students, particularly in social contexts,
assessment must be equitable for all individuals and groups e.g.
students whose 1st language is not English, required to take tests in
English; high stakes testing, used to select students for uni entrance
favours students from high socioeconomic areas over those from
low socioeconomic areas
o Assessment can also point to inequities e.g. indigenous students
where English was not always spoken & where school attendance
was poor P8
o Assessment must be used with care and not to unintentionally
create social outcomes p 9

Assessment however can alert us to potential social problems &

inequities & provide the grounds on which specific action can be
taken p 9
ACCOUNTABILITY P 9
o An example of assessment used for accountability include the
NAPLAN p 9
o This assessment enables education systems to determine social
groups, schools and regions that are not meeting acceptable levels
in basic skills, and appropriate action to then be taken
Personal fulfilment and satisfaction-p 10
o Need for assessment to be responsive to the needs of individual
students p 10
o Assessment based on personal dimensions, are important as they
recognise each student as individual, enabling teachers to know
where children are, how they are responding to lessons and
activities, and how they are or are not progressing p 11
o Student-centred assessment involves being in constant
conversation with the children about the sense they are making of
their work, what it is they are learning and doing (Smith &
Goodwin, 1997, p 103-p 11
o

CHAPTER 2The Role of Assessment-p 15

Modes of assessment (NSW Board of Studies)

o Formal; formative; continuous; coursework; process-orientated;
internal
o Informal (everyday teaching); summative; terminal (at the end of
the term/semester/year/stage); examination; product-orientated
(written texts, artworks etc); external (assessed by person/people
outside the teaching situation p 16
o Different forms of assessment short answer tests, essays, multiple
choice, quizzes and oral presentation test different kinds of
knowledge and skills - 15
TYPES OF ASSESSMENT AND THEIR PURPOSES
o Teachers tend to use informal modes of assessment each day-very
often such assessment is formative p 15
o Summative assessment, perhaps using formal tasks that are
common across grade levels, are used during the year, sometimes
mid year and end of year. This is all internal assessment during
earlier years
o Categories of assessment Wyatt-Smith and Ludwig p 17
Cohort testing e.g. NAPLAN-All students
Survey sampling- TIMSS-selection of students from a
particular year level
Progress mapping-e.g. Year 2 Diagnostic Net; PIPSdevelopmental continuum (sometimes referred to as a
profile), drawn up from a learning area e.g. maths, and

individual student progress can be mapped against what is

considered to be typical
School based assessment-years 11 & 12 Qld & ACT-teachers
and schools take responsibility for the assessment of
students achievements
Standardised tests administered for diagnostic purposes or to
measure the achievement of an entire age group of students
can help teachers to plan for learning or help parents to
understand how well their child is doing in relation to others 15
Informal assessment = any process that allows the teacher to make
judgements about what students are learning e.g. observations of
students, seeking feedback from students during teaching, checking on
homework, asking questions, a short-answer test during the course of a
unit of work)
The way assessment is conducted influences students attitudes-18
Hattie & Jaeger suggest that assessment be an integral part of teaching
and learning process, rather than an add on-18
Authentic assessment or performance based assessment
o Can take into account the personal histories of students, engaging
them more in assessment tasks that are meaningful p 18
o Is used to depict holistic assessments that are embedded in
classroom contexts and enables children to demonstrate learning by
integrating and applying knowledge and skills to real world tasks-18
o Challenges assessment practices to be relevant, meaningful and
engaging for students-18
Standardised assessment doesnt consider variations in backgrounds - 18
CONTEXTS FOR DIFFERENT TYPES OF Assessment p 19
o Assessment occurs in contexts
In the classroom on a daily basis
The broader social and political context in which schools are
embedded
Large scale assessments that test an entire age group in
literacy/numeracy must be formal, objective, time-efficient, cost-efficient,
widely applicable and centrally processed p19
Assessments designed to support classroom learning are informal, teacher
mandated, adapted to local context, locally scored, sensitive to short-term
change in students knowledge, and meaningful to students. they
provide immediate, detailed and complex feedback-p19
The importance of both large scale and classroom assessment, is the
extent to which they are able to contribute to school environments that
encourage creative and critical thinking, problem solving, teamwork, good
interpersonal skills, and literacy and numeracy p 20
Making assessment meaningful for students, and relating it to their
interests/cultural backgrounds, ensure integrating assessment into the
teaching/learning process-20
THE REPORTING OF OUTCOMES FOR DIFFERENT TYPES OF ASSESSMENT
p 20

GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR ASSESSMENT AND REPORTING p 23

o Improve students performance/learning
o Should be based on an understanding of how students learn
o Enables students to demonstrate what they know, value and are
able to do
o Focused on moving beyond gathering & recalling information
o Has clear direct links with outcomes
o Integral part of the course, not added on
o Is fair, free from bias and inclusive
o Monitors learners emotional wellbeing
o Provides timely, precise, genuine and constructive feedback
Assessment principles-should: - p 25
o Facilitate learning
o Refer to criteria that are explicit
o Identify strengths/achievements
o Cover all aspects of the curriculum
o Encourage a variety of intended learning outcomes
o Use a range ofstrategies
o Involve teacher judgement
o Enable self-assessment
o Provide opportunities for students to work together
o Provide opportunities for students to negotiate required tasks
o Provide more than one opportunity for students to meet
requirements
o Be sensitive to gender, culture, linguistic, physical disability,
socioeconomic status & geographical location (Aust Curriculum
Studies Association 1994)
General agreement that assessment should be student-centred
curriculum-related, constructive, cooperative and inclusive p 25
THE EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES OF ASSESSMENT AND REPORTING p 27

CHAPTER 3:

Assessment can be used to improve learning when properly designed

provides feedback
To students, leads to re-teaching and provides extra opportunities for
practice p 30-31
Designing valid, reliable and fair assessment
o Needs to reflect as accurately as possible what students know and
are able to do-31
o Validity-tied to the purposes for which an assessment is used p
31
o Test validity should depend in part upon whether the test simulates
real world tests of ability. (Wiggins, in Brady, p 32)
o Various types of evidence can be used to judge the validity of an
assessment task:
Construct validity-is appropriate in terms of its stated
purposes-it is a relevant, meaningful and fair task that will
provide accurate info about what students know; are able to

do, within the domain of knowledge, skills, or values being

assessed
Content validity assessment task linked to specific
curriculum objectives, outcomes or standards
Consequential validity-specific groups of students e.g.
indigenous students consistently do poorly on the
assessment task (Interpreted as-the assessment task is
biased & therefore invalid for some students)
Concurrent validity-student results on one task are repeated
on a similar task
Predictive validity-results of the assessment task predict
some future performance p 32
Assessment tasks, if they are to be considered authentic, must be
challenging, relevant and engaging for students p 33
They must reflect real world contexts and situations that will confront
students outside of school p 33
Valid and reliable tasks need to be fair p 34
To detect any bias, examine differences such as splitting the results for
boys and girls; English as a first or second language p 35
Assessment tasks need to be authentic and meaningful p 36
Wiggins-teaching and assessment are linked this is the basis for
assessment that needs to be meaningful, relevant and engaging for
students p 36
Broadfoot sees assessment as a way of promoting learning- encourage
more effective learning and then use assessment to encourage the desire
to learn p 36
Broadfoot- better recording and reporting processes records of
achievement as a way of recognising the whole range of student
achievement and asserting the need to motivate and encourage students
development p 36-37
Assessment through this way, is more about celebrating achievement ,
and is concerned more with individuals and their progress rather than
ranking and rating individuals against one another p 37
Broadfoot assessment for learning-acknowledge that assessment should
occur as a regular part of teaching and learning & that information gained
from assessment activities can be used to shape the teaching and learning
process (Curriculum Corporation) p 37
Assessment for learning the process of seeking and interpreting
evidence for use by learners and their teachers to decide where the
learners are in their learning, where they need to go and how best to get
there (Assessment reform group) p 37
A F L is a regular part of the teaching process, and its capacity to provide
feedback that can help students to improve their learning p 37
Formative assessment enables teachers to use evidence to adapt the
teaching to meet students needs -37
Assessment and reporting come under scrutiny of groups/individuals
external to schools, but who see themselves as having a stake in the
outcome of schooling p 39

These include accountability; school reform; and the social purposes of

schooling:
o Assessment, accountability and politics-large scale assessmentsdistinct from classroom assessments, are designed not so much for
learning as for accountability p 39
o School reform and the economy-there is a strong, unwanted view in
Australia that if only schools could do more to enhance student
achievement the nation would do much better economically p 40
o Schools and their social purposes-assessments:
Help students and their parents understand what progress is
being made in learning
How much of the journey has been completed successfully
How far there is to go
What needs to be accomplished along the way p 40
it is the content of schooling that will provide young people
with pathways to the future p 40
Designing assessment FOR learning can help students to
demonstrate how they are progressing against important
goals and outcomes that will help them not just in the
classroom but in the broader society of which they are a partp 40

CHAPTER 4

Traditional and authentic assessment- often norm-referenced

o Standardised tests according to Darling-Hammond, Ancess and Falk,
fail to assess student ability to perform real-world tasks as they:
Require single correct answers, rather than engaging with
complex/big problems therefore tests do not assess the
ability to learn in meaningful contexts
Promote a view of the curriculum as the narrow often
superficial coverage of content, as teachers focus on subject
mastery rather than research, discussion and problem solving
Provide little meaningful diagnostic information on how
students solve problems or approach tasks-instead they
promote a view of students as having deficits that need
remediation p 44

o Cumming and Maxwell- identify 4 main interpretations of

authentic assessment
Performance assessment or tasks assessed by actual
demonstration
Situated assessment, or tasks assessed in context
Problem based assessment or assessment of tasks that
involve more than mere technical facility
Competence-based assessment, or tasks assessed for
competence in the workplace p 44

Authentic assessment- involves a variety of assessment strategies that

capture the quality of a students work; focuses on students normal daily
work/performance, rather than just by tests; reflects the actual learning
and teaching of the classroom beyond the real world p 44
Authentic assessment allows learning to continue while assessing; regards
learners as active participants; - p 44
Wiener and Cohen advantages of authentic assessment:
o Uses tasks that reflect normal classroom activities
o Focuses on higher-level thinking skills
o Embeds assessment in the classroom context
o Requires active performance to demonstrate understanding
o Promotes a wide range of assessment strategies
o Involves the teacher and student collaboratively in determining
assessment
o Focuses on progress, rather than identifying weaknesses p 45
Brady & Kennedy, provide a classification that focuses on the sources of
assessment:
o Outcomes-formal , practical, performance dance, art or writing,
oral tasks in debates and reports; assignments
o Processes student-student interaction; student-teacher
interaction; social and casual interaction; formal behaviour
o Personal attributes-initiative in defining, structuring and
coordinating tasks; commitment of completing tasks; moral/ethical
behaviour; pro-social behaviour; risk taking orientation
o Records-personal histories; information from surveys and research;
other records involving discipline, attendance, library borrowing etc
p 45
A - TESTS-standardised and teacher-devised
o Standardised-are commercially produced tests distributed with a
manual explaining how the test is to be administered/marked.
o Majority are achievement tests-usually English and maths
o Other tests include aptitude tests; intelligence tests; interest and
aptitude tests; competency tests-p 46
o An example is the NAPLAN test, which produce data for parents on
1. Individual students; 2. For schools to report to communities; 3.
For aggregate reporting against national standards- p 47
o Teacher-Devised-developed by teachers for their own classroom
use
o when focused on outcomes, such tests can assist students in
identifying areas to target-when used in conjunction with other
assessment strategies, they can provide an accurate description of
student achievement
o effective student achievement tests, must assess clearly defined
and intended outcomes; must be in line with the outcomes; must
provide results that are meaningful and relevant information;
identifies particular student weaknesses to be identified; needs to
provide quick feedback p 47
o When preparing teacher-devised tests:
Match the test item to the learning outcome

Write items that clearly specify the task-simple

vocab/sentence structure/statements that are
unambiguous/material not gender-ethnic specific
Develop items that are free from irrelevant/unrelated material
Ensure marker agreement concerning answers
Match the difficulty level of items with the learning outcome
Write items that do not provide clues as to correct/incorrect
answers
Create items that do not assist students in answering
subsequent items in the test
Develop more items than required p 47-48
Teacher devised/standardised tests include:
Multiple choice-direct question/incomplete statement form/for
different cognitive levels-knowledge; comprehension;
application; analysis p 49
Guidelines for writing multiple choice-relate items to
significant learning outcomes; position easier items
early in the test to assist weaker students & develop
confidence p 49
Dont give clues to the right answer; use positive forms
e.g. most important; most relevant rather than least
Write in simple language; ensure there is only 1 clear
answer
Make distracters plausible
Consider using graphs, tables and pictures
Vary the position of the correct answer-p50
True-false-benefits-can cover a larger amount of subject
content; quicker to mark. Limits performance which may be
influenced by guessing
Guidelines for writing true-false tests Provide a statement that is definitely true or false
Eliminate clues to the answer e.g. all, never, always
tend to be false,---usually, may, sometimes tend to be
true
Include one main idea in each statement rather than
confuse with a variety of notions
State the item in + form and avoid double s
Ensure that true statements are not consistently longer
or shorter than false statements
Avoid statements expressing opinion only.
E.gwordsworth was a better poet than Coleridge this
is an opinion not a fact p 51
Short answer
Benefits-capacity to assess a wide range of content,
the ease of developing items, the reduced likelihood of
guessing (as with multiple choice and true false items);
high reliability of marking-p 52
Guidelines for writing short answer ?s:

Ask for a single brief answer

Indicate the precision required in answers if not
already obvious
Specify the criteria for answering e,g, spelling,
grammar, handwriting- students need to be made
aware of this p 53
Begin ?s with verbs such as compare, contrast, predict,
and give reasons for, rather than what, who, and when
because the latter only require recall p 53
Mark the more sophisticated short answer items 1 ? at
a time, without knowing what assessment belongs to
which student
Arrange questions in order of difficulty p 53
Matching tests Guidelines for matching tests-place the premises on
the left, the responses on the right
Use an uneven number of premises to responses- p 53
Cloze-otherwise know by Alexander (2006) as restricted
response questions.
Cloze can be used to assess knowledge,
comprehension and the ability to understand written
material p 54
Cloze assessments are often accompanied by diagrams
that have to interpreted
Guidelines for cloze-place blanks at the end of the
sentence, so complete statement can be ascertained
before the missing info is supplied
Eliminate clues to the answers, such as providing short
blanks (prompts) for short words, and long blanks for
long words
Focus on content that is factual or declarative
Ensure the prompt requires a single unambiguous
answer - 53
Interpretive-test items may present a paragraph, table, chart,
map or picture
Guidelines-develop the presented material so that it is
relevant to the outcomes being assessed
Ensure that answers are not given directly in the
material and that it is not possible to answer the
question without the material
Make the presented material easy to interpret and as
succinct as possible p 55
Concept maps-also known as mind maps, plot maps, and
semantic webbing- used to determine what students already
know or have learned, as they indicate how they see the
relationships between concepts by graphically organising
them.

Concept maps assist students by meaningfully

connecting new info with existing knowledge; assists
them in organising their knowledge effectively; enables
the cognitive structures of students to be made visible,
and provided teachers with valuable info both about
the way students perceive the relationship between
concepts and the misconceptions they have
Guidelines for implementing concept maps-ensure that
students brainstorm all they know about a topic
Request students to place the most importance topic
at the top or middle of the page so they can organise
concepts hierarchically
Allow each concept to be used only once p 56
Essays extended writing Essays enable students to formulate their own
answers-to develop an approach, to determine what
emphasis should be given to particular factual
information. Students can be assessed on organising,
integrating and communicating ideas. Apart from
displaying the skills of exposition and persuasion, an
essay reveals quality of structuring, grammar and
vocab p 56
Essays useful for meeting outcomes where students
defend, generalise, give examples, demonstrate,
predict, outline, relate, create, devise, design, explain,
rewrite, summarise, tell, write, appraise, compare,
conclude, contrast, criticize, interpret, justify or
support p 56
Benefits- sophisticated learning outcomes involving
analysis, synthesis and evaluation can be assessed, &
the assessment format allows the student relative
freedom in answering. Teacher time in preparing the
assessment is minimal p 57
Limitations-difficult to relate the answer to learning
outcomes, as students are able to freely organise,
integrate and express their answers as they deem
appropriate p 57
Limitations do students have sufficient writing skills
to convey their achievement and reasoning skillsmarking can be time consuming; differences in
markers
Guidelines for writing essay ?s:
o specify the exact nature of the task required
o consider providing a model for students e.g.
might give an initial position statement & 3
reasons with an example for each the no. of
words might be specified for each

determine whether marking will be analytically

(using a checklist), or holistically
o Confine essays to assessing complex outcomesessays are rarely the appropriate form for
assessing knowledge only
o Relate topics to outcomes- real challenge for
teachers is designing essays that validly assess
one or a cluster of outcomes p 57
Interviews/conferences- p 58
Conner reports 5 different kinds of interview
o Structured or standardised interview involving a
predetermined set of ?s
o Unstructured or unstandardized interview
usually associated with counselling
o Non-directive interview, which is largely
controlled by the interviewee
o Focused interview, which is directed at a
particular topic
o Conversational interview, conducted in a relaxed
fashion and often yields insights about students
(these 2 the main ones in schools)
o Benefits of interviews allows for probing, face to
face communication, ready identification of
problems, capacity to adapt the age or language
level
o Limitations-inability of some students to express
their thoughts or reveal their feelings can be
time consuming
o Guidelines for conducting interviews:
Establish empathy without assuming a
dominating role
Preserve neutrality when feelings are
being expressed
Adopt care in formulating ?s-all students
should be able to discuss the issues if the
language, intention and context of the
interview are appropriate p 58
B- Performance assessment:
o Forster and Masters performance assessment is The assessment
of students as they engage in real learning activities. It is the onthe-spot evaluation of performance, behaviour or interaction. P 58
o Based on constructivism theory than traditional forms of
assessment on the belief that learners are active builders of their
own knowledge who relate new learning to what they already know,
and who understand that new learning can be transferred to other
situations p 59
o

o
o
o
o

Examples of performance assessments portfolios; exhibitions;

annotated sketchbooks, games, critiques may include role plays,
performances in dance or sport, - p 59
Performance assessment may also be used to assess both product
(a finished work or completed performance) and process (the range
of skills required to produce the finished work from concept to
creation-p 59
Clark a balanced approach to grading considers both student
engagement in the process of creation and the quality of the
resulting product or performance p 59
Performance assessment ensures that assessment is integral to
teaching and learning; it allows teachers to readily identify student
needs; it involves a wide range of assessment strategies, including
checklists, anecdotal records and rating scales; it enables students
to be involved in their own learning; it permits students to
demonstrate knowledge and skills in context; it enables teachers to
observe the processes that students use in demonstrating learning;
and it provides direct info about student performance to the student
and parent (NSW Dept of School Education) p 59
Alexander- performance assessment- has complexity (students deal
with more complex ideas that cannot be conveyed in a few words);
procedural orientation (students are engaged with how to
knowledge); depth of expression (students explore topics or
processes in more depth than with traditional assessment); student
engagement (students are more typically involved in their own
assessment) p 59
Observation is the central component of performance assessment
p 59
It also involved recording the observation so that student progress
over time can be ascertained p 59
Performance assessments typically require a method of
recording/scoring or a rubric-p 59
Rubric-scoring-recording sheet could use 1, 2, 3, or not achieving,
achieving, achieving beyond
Anecdotal records-brief descriptors of a significant classroom
event
No standard or prescribed format for anecdotal records
Observations often recorded in a teachers notebook
Benefits-possibility of gathering evidence about a
variety of student behaviours, the capacity to improve
teacher understanding through providing ongoing
records, the opportunity for closer relationships with
students and that no particular preparation or training
is required-p 61
Limitations describes behaviour after the event
(raises concerns about how well a teacher remembers
the incident.)
Guidelines for using anecdotal records:

Focus on meaningful incidents that relate to

learning, rather than behaviours
o Write sufficient info to be understandable later &
make written records shortly after observations
o Ensure that observations are made for all
students p 61
Checklists a list of dimensions, characteristics or behaviours
that are essentially a yes or no
Checklists are useful for determining the What (the
subject matter learned), and the HOW (the process
mastered) p 61
May include tick boxes for content that is expected as
well as space for teacher to write comments p 61
Benefit-teachers have valuable info on how a student
is developing according to a particular theory of
learning
o can assess the process and product of learning
Limitation-checklists rely heavily on teacher
observation
Guidelines create the checks by sequencing the
components of a task
o Ensure that a single dimension is provided for
each check
o Provide a space for the checks and commentsp62
Rating scales-Excellent, very good, average, fair, and poor, to
tasks. Can also contain a Likert scale from 1 to 5
Like checklists, rating scales can rate both the
processes & products of learning p 62
Guidelines for developing rating scales:
o Ascertain the behaviours to be assessed, stating
them in clear language
o Determine the number of points for the scale
according to the fineness with which teachers
can discriminate p 63
C PRODUCT ASSESSMENT Forster and Masters state product assessment
is the assessment of students mastery of the processes and tools to
make productsand the assessment of the practical and/or aesthetic
qualities of the items students make p 63
o Product assessment does have a process dimension:-an exhibition,
project or portfolio is the product of a process that may involve
collecting and organising info, just as a dramatic performance is the
product of planning and rehearsing. p 63
o Some products may be the means for assessing aspects of process,
or skills deemed to be more important than the product itself e.g.
baking a cake produces a product, yet the teachers major concern
may be the students ability to measure and weigh ingredients.
This is not product assessment p 63
o

Portfolios-has 2 elements:
-a collection of student work that demonstrates the
achievement of outcomes:
o A collection of student work that shows evidence
of learning
o The systematic and selective collection of work
that shows mastery or growth
o A collection of materials assembled by students
to demonstrate achievement
o A deliberate strategic and specific collection of
student work that demonstrates that learning
has occurred
-student engagement-essential to ensure portfolios are
not simply a bunch of stuff collected by teachers or
students
o May involve students collaborating with teachers
to select content, or students reflection on
learning---or both p 64
Another characteristic is the rubric or criteria for
judging the portfolio
Smith, Brewer and Heffner, discuss several portfolios:
o Showcase portfolio (best work)
o Reflective portfolio (specific learning)
o Cumulative portfolio (collection over time)
o Goal-based portfolio (pre-established outcomes)
p 64
Borich and Tombari discuss:
o Working portfolio (work in progress)
o Display portfolio ( best work for presentation)
o Assessment portfolio (may include either or both
of the above and documents what a student has
learned)
Richter discusses:
o Working portfolio (daily work)
o Showcase portfolio (containing best work) p 64
Valencia and Place describe:
o Showcase portfolio that contains the students
best work (in all learning areas, possibly
including artwork, photographs and software)
o Evaluation portfolio that includes specified and
marked work (test papers, marked assignments,
learning contracts)
o Documentation portfolio that includes student
work systematically kept by the teacher but not
marked
o Process portfolio that contains ongoing work and
student self-reflection (some or all of the above
+ self-assessments and written reflections)

Stiggins celebration portfolio can begin to put

students in touch with their own strengths and
interests and can help them to learn to make choices
before experiencing the motivational power of a
growth portfolio through seeing improvement in their
learning p 64
Brady a process portfolio is best that provides
students with opportunities to self assess and reflect
p 65
o Including reflective writing about students
progress as learners will make their portfolios
become more meaningful learning tools and rich
assessment resources, rather than just a tool for
reporting.
From all of the above, portfolios should be:
o A strategic collection of student work or
evidence of student work that demonstrates that
learning has occurred
o Indicates outcomes achieved, often with an
outcomes sheet attached
o Involves the student in reflecting upon the
quality of work, often through self assessment
o Involves some student choice/collaboration with
teachers to determine content
o Provides & reflects information on how the
contents are to be assessed
o Includes a selection of work samples, prose,
journal entries, artwork, photographs, software,
learning contracts, text papers, assignments,
research reports and self assessments p 65
When establishing portfolios:
o Establish a purpose
o Consider the degree of student ownership
o Identify outcomes for assessment
o Develop clear guidelines for selecting the items
for the portfolio
o Create a shared language by focusing on clear
criteria for assessing work
o Integrate the assessment with teaching Wright
claims each portfolio provides the bridge
between the teachers instructional efforts and
the childs educational attainment assessment
should provide constant feedback for both
teachers and learners
o Schedule portfolio conferences p 66
Claimed benefits of portfolio assessment
o Tailors assessment to the individual needs,
interests and abilities of each student

Creates authentic portrait of students learning

Tracks student achievement over time to reveal
improvement
o Enables students to reflect on their own learning
provides motivation
o Provides teachers with meaningful info about
student needs, interests and self-concepts
o Provides tangible illustrations of student learning
o Provides opportunities for teacher-student
collaboration in the selection of content
o Facilitate meta-cognition gives students an
understanding of how they learn
o Enhances student ownership of their learning
o Cultivates the notion of individual difference in
learning
o Facilitates the accountability of teachers and
schools
o Improves the quality of teaching by integrating
assessment and teaching/learning
o Connects school experiences with real life p 66
EXHIBITIONS-enable students to bring together and
connect a range of factsfrom past experiences,
building on and further developing their knowledge,
values and understanding & seeing how they can
apply it, subsequently reflecting on the learning
process and themselves as learners p 67
In studying a topic for an exhibition, students acquire
deeper understandings of the subject matter p 67
Assessment may involve the teacher, other teachers
and peer assessment and the actual exhibition
involves a subsequent submission of written work p
67
Benefits of exhibitions
o Understanding developed through collecting,
organising and exhibiting info
o The skills acquired through collaborative
learning
o Schools being accountable externally, to their
communities p 68
Woolfolk and Margetts- advantagesexhibition requires collaboration, risk
taking, thoughtfulness, commitment,
sustained effort, critical thinking and
original work p 68
Limitations difficulty of ensuring that outcomes are
demonstrated and that the quality of the performance
alone does not mask the teachers ability to assess
substantive learning p 68
o
o

ANSN developed an assessment rubric of 4 elements,

involving the exhibition itself and the process of
developing the exhibition:
o Student as researcher how the student
collects, analyses and interprets date and
organises ideas and info
o Student as active learner how the student sets
goals, implements plans, accesses resources,
and works independently & in teams
o Student as reflective learner how they reflect
on learning, evaluates own progress and
transfers understanding to other areas
o Student as presenter how the student
communicates the exhibition p 68
Guidelines for developing exhibitions:
o Describe or portray in detail the nature of the
task to be exhibited and articulate it with
syllabus outcomes
o Specify strict assessment criteria, indicating
what is to be assesses, how and by whom
o Indicate time limits and requirements for
individual contributions p 68
PROJECTS-may be individual or group work
o Presentations mainly involve written work, with
pictures, tables, diagrams, graphs
o May be assessed by performance assessment
strategies
o Forster an Masters believe projects, focus on
both product and process p 69
o Benefits of a project- represents the culmination
of a students collection and organisation of date
n an integrated way, and that is assesses
outcomes achieved through research p 69
o Limitations students may focus on making it
pretty (cosmetic), rather than content of info
o Guidelines for setting projects similar to those
of exhibitions:
Detail the exact nature of the task
Articulate the task with syllabus outcomes
Specify clear assessment criteria p 69
CRITERIA FOR SELECTING STRATEGIES:
Curriculum relevance assessment strategies
should be chosen to reflect the knowledge, skills and
understandings that are to be demonstrated in
syllabus outcomes p 69
Herman, Aschbacher and Winters- Does the
assessment task match specific instructional
intentions?

Does the task adequately represent the content

and skills you expect students to attain
o Does the task enable students to demonstrate
their achievements
o Does the assessment use authentic and real
world tasks
Instructional utility- assessment strategies should
collect info that is useful for teaching. Whatever the
nature of the data, it can inform a teachers planning
Fairness-assessment strategies should be fair in
ensuring that students are engaged in those learning
activities that will best prepare them for assessment &
that they are familiar with the formats & expectations
of the assessment tasks e.g. ensure that assessment
doesnt discriminate against students from non English
speaking backgrounds p 70
Reliability/comparability-assessment should
accurately reflect a students achievement, particularly
when comparisons are being made with other students
Practical convenience-assessment should be
manageable and be part of ongoing teaching/learning.
p 70
Ormrod scrutinise assessments to ensure they are free from
cultural bias. p 70
o Identify assessment criteria in advance,
understanding that a rubric or model can
achieve this requirement p 70
o Establish conditions enabling students to
perform at their best, understanding that this
involves both a comfortable environment and
the opportunity to ask clarifying ?s p 70
COMMON ASSESSMENT ERRORS p 71
Prejudging- developing expectations of a student
based on ability rather than performance
Confusing achievement with effort-rewarding students
for effort rather than demonstrated achievement
Applying different standards for different studentsadopting different standards according to impressions
of ability
Cultural stereotyping-assigning higher performance to
students from a particular race/culture
Gender stereotyping-assigning higher performance to
either girls or boys
The halo effect-allowing the assessment of one aspect
of a students performance to influence the
assessment of other aspects
The proximity error-giving similar assessments on
outcomes that are similar
o

The central tendency error-avoiding assigning very

high or very low ratings
The severity/leniency error-assigning very high or very
low ratings = p 71
Authentic assessment is developed as a response to formal testingcomprises a variety of strategies that capture the quality of a students
work, focus on daily performance, and reflect the actual learning of the
classroom and beyond p 71
Assessment strategies should be selected on the basis of their curriculum
relevance, instructional utility, fairness, reliability and practical
convenience p 72

CHAPTER 5: Strategies for self and peer

assessment

All forms of assessment must be considered in relation to the curriculum

and the theories of teaching and learning applied p 77
Brady contemporary teaching and learning is characterised as
participative, collaborative and involving the construction of personal
meanings p 77 (comes from the work of Vygotsky)
This involves appropriate teacher scaffolding, or sensitive, supportive
teacher interventions and ongoing dialogue between teacher and learners,
and between learners and learners.
This view of teaching/learning accents the importance of both selfassessment (students constructing and monitoring their own learning),
and peer assessment (students engaging in dialogue with the teacher and
peers) p 77
Experiential learning (learning involving the students active involvement
and learning through experiencing) these principles are consistent with
the principles of constructivism:
o Experience is the foundation of & stimulus for, learning, so selfassessment must engage students in meaningful learning tasks.
o Learners actively construct their own experience, so self
assessment needs to take into account the fact that students
respond differently to the same learning experience, and that
meaning is the product of the students interaction with the learning
environment
o Learning is socially and culturally constructed, so self assessment,
occurring within a particular social and cultural setting, involves the
opinions of others teachers/peers
o Learning is influenced by the social-emotional context in which it
occurs, so self assessment involves the feelings of students and
how they perceive themselves p 77
The benefits of self assessment
o Prepares students for reflection on the quality of performance
necessary in future professions

Short term, it is valuable as students engage in critical self

reflection,
o Students able to self-monitor and check their performance p 78
o Develops fuller understanding of student strengths and weaknesses
o Students develop responsibility for their own learning in & beyond
school
o Makes them active rather than passive in the learning process
o Teachers develop awareness of how different students learn, and
can use this knowledge to develop relevant learning tasks
The benefits of peer assessment
o Provides students with more ownership of assessment- as they
participate in each others assessment, it helps them become more
autonomous
o Gives students a wider range of feedback on their work
o Encourages critical appraisal of the work of others
o Promotes the idea that assessment is an ongoing and integral part
of learning and not just something added on at the end
o Uses external assessment to provide a model for internal selfassessment (through students assessing anothers work) p 78
o Assists students in learning collaborative and interpersonal skills- if
verbal, enhances communication skills p 79
o Improves learning in enabling students to polish their original work
before submission
o Offers greater probability of interactive assessment through the use
of spoken language between students and with the teacher
o Is more valid in assessing some processing skills e.g. peers are the
more appropriate assessors for group processing skills such as
listening, communicating and contributing
o Fosters deep learning
o Helps the clarification of assessment criteria & underscores the
need for assessment
o Builds the appraisal (even supervisory) skills that can be transferred
to future professional life
o Relaxes the marking load of the teacher p 79
o Some limitations to peer assessment
Students may not have the skills to assess each other
Students may misinform each other without appropriate
teacher intervention
Students may be influenced by friendship in assessing
Students may be concerned about discrimination
Students acquire knowledge at different rates p 79
IMPLEMENTING SELF AND PEER ASSESSMENT
o ESSENTIALS
Promoting the value of reflection-make it a natural
expression of classroom practice p 80
We must help students in meta-cognition-mindful of ones
own thinking & processes of learning-as students are asked
what they learned, why they learned it and how they learned
it
o

Setting targets-students need to develop a clear

understanding of what they have to achieve. Wilson & Wing
Jan advocate the use of class brainstorming to determine
both individual targets and class targets, and their
subsequent documentation on class charts/personal action
plans-p80
Developing explicit criteria-students often feel their
assessment suffered because teacher expectations were illdefined. Explicit criteria whether given by the teacher or
created by or with the students are essential.- p 80
Providing practice-students need time and practice to
master the skills of self and peer assessment p 80
CONTEXT-important to provide a supportive learning environment as
self and peer assessment involves opportunities for reflection and
interaction between peers p 81
Provide students with opportunities to collaborate.
As they interact in providing and receiving feedback, it is
important that they feel free from threat and have the
opportunity to establish relationships p 81
One way to sustain cooperation and collaboration is through
the use of small group work
Teachers can model reflection and cooperation in everyday
classroom activities by providing constructive feedback about
students self and peer assessments, by setting clear targets,
and reflecting on their own performance with the class as an
audience p 81
Knowledge is constructed through teacher scaffolding
important to maintain language in a supportive classroom
environment
Ask open questions; allowing wait time after asking a ?;
fostering verbal interaction between students; engaging
them in substantive conversations (verbal exchanges that
extend beyond the initiation-response-feedback pattern
STRATEGIES some ideas that may be used for self and peer
assessment(viewed by, and critically discussed with a peer):
o Journals-usually done several times a week become a useful 2 way
process in which the teacher responds to the students comments.
While there is usually free range, some structure is typically, - my
plan is., I found difficult I enjoyed. p 81-82
In using journals, teachers need to define the purpose of
student journals; indicate the degree of structure required;
specify the teachers role in assessing journals; assure
confidentially and establish empathy- p 82
o Process portfolios- differs from showcase, evaluation,
documentation portfolios- it requires ongoing written reflections by
the developer
o Contracts-often negotiated between the teacher and individual
students undertakings to complete prescribed work, -a statement

of the task, a date for completion-a place for the students

signature. The work, time and assessment may be negotiated p 82
o Self-assessment proformas Rating scales- these enable students to self-assess by rating
the degree to which a task has been achieved e.g. I
researched the topic effective.not effective; may contain
words such as always often sometimes; excellent, very
good, good, satisfactory, unsatisfactory - p83
Checklists-In our small group work we..listened to each
other yes no; encouraged each other yes no
Short answers-the part I enjoyed most was..; the most
challenging part was.
o Physical continuums-involves students standing along an imaginary
or a drawn line, typically with signs such as a lot or not at all at
the end. Students position themselves according to the dimension
being assessed. Their perception of how much has been learned;
how well they listened, read or behaved; or how well they
conferenced or contributed to the group p 84
o Presentations-students give presentations and invite comments
from the teacher and peers according to pre-established criteria.
These criteria may have been developed in whole class
brainstormingmay include content criteria (knowledge of subject
matter, critical discussion of issues, ability to explain/simplify; and
communication criteria (engaging presentation, ability to create
and sustain interest, and use of a range of technologies)
o Conferencing-less formal opportunities for teacher/individual
students to talk. Discussion about portfolio; appropriate student
reflection on achievement; or co-assessing reading and writing. The
teacher might realistically aim to conference with each student
once every fortnight
o Student-led reporting-student is given the responsibility of reporting
to his/her parent in a supervised environment-teacher present in
the classroom with 6-8 reporting students but does not participate.
o Joint marking-involves students and the teacher (or a peer) marking
work independently and comparing their assessments.
o traffic lights-students read each others work and assign one of
three colours, green means that the work is better than the
assessors own work; red means that it is not as good as the
assessors and amber means that it is of a similar quality may also
be used for self assessment- p 84
STUDENT RESPONSE-

CHAPTER 8:

Australian Curriculum ACARA- established to develop the national

curriculum kindy to year 12 & to regulate assessment and reporting at
the national level p 122
o It develops and implements the national curriculum, administers
national assessments, analyse assessment data relating to schools,
provide curriculum resource services, promote sharing between
Australian gov bodies and support the teaching profession.
National curriculum developed to meet the challenges set by MCEETYA
and to create a wide and adaptive set of knowledge, skills and
understandings to meet the changing expectations of society and to
contribute to the creation of a more productive, sustainable and just
society (National curriculum Board 2009, p 6)
National Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians MCEETYA
specified goals in 3 areas
o Successful learners (who are active, creative, motivated, innovative,
collaborative, possess strong skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT,
and are proficient in making sense of their world
o Confident individuals (who are self aware and self confident,
optimistic, honest, empathic, relate well to others, and possess the
skills to maintain satisfying lives and healthy relationships)
o Active and informed citizens (who are moral, committed to
democracy, justice, global citizenship, social improvement, national
awareness and cultural understanding) p 122
National Curriculum: Assessment and reporting
o Identify the achievement standard teachers not only need to focus
on specific standards in their teaching, but standards that
interrelate across learning areas p 125 e.g. achieving in the
humanities, may also be achieving in English
o Consider indicators/steps an achievement standard might be
realistically achievable only after a term or a years teaching, so
teachers may need to identify indicators, pointers or steps towards
the attainment of the standard. This involves breaking down a skill
into sequential parts
o Develop rubrics to define progress-a rubric operates as a bridge
between standards and assessment, and can be applied
summatively or formatively. Mandatory for the teacher to apply the
A-E framework summatively
o Administer ongoing teacher-devised tests-teacher is collecting data
about student performance every day in both formal & informal
contexts
o Collect student work samples may be required for formal
reporting, but is also valuable to collect student work samples with
teacher annotations progressively
o Compile a process portfolio-select from the work samples
systematically and strategically to form a portfolio that includes

student work with teacher annotations and written reflections by

the student
o Apply the a-e framework-mandatory but may be supplemented by
rich assessment data collected progressively and formatively p
125
Curriculum/NAPLAN testing using the results for improvements/benefits:
- p 129
o Teachers-can identify both the students in need of additional
teaching support and the domains in which they can improve their
own teaching
o Teachers can differentiate the curriculum to vary what students
learn (content), and the strategies by which they learn (process) :
the following can be differentiated to meet individual student needs
Achievement standard-these are nominated for each grade,
however students achieve at different rates it may be
appropriate to break down the standard into more finite parts
(indicators or pointers), to teach students needing additional
support
The content content is prescribed, however it may be
treated at a basic level, or include opportunities for
enrichment
The strategies this is the most commonly differentiated
element teaching methods need to be varied e.g. In the use
of differentiated **questioning to elicit different cognitive
operations
The context- conferencing; the forming of small groups;
prescribing individual work in learning centres are examples
of differentiation
The supervision-supporting individual students when the
class is engaged in completing a learning task is an example
of curriculum differentiation
o Students benefit by identifying the areas in which they need to
improve
o Teaching and learning are increasingly regarded as participative,
proactive and collaborative
National curriculum content is planned in 3 broad areas:
o Knowledge, skills, understandings and values as a basis for further
learning
o Deep knowledge and skills that enable applied creativity &
translation into practical applications
o General capabilities, necessary for flexible/analytical thinking, the
ability to work with others, and the ability to develop new expertise
o NAPLAN testing provides essential data about the impact of the
national curriculum

CHAPTER 9: