Assessment FOR Learning (Above and Beyond EC)

"If you can both listen to children and accept their answers not as things to just be judged right or wrong but as pieces of information which may reveal what the child is thinking, you will have taken a giant step toward becoming a master teacher, rather than merely a disseminator of information." - Easley & Zwoyer, 1975

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           With the field of education constantly changing and growing, formative assessments prove to be a powerful tool that can be used to improve student learning. While high stakes testing and summative assessments can be useful, one of the most significant limitations to this form of assessment is how distant it is from understanding student's current level of achievement. Formative assessments can be used to provide educators with real-time information regarding the students' understanding and allow teachers to make immediate instructional decisions based on the information gained from these assessments. In addition to this, formative assessments allow educators to identify struggling students and provide early interventions in order to address issues before they become major learning deficits. Trends in formative assessment and using data to positively impact student learning have become an integral part of teacher practices in the classroom today.

The image above shows examples of each form of assessment. This visual aid showcases the distinct similarities and differences between these two forms of assessments.

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"The benefit of assessments for learning isn’t merely a more clear picture of understanding; Used properly, it can also inform the rest of the learning process, from curriculum mapping (what do we learn when?) to instruction (how will it be learned?) to assessment design (how should future learning ideally be measured?). While the role of testing in instructional design isn’t simple, it really might be. If the goal of any assessment is to provide data to refine planned instruction, then the primary function of any assessment, whether an authentic, challenge-based learning performance or a standardized test, should be to answer the following question for any teacher:

“What now?”

If the data doesn’t provide a clear path forward for both students and teachers, it likely obscures more than it clarifies." - Terry Heick

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Below I have created an infographic that provides useful information, insights, as well as, resources that can be used when using formative assessment.