Pros And Cons Of Formative Assessment

The term ‘formative assessment’ is used to describe the activities and processes used by teachers and learners to gather information that informs future teaching and learning. Assessment becomes formative if the information gathered is used as feedback to adapt and modify teaching and learning (Black and Wiliam, 1998, p.2). There are a variety of different methods and techniques that can be used by teachers and learners that can contribute to enhancing learner progress. These include

Their research takes into account individual teachers opinions on assessment and highlights their concerns on various approaches. It displays the negative feeling towards summative assessment and its restrictive nature. This view is best summarised by one teacher within their research who feels that the process of marking is a defeatist act stating “marking reinforces under-achievement and under-expectation by being too generous or unfocused” (OFSTED general report on secondary schools 1996, p.40 cited in Black & Wiliam, 2001). It is therefore not surprising that those pupils who require differentiated materials or have additional support needs benefit from the formative assessment approach. For this group of learners it allows them to interact with the teacher, receive informed feedback to promote clearer understandings and therefore leads to learning being clear and achievable goals set. As Black and Wiliam highlight, forms of summative assessment contributes to national league tables which is a political concern held higher than the implementation of formative assessment (2001). This approach does not however promote self-esteem or encourage learning as there is no form of focused feedback, only a high or low mark. It was therefore emphasised

Efficient educators know and understand the importance of selecting, planning, and implementing effective assessment tools and strategies that measure student’s levels of understanding. Different types of assessments are used for a broad range of purposes that include formative, placement, diagnostic, and summative assessments. However, the main purpose is to “foster learning in all its forms” (Lefrancois, 2013, Ch. 6.1). Teachers use pre, formative, and summative assessments to determine what students know before, during, and after instruction. Each measurement is used to plan, modify, and adjust instruction to meet the needs of all learners. Although each form of assessment plays a critical role in ensuring all students succeed, educators

Assessments are vital to the educational process. They provide feedback about what the students know and what they may need to learn in order to obtain the content within a given curriculum. It provides teachers with a glimpse into the student’s readiness on a particular topic or subject. One of the six key principles of having an effective differentiated classroom is having a formative assessment that informs teachers on the effectiveness of their teaching. It also provides teachers with the readiness levels of their students and shows them exactly where the students’ readiness, interests, and learning profile needs really are (Tomlinson, 2014).

The first article that I viewed was on Edutopia and it was titled Why Formative Assessments Matter. This article was a very helpful in that it was a review of what formative assessments are, why they are used, and when and how you use them. The middle part, why they are used, it reinforces that they are used for, to inform, not to punish. This is important to remember as we are assessing and planning instruction for students each day. Learning and showing what you have learned should never feel like a punishment. At the end of the article, in the last section, there were suggestions on ways to formatively assess students in a way that would not feel as though they are being punished. Instead, they are enjoying showing what they have learned. The last tip in this article was to watch, look, and listen. It is important to remember that to formatively assess students you must constantly

Assessments have been used in the classroom throughout the years as feedback to educators on how effective they are at teaching and how well students are learning. Since school’s decision-making is being predicated off assessment scores, they are increasingly becoming more important. “Assessment affects decisions about grades, placement, advancement, instructional needs, curriculum, and, in some cases, funding” (Edutopia, 2008, para. 1). With more and more reliance on assessments, it forces educators to take a step back and reflect on their lessons in order to ensure that all accommodations and strategies are in place to promote student success. Among those strategies, teachers must be able to “demonstrate skills at selecting, developing, applying, using, communicating, and evaluating student assessment information and student assessment practices”(Buros, 2014, pg.1). While reflecting on my own skills or competencies involving student’s assessment, I have found that my strengths lie in administering, scoring, and interpreting assessments; and choosing assessment methods appropriate for instructional decisions. On the other side, my weaknesses lie in developing valid grading procedures that incorporate assessment information. This paper will analyze these strengths and weaknesses and examine how they impact the development of assessment inside the classroom.

There are targeted learning goals for all students, and these are based on standards that are set by those higher up than the teachers (Black, 2007). There are many ways that formative assessments can be used, and many formats in which they can be appeared. It is important that they are distinguished from summative assessments, however, and there are several ways in which that can be done (Black & William, 1998; Blatchford,

When a teacher introduces the idea of formative assessment to a classroom, modifications may need to be made for it to work its purpose. The teacher might need to alter their teaching method and the student will need to be open to changing their learning style to accommodate the change. If both the teacher and students can achieve this, then formative assessment will be successful (al., C. E., 2016). If unsuccessful then formative assessment can be seen by both the teacher and student in a negative light. For example, The Classroom Experiment (Barry, 2010), showcased a range of different formative assessment techniques that can be quite successful in the classroom. One technique that Dylan Wiliam posed was that the teachers give each student

Formative assessments are unique in that they can be quick, do not necessarily have to be graded, and can be used as an ongoing way to check for understanding (Swearengin, 2002). I keep these considerations in mind when I implement quick exit tickets, ungraded activities, and various types of questioning. I check for understanding because it identifies the students that are struggling and the content that is posing problems for many individuals. In my opinion, many teachers have become too concerned with grades, rather than checks for understanding, and often forget that formative assessments do not have to create more work for the teacher. In fact, they assist the teacher in modifying and improving his or her instruction so that student achievement will increase (Wiggins, 2006).

Assessment is an essential part of the teaching and learning process. Assessment is most effective when there is alignment between the outcomes, the design of assessment tasks, the criteria, marking procedures and feedback provided; this referred to as constructive alignment (Potter & Kustra, 2012). The purpose of an assessment, and the modes and strategies used will depend on a number of factors. Diagnostic, formative, and summative assessment are three modes of assessment that may be used. While each of these modes of assessment has a particular purpose, the underlying purpose of all assessments is to promote student learning (Brady & Kennedy, 2012).

In order for teachers to use formative assessment effectively there must be these components: it must be incorporated into each lesson, must have student involvement, must collect information on student performance to determine if outcomes are meet, must give the teacher feedback to help shape and guide student learning, and must give the student feedback to help them reflect upon their learning. Anecdotal Records, Quizzes, Portfolios, and Student-Led Conferences all meet the components of an effective formative assessment and are applicable within a Social Studies classroom.

A. Pre-assessment/Assessment of Prior Knowledge- 1. Students may have misconceptions or misunderstanding about the drinking water shortages in some places on Earth. Students may not understand how the temperature of the water will affect the salinity of the water. Students may misunderstand information about the Gulf Stream and they may think that it is located in the Gulf of Mexico. Another partial understanding students may have is how the sloping of the ocean floor affects the wave heights. Lastly, students may have a misconception about the subsurface geologic features of the oceans compared to geologic features of the World, like volcanoes and ocean trenches.

Formative feedback is an instructional technique to inform the student of their progress and what the next steps to learning look like. Formative assessments are used to collect the evidence, which will measure student growth and provide valuable information to both the teacher and the student. As the unit progresses formative assessments should be used to make instructional decisions to meet student’s needs. The collection of formative data provides a clear picture of the student’s ability and can be used to directly respond to the students needs (Rea-Dickins, Gardner, 2000). Though formative feedback and formative assessment are essential to the learning process it is often left to the side, as a forgotten piece of the puzzle. To carry

Success criteria are also just as important as the learning objective as this is the ingredients to ensure that the children succeed at every stage and when being assessed by their teachers (formatively) they can show to have met or exceeded their target. If pupils are involved in the stage of writing the success criteria then this ensures greater success.

The author, Margaret Heritage, is the assistant director for professional development at the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing at the University of California, Los Angeles. In this article, Heritage defines formative assessment as a continuous process of gathering evidence of learning.  She continues by stating that formative assessment can typically be enforced within the room with three broad strategies: on-the-fly, planned for, and curriculum embedded. She suggests that four core elements comprise formative assessment: (a) identifying the “gap,” (b) feedback, (c) student involvement, and (d) learning progressions.  She additionally suggests that teachers must have specific knowledge and skills so as