Teaching for effective learning - assessment

What we know

In recent years, one of the most important educational debates has centered on the role of assessment in learning. Fundamental questions are being asked anew about the nature, purpose, and impact of assessment systems in our schools.

The traditional view of assessment might be thought of as assessment of learning. This is where assessment is used to confirm what learners know, to demonstrate whether or not they have met attainment standards and/or show how they are placed in relation to other learners.

In assessment of learning, schools and examination bodies use assessment to provide statements of proficiency or competence for learners. Its purpose is summative – it is intended to certify learning and provide reports for parents and learners about their progress in school.

Assessment of learning in classrooms is typically done at the end of some activity, for example, a unit of work, a topic or a course. Assessment takes the form of tests or exams that include questions drawn from the material studied during that time. Results are expressed generally as marks or grades that summarise performance. This is why assessment of learning is often referred to as summative assessment.

For generations, summative assessment has dominated most classroom assessment work, especially in secondary schools, where the bulk of teacher time has been taken up with creating tests, marking and grading. There is a strong emphasis on comparing students to national standards, and feedback to learners comes in the form of marks or grades. These kinds of testing provide little direction or advice for improvement. Typically, they don't give much indication of mastery of particular ideas or concepts because the test content is generally too limited and the scoring is too simplistic to represent the broad range of skills and knowledge that have been covered.

In recent years there has been a fundamental change in the way that schools think about the role and nature of assessment. There is a growing acceptance that where assessment is used as a formative element of classroom work, learning and attainment can be significantly enhanced. Assessment for learning shifts the emphasis from summative to formative assessment - from making judgments to engaging in ongoing activities that can be used to support the next stages of learning.

Formative assessment, like summative assessment, is about gathering information relating to students’ learning but it is the point at which this information is gathered which makes it different. Formative assessment focuses on how a young person is learning as they undertake the task. The teacher is then more able to tune into the learner’s progress, picking up on emerging understandings and difficulties. Formative assessment provides teachers with information with which to modify or change the teaching and learning activities in which students are engaged.

When using assessment for learning, teachers create assessment tasks that open a window on what students know and can do already and use these insights to design the next steps in teaching and learning. Marking is not used to make comparative judgments among the students or to grade against national standards, but to highlight each student's strengths and weaknesses and provide feedback that will further their learning. In summary, formative assessment helps learners to focus on how they can improve and it also provides the information required to help them do so.

Research has also shown that involving learners actively in the assessment process is an important element of developing metacognition - that is the ability to reflect upon and critically analyse their own thinking and learning. Assessment as learning occurs when students personally monitor what they are learning and use the feedback from this process to make adjustments, adaptations and even major changes in what they understand. Peer and self-assessment places learners at the heart of the assessment system, enabling them to become active, engaged and critical assessors of learning.

Implications for learning

In recent years there has been a major national initiative to overhaul the assessment system with a view to achieving a better balance between formative and summative assessment. This has resulted in schools engaging with the principles of Assessment for Learning to enable teachers to develop their understanding of the role of assessment in learning and using this to refine their assessment practice. This includes for example:

• sharing learning objectives and discussing success criteria with pupils
• giving and receiving feedback about learning
• providing opportunities for peer and self-assessment
• questioning techniques
• developing metacognition
• exploring alternative ways of marking
• creating a climate for personal learning planning where pupils:
  • assess their own progress
  • reflect on where they are and where they want to be
  • set their own goals.

Learning objectives

Formative assessment involves teachers in being more explicit about what they want pupils to learn and how they will know they have been successful, rather than simply telling them what they have to do.

In order for assessment to play a formative role in teaching and learning, it must be integral to a teacher’s planning. Sharing learning objectives (learning intentions), helps children understand what they are going to learn, rather than what they are about to do. They focus on the learning not the task.

Research shows that children are more highly motivated and task-orientated if they know and understand the learning intention. They are also better equipped to make decisions about how to go about tasks. This is why learning objectives should be shared with pupils in advance and displayed visually during lessons.

Developing success criteria at the planning stage is also a vital element of formative assessment. Success criteria describe how both the teacher and the pupils will know that they have been successful in achieving the planned objectives, (learning intentions). Involving learners in the creation of success criteria enables them to see more clearly the relevance of classroom activities.

Feedback

The provision of feedback is arguably one of the most important elements of Assessment for Learning. Assessment is only formative if information gained during the process of learning and teaching is used to adapt or alter future learning, so the nature and quality of feedback is crucial.

Research shows that the feedback given by many teachers often focuses heavily on presentation, punctuation, spelling, the quantity of writing and effort, rather than feedback on the learning intention.

Effective feedback should relate to the learning intention, pointing out success and improvement needs. It should offer clear guidance on how work can be improved, the next steps in learning and how pupils can take them.

Many teachers now make more use of comment-only marking, rather than giving marks for a piece of work submitted. Giving a mark or score for work often leads learners to attributing greater significance to the mark rather than to any accompanying comment by the teacher. Learners who have achieved a good mark tend to ignore comments as they feel they don’t need to improve. Those who received a poor mark often don’t read the comments because they feel that they have failed.

Providing constructive feedback on weaknesses and strengths, together with advice on how to deal with them will help all children learn. Supportive feedback builds self-confidence and sends messages to children that everyone can improve if they work at it. 

Questioning

Participation, interest and effective thinking and learning are hugely influenced by the questions asked by both teachers and their pupils.

Formative assessment makes increased use of open questions, which allow a range of responses and make progressive cognitive demands on the children. The effective use of higher order questions enable teachers to assist children’s understanding and thinking, but in order for this to be effective, it is important to give pupils time to think about their responses. Research shows that, on average, most teachers leave only 2 seconds for pupils to respond to a question, when leaving a minimum of 5 would markedly improve the quality of responses. 

Effective questioning needs to extend pupils thinking, draw out their ideas, encourage them to volunteer points and explain things further. Research shows that the quality of classroom questioning and its effectiveness can be improved through, for example:

• preparing key questions to ask in advance of classroom work
• distributing questions around the class
• giving pupils ‘thinking or waiting time’ to respond to questions
• using questions that make progressive cognitive demands
• giving clues and prompts
• making use of pupils’ responses – especially incorrect ones to explore misunderstandings 
• encouraging pupils to ask questions.
  
  

Self and peer assessment

Assessment by pupils of their own learning, and that of their peers, is an integral part of formative assessment. Self-evaluation helps a teacher to assess the level of pupils’ knowledge and understanding, and provide greater insights into their learning needs.

Encouraging pupils to take greater responsibility for their own learning, however, requires pupils to be clear about the main purposes of their learning and what they need to achieve. Research shows that when children understand the criteria for success, they are more able to assess their own work. When self-evaluation is linked to the learning intentions, children make greater progress and their self-confidence grows.

Schools have made increased use of different approaches that can help to promote effective pupil peer and self assessment. These include for example:

• small steps learning intentions
• paired marking
• two stars and a wish
• traffic lighting
• highlight prompts
• KWL grids
• learning logs
• plenary sessions.

Many schools have worked towards this by introducing peer assessment strategies to encourage pupils to work more productively with learning partners and to give each other feedback on how to improve. This means each pupil gets more one-to-one feedback than would be possible if relying entirely on the teacher. Learning partner arrangements helps pupils to talk through what they know and think about what strategies they are using to learn. This helps develop skills essential for self-assessment and personal learning planning.

Changing the balance between formative and summative assessment presents other challenges for schools. One of the most significant is raising the awareness of parents of the changing nature of assessment and their expectations of how progress is reported. This might be reflected in reduced emphasis on marks and grades, together with alternative reporting formats. The development of personal learning planning in Scotland also provides opportunities for parents, teachers and learners to share responsibility for the identification of learning goals and in the assessment of progress towards these goals.

At the same time, some schools are exploring alternative forms of assessment related to different learning styles and multiple intelligences. Such assessments provide a different lens with which to better understand how young people learn.