FORMATIVE%20ASSESSMENT

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FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT

• Nisreen Ahmed
• Wilma Teviotdale

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An overview of todays session

• The aims of the session are
• 1. To inform you about the nature of the TQEF
  project on Formative Assessment and future
  developments.
• 2. To enable you to differentiate between
  formative and summative assessment
• 3. To enable you to give your views as to the
  meaning and use of formative assessment.
• 4. To inform you about the use if ICT in the
  project.

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Nature of the Project

• Support student retention, progression
• and achievement in a diverse student body
• through
• developing fit for purpose approaches
• to formative assessment
• by
• compiling and providing rich
• resources for tailored solutions.

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Project Outcomes

• Develop a dynamic, interactive resource to guide
  staff through the design and development of
  formative assessment
• Support staff and students to engage with
  formative assessment positively and creatively
• Improve student outcomes across all levels of
  course provision

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What is assessment?

• Assessment consists, essentially, of taking a
  sample of what students do, making inferences and
  estimating the worth of their actions.
  (Assessing Student Learning in Higher Education.
  Brown. G, Bull. J Pendlebury M. 1997 P.8)

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Task

• In groups make a list of the features of
  summative assessment and then a list for the
  features of formative assessment.

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Task

• In groups, provide a definition of
• Formative Assessment and
• Highlight the key words you think are important.

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Defining formative assessment

• Assessment for learning is any assessment for
  which the first priority in its design and
  practice is to serve the purpose of promoting
  students learning. It thus differs from
  assessment designed primarily to serve the
  purposes of accountability, or of ranking, or of
  certifying competence. An assessment activity
  can help learning if it provides information to
  be used as feedback, by teachers, and by their
  students, in assessing themselves and each other,
  to modify the teaching and learning activities in
  which they are engaged. Such assessment becomes
  formative assessment when the evidence is
  actually used to adapt the teaching work to meet
  learning needs. (Black et al 2002)

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• A widely quoted and influential idea about
  formative assessment comes from Roy Sadler who
  defines it as follows
• In assessment for learning, the learners task
  is to close the gap between the present state of
  understanding and learning goal. Self-assessment
  is essential if the learner is to do this. The
  teachers role is to communicate appropriate goals
  and promote self-assessment as pupils work
  towards the goals. Feedback in the classroom
  should operate from teacher to pupils and from
  pupils to teacher (Sadler, 1989).

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Task

• Look at your definition and the words youve
  highlighted as important.
• Is what you have written similar to what has been
  stated by Black and Sadler?
• Which of the following would you associate with
  formative assessment assessment for learning
  or assessment of learning

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What do learners need to know?

• Where they are in their learning
• Where they are going and
• How to get there.

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Task

• Set out which of the terms opposite are most
  likely to be identified with formative or
  summative assessment

• After learning
• During learning
• Feedback
• Of learning
• For learning
• Learning continuum
• Review/reflect
• Improve/enhance.

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Formative Activities

• Formative assessment can come from a range of
  activities that tutors students might normally
  associate with teaching e.g. classroom
  questioning feedback, group work and peer
  assessment on a piece of previously assessed
  work, feedback on draft or interim assessment.
• It is therefore the purpose of the assessment
  that makes it formative not the method, timing or
  activity e.g. a timed examination can be used
  for formative purposes.
• The primary distinction between formative and
  summative assessment relates to purpose and
  effect, not to timing (Sadler 1989).

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Examples of formative activities

• Questions asked individually or in class to
  diagnose understanding and to build understanding
  with students
• Written feedback and advice that focuses on the
  task and not the grade, feelings or ego of the
  student.
• Drafting assignments or a performance for
  feedback from tutors, self or peers.

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• Using exemplars of good and poor quality work to
  assess the quality of ones and others work in
  relation to the assessment criteria
• Initial diagnostic assessment (tests, assignments
  etc)
• Tutorials or reviews-group and individual, peer
  or tutor-led
• Questions at the end of sessions to find out what
  was easy, difficult, what still needs to be
  learned.

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• Such activities can be very formal or quite
  informal e.g. asking students what they want to
  get out of a session, or what they think they
  need to learn or to write down one new thing they
  learned and one thing they still dont understand
  at the end of a session have a formative purpose
  but are quick and informal methods.

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Task

• Think about your teaching
• How much formative assessment do you undertake?
• What barriers do you consider to be present which
  prevent the introduction of more formative
  assessment?
• What steps can you take to offer more
  opportunities for formative assessment?

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ICT

• Use of ICT in the project.