Formative assessment
[2] It typically involves qualitative feedback (rather than scores) for both student and teacher that focuses on the details of content and performance.
[3] It is commonly contrasted with summative assessment, which seeks to monitor educational outcomes, often for purposes of external accountability.
Examples of formative assessments include asking students to draw a concept map in class to represent their understanding of a topic, submit one or two sentences identifying the main point of a lecture, or turn in a research proposal for early feedback.
[8] Benjamin Bloom took up the term in 1968 in the book Learning for Mastery to consider formative assessment as a tool for improving the teaching-learning process for students.
[8] Subsequently, however, Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam suggested this definition is too restrictive, since formative assessments may be used to provide evidence that the intended course of action was indeed appropriate.
The authority, which is sponsored by England's Department for Children, Schools and Families, is responsible for national curriculum, assessment, and examinations.
It typically involves a focus on the detailed content of what is being learnt,[3] rather than simply a test score or other measurement of how far a student is falling short of the expected standard.
[22] Educational researcher Robert J. Marzano states: Recall the finding from Black and Wiliam's (1998) synthesis of more than 250 studies that formative assessments, as opposed to summative ones, produce the more powerful effect on student learning.
[26] Some researchers have concluded that standards-based assessments may be an effective way to "prescribe instruction and to ensure that no child is left behind".
[23]: 13 In past decades, teachers would design a unit of study that would typically include objectives, teaching strategies, and resources.
In 1998, Black & Wiliam produced a review that highlighted that students who learn in a formative way achieve significantly better than matched control groups receiving normal teaching.
Another study done by White and Frederiksen[30] showed that when twelve 7th grade science classrooms were given time to reflect on what they deemed to be quality work, and how they thought they would be evaluated on their work, the gap between the high achieving students and the low achieving students was decreased.
Further, it helps students monitor their own progress as they get feedback from the teacher and/or peers, allowing the opportunity to revise and refine their thinking.
This type of testing allows for a teacher's lesson plan to be clear, creative, and reflective of the curriculum (T.P Scot et al., 2009).
[40] Based on the Appalachian Education Laboratory (AEL), "diagnostic testing" emphasizes effective teaching practices while "considering learners' experiences and their unique conceptions" (T.P Scot et al., 2009).
Black and Wiliam (1998) report that studies of formative assessment show an effect size on standardized tests of between 0.4 and 0.7, larger than most known educational interventions.
Research examined by Black and Wiliam supports the conclusion that summative assessments tend to have a negative effect on student learning.
Model-eliciting activities are based on real-life situations where students, working in small groups, present a mathematical model as a solution to a client's need (Zawojewski & Carmona, 2001).
Model-eliciting activities (MEAs) are ideally structured to help students build their real-world sense of problem solving towards increasingly powerful mathematical constructs.
Instead, they choose activities that maximize the potential for students to develop the concepts that are the focal point in the curriculum by building on their early and intuitive ideas.
Others are wishing to meet student expectations for more flexible delivery and to generate efficiencies in assessment that can ease academic staff workloads.
The move to on-line and computer based assessment is a natural outcome of the increasing use of information and communication technologies to enhance learning.
[45] The UK government has stated[46] that personalized learning depends on teachers knowing the strengths and weaknesses of individual learners, and that a key means of achieving this is through formative assessment, involving high quality feedback to learners included within every teaching session.
Webster, Pepper and Jenkins (2000)[51] discussed some common general criteria for FYP thesis and their ambiguity regarding use, meaning and application.
Researchers Kim Bailey and Chris Jakicic have stated that common formative assessments "promote efficiency for teachers, promote equity for students, provide an effective strategy for determining whether the guaranteed curriculum is being taught and, more importantly, learned, inform the practice of individual teachers, build a team's capacity to improve its program, facilitate a systematic, collective response to students who are experiencing difficulty, [and] offer the most powerful tool for changing adult behavior and practice.
"[58] Developing common formative assessments on a teacher team helps educators to address what Bailey and Jakicic lay out as the important questions to answer when reflecting on student progress.
With these things in mind, the teacher team can make some evaluations on what tasks and explanations seemed to produce the best student outcomes.
Through this practice, teachers are presented with an opportunity to grow professionally with the people who know them and understand their school environment.
Tomlinson and McTighe wrote, "Although not a new idea, we have found that the deliberate use of backwards design for planning courses, units, and individual lessons results in more clearly defined goals, more appropriate assessments, and more purposeful teaching.
For example, Harry Torrance and John Pryor proposed a model that aims to provide a pattern and balance for assessment activities based on 14 categories.
