Assessment
What is Assessment?
• Assessment is any formal or informal
method you use to evaluate whether
students are achieving your desired
outcomes.
• What are some of the worst
assessments you have experienced?
• What are some of the best?
Questions you should ask:
• Does the assessment focus on the
outcomes that I value?
– Does it assess the important content?
– Do it teach the important content?
– Does it measure the kinds of learning I
value?
– Does it support the other outcomes I
value?
Questions you should ask:
• Is it reliable?
– Does it give consistent results?
– If a student completed the same
assessment at 2 different times would the
results be about the same (assuming no
learning took place between the 2 times)?
– If you graded the same assessment at 2
different times, would you give about the
same score?
Questions you should ask:
• Is it valid?
– Does it measure the outcome(s) it is
supposed to measure?
– Note: an assessment can be reliable
without being valid.
• Example: using a measure of head size as an
assessment of intelligence.
– But it can’t be valid without being relatively
reliable.
Questions you should ask:
• Is it fair?
– Do all students have an equal opportunity
to succeed?
– What might put some students at a
disadvantage?
• Cultural bias
• Gender bias
Types of Assessments
Traditional
Assessments
Objective
Assessments
T/F, Multiple Choice,
Matching
Reliability
Meaningfulness
Time
Short Answer,
Essay
Alternative
Assessments
Authentic/
Performance-Based
Projects, Experiments,
Reports, Performances
Porfolio
Objective Assessments
• Pros
– Reliable and easy to grade.
– Can cover all the important cognitive content (but may cover it
at a shallower level).
– Direct measure of content knowledge as opposed to such
things as writing ability, effort, or collaboration.
• Cons
– Not very meaningful.
– Often written to assess just basic recall/memorization (but can
be used to assess higher level thinking).
– Don’t directly support non-cognitive outcomes (e.g.,
collaboration, self-regulation, transformative experience,
psychomotor skills).
Short Answer/Essay
• Pros
– Reliable if you have a clear rubric.
– Can cover a lot of the important cognitive content.
– Can be used to assessed deeper levels of
understanding/thinking.
– Can allow some choice and creativity.
• Cons
–
–
–
–
May not be seen as meaningful.
Writing ability is always a confounding factor in scoring.
Takes more time than objective assessments.
May support some non-cognitive outcomes, but probably not
as well as alternative assessments.
Rubric
• Having a good rubric is essential for making
essays and alternative assessments more
reliable.
• A quality rubric should have:
– A clear set of criteria
– Clear levels of performance for each criteria
– Some scoring system.
• See examples on pgs. 540-541.
Authentic/PerformanceBased Assessments
• Pros
– More meaningful; allow more choice and creativity.
– Can be used to assessed deeper levels of
understanding/thinking.
– Support non-cognitive outcomes such as self-regulation,
transformative experience, and collaboration.
• Cons
–
–
–
–
Generally less reliable.
Take a lot of time.
May cover less content (but in more depth).
Things other than content knowledge such as writing ability,
ability of group members, rule following, or effort may play a
significant role in the evaluation.
Portfolio Assessments
• Pros
– More meaningful; allow lots of choice and creativity.
– Can be used to assessed deeper levels of
understanding/thinking.
– Support non-cognitive outcomes.
– Show progress over time.
• Cons
–
–
–
–
Generally less reliable.
Take a lot of time.
May cover less content (but in more depth).
Things other than content knowledge may play a significant
role in the evaluation (may measure students’ willingness to do
projects instead of their understanding).