University of Redlands
You’re most likely familiar with the two types of assessments commonly used in the U.S. education system: summative and formative. Both are discussed in this section, along with some of their defining characteristics and strengths and weaknesses. Because formative assessment is the more atypical of the two, it is discussed at greater length, with additional examples provided to illustrate the range of techniques and strategies comprising formative assessment.
The goal of summative assessment is to evaluate student learning at the end of a learning unit.
Summative assessments are often high stakes, which usually means that they have a high point value, but not always. Sometimes the assessment may be pass/fail with significant consequences for failing, such as repeating a module. Examples of summative assessment include the following:
Information from summative assessments can be used formatively when students or faculty use it to guide their efforts and activities in subsequent course activities. For example, if the majority of the students on a summative assessment missed a concept or question the instructor could go back and review that concept or do additional learning activities before moving on to the next module.
The goal of formative assessment is to monitor student learning to provide ongoing feedback that can be used by instructors to improve their teaching and by students to improve their learning. Formative assessments would help students identify their strengths and weaknesses and target areas that need work and help faculty recognize where students are struggling and address problems immediately.
Formative assessments are generally low stakes, which means that they have low or no point value and few immediate consequences if students perform poorly. Examples include:
Formative assessment often assess student learning, but some formative assessments seek to understand the students’ learning experience — how they perceive the experience of the course, and how they feel about it. For example, a mid-semester formative assessment might ask such questions as, “What about this course and its instruction helps your learning?” and, “What about this course and its instruction presents a barrier to learning? What suggestions to you have to improve this?”
The primary purpose of formative assessment is to improve learning, not merely to audit it. It is assessment for learning rather than assessment of learning. Formative assessment is both an “instructional tool” that instructors and their students “use while learning is occurring” and “an accountability tool to determine if learning has occurred” (National Education Association, 2003, p. 3). In other words, to be “formative,” assessments must inform the decisions that instructors and students make minute by minute in the classroom. The table below compares the characteristics of formative assessment and summative assessment.
| Formative Assessment (Assessment for Learning) |
Summative Assessment (Assessment of Learning) |
|---|---|
| Purpose: To improve learning and achievement | Purpose: To measure or audit attainment |
| Carried out while learning is in progress—day to day, minute by minute. | Carried out from time to time to create snapshots of what has happened. |
| Focused on the learning process and the learning progress. | Focused on the products of learning. |
| Viewed as an integral part of the teaching-learning process. | Viewed as something separate, an activity performed after the teaching-learning cycle. |
| Collaborative: Instructors and students know where they are headed, understand the learning needs, and use assessment information as feedback to guide and adapt what they do to meet those needs. | Instructor directed: Instructors assign what the students must do and then evaluate how well they complete the assignment. |
| Fluid: An ongoing process influenced by student need and teacher feedback. | Rigid: An unchanging measure of what the student achieved. |
| Instructors and students adopt the role of intentional learners. | Instructors adopt the role of auditors and students assume the role of the audited. |
| Instructors and students use the evidence they gather to make adjustments for continuous improvement. | Instructors use the results to make final "success or failure" decisions about a relatively fixed set of instructional activities. |
| Method | Description |
|---|---|
| Observations |
Anecdotal Notes: These are short notes written during a lesson as students work in groups or individually, or after the lesson is complete. The instructor should reflect on a specific aspect of the learning and make notes on the student's progress toward mastery of that learning target. The instructor can create a form to organize these notes so that they can easily be used for adjusting instruction based on student needs. Anecdotal Notebook: The instructor may wish to keep a notebook of the individual observation forms or a notebook divided into sections for individual students. With this method, all of the observations on an individual student are together and can furnish a picture of student learning over time. Anecdotal Note Cards: Instructors can create a file folder with 5" x 7" note cards for each student. |
| Questioning | Asking better questions affords students an opportunity for deeper thinking and provides teachers with significant insight into the degree and depth of student understanding. Questions of this nature engage students in classroom dialogue that expands student learning. Questions should go beyond the typical factual questions requiring recall of facts or numbers. Paul Black, a noted authority on formative assessment, suggests that "more effort has to be spent in framing questions that are worth asking: that is, questions which explore issues that are critical to the development of students' understanding." (Black et al., 2003) |
| Discussion | Classroom discussions can tell instructors much about student learning and understanding of basic concepts. Instructors can initiate discussions by presenting students with an open-ended question. The goal is to build knowledge and develop critical and creative thinking skills. Discussions allow students to increase the breadth and depth of their understanding while discarding erroneous information and expanding and explicating background knowledge (Black and William 1998; Doherty 2003). By activating students as learning resources for one another there is the possibility of some of the largest gains seen in any educational intervention (Slavin, Hurley and Chamberlain 2003). Student understanding can be assessed by listening to the student responses and by taking anecdotal notes. |
| Exit/Admit Slips | Exit Slips are written responses to questions the instructor poses at the end of a lesson or a class to assess student understanding of key concepts. They should take no more than 5 minutes to complete and are taken up as students leave the classroom. The instructor can quickly determine which students get it, which ones need a little help, and which ones are going to require much more instruction on the concept. By assessing the responses on the Exit Slips the instructor can better adjust the instruction in order to accommodate students' needs for the next class. Admit slips are exactly like Exit Slips, but they are done prior to or at the beginning of the class. Students may be asked to reflect on their understanding of their previous night's homework, or they may reflect on the previous day's lesson if the question required a longer response time. Exit and Admit Slips can be used in all classes to integrate written communication into the content area. |
| Learning Logs / Response Logs | Learning Logs are used for students' reflections on the material they are learning. This type of journal is in common use among scientists and engineers. In the log, students record the process they go through in learning something new, and any questions they may need to have clarified. This allows students to make connections to what they have learned, set goals, and reflect upon their learning process. The act of writing about thinking helps students become deeper thinkers and better writers. Instructors and students can use Learning Logs during the formative assessment process, as students record what they are learning and the questions they still have, and instructors monitor student progress toward mastery of the learning targets in their log entries and adjust instruction to meet student needs. By reading student logs and delivering descriptive feedback on what the student is doing well and suggestions for improvement, the instructor can make the Learning Log a powerful tool for learning. Response Logs are a good way to examine student thinking. They are most often connected with response to literature, but they may be used in any content area. They offer students a place to respond personally, to ask questions, to predict, to reflect, to collect vocabulary and to compose their thoughts about text. Instructors may use Response Logs as formative assessment during the learning process. |
| Graphic Organizers | Graphic organizers are visual models that can assist students in organizing information and communicating clearly and effectively. Students can use graphic organizers to structure their writing, brainstorm ideas, assist in decision making, clarify story structure, help with problem solving, and plan research. |
| Peer/Self Assessment | Peer and self assessment help to create a learning community among students. When students are involved in criteria and goal setting, self evaluation becomes a logical step in the learning process. Students become metacognitive and are more aware of their personal strengths and weaknesses. With peer assessment students begin to see each other as resources for understanding and checking for quality work against previously determined criteria. Instructors can examine the self assessments and the peer assessments and identify students' strengths and weaknesses. |
| Practice Presentations | Just as in sports, practice before a classroom presentation is vital. Through practice and peer review, students can improve their presentation skills and the content of the presentation itself. The practice presentation should take place a few days before the final presentation due date. Students run through their presentations with the audience, their peers, evaluating the performance based on the previously established rubric criteria. An easy way for students to furnish feedback is through a T-Chart. Students use the left column of the chart to comment on the positive aspects of the presentation, and they use the right columns to suggest changes that the presenter might make to improve the quality of the presentation. |
| Think-Pair-Share | Think-Pair-Share (Lyman, 1981) is a summarizing strategy that can be used in any content area before, during, and after a lesson. The activity involves three basic steps. During the "think" stage, the instructor tells students to ponder a question or problem. Next, individuals are paired up and discuss their answer or solution to the problem. Finally, students are called upon to share with the rest of the class. There is also a Think-Pair-Square-Share. In this strategy, partners discuss answers with another pair before sharing with the class, ensuring that all students are interacting with the information. Instructors can use this activity in the formative assessment process as they walk about the room listening to student conversations. |
You’re most likely familiar with the two types of assessments commonly used in the U.S. education system: summative and formative. Both are discussed in this section, along with some of their defining characteristics and strengths and weaknesses. Because formative assessment is the more atypical of the two, it is discussed at greater length, with additional examples provided to illustrate the range of techniques and strategies comprising formative assessment.
The goal of summative assessment is to evaluate student learning at the end of a learning unit.
Summative assessments are often high stakes, which usually means that they have a high point value, but not always. Sometimes the assessment may be pass/fail with significant consequences for failing, such as repeating a module. Examples of summative assessment include the following:
Information from summative assessments can be used formatively when students or faculty use it to guide their efforts and activities in subsequent course activities. For example, if the majority of the students on a summative assessment missed a concept or question the instructor could go back and review that concept or do additional learning activities before moving on to the next module.
The goal of formative assessment is to monitor student learning to provide ongoing feedback that can be used by instructors to improve their teaching and by students to improve their learning. Formative assessments would help students identify their strengths and weaknesses and target areas that need work and help faculty recognize where students are struggling and address problems immediately.
Formative assessments are generally low stakes, which means that they have low or no point value and few immediate consequences if students perform poorly. Examples include:
Formative assessment often assess student learning, but some formative assessments seek to understand the students’ learning experience — how they perceive the experience of the course, and how they feel about it. For example, a mid-semester formative assessment might ask such questions as, “What about this course and its instruction helps your learning?” and, “What about this course and its instruction presents a barrier to learning? What suggestions to you have to improve this?”
The primary purpose of formative assessment is to improve learning, not merely to audit it. It is assessment for learning rather than assessment of learning. Formative assessment is both an “instructional tool” that instructors and their students “use while learning is occurring” and “an accountability tool to determine if learning has occurred” (National Education Association, 2003, p. 3). In other words, to be “formative,” assessments must inform the decisions that instructors and students make minute by minute in the classroom. The table below compares the characteristics of formative assessment and summative assessment.
| Formative Assessment (Assessment for Learning) | Summative Assessment (Assessment of Learning) |
|---|---|
| Purpose: To improve learning and achievement | Purpose: To measure or audit attainment |
| Carried out while learning is in progress—day to day, minute by minute. | Carried out from time to time to create snapshots of what has happened. |
| Focused on the learning process and the learning progress. | Focused on the products of learning. |
| Viewed as an integral part of the teaching-learning process. | Viewed as something separate, an activity performed after the teaching-learning cycle. |
| Collaborative: Instructors and students know where they are headed, understand the learning needs, and use assessment information as feedback to guide and adapt what they do to meet those needs. | Instructor directed: Instructors assign what the students must do and then evaluate how well they complete the assignment. |
| Fluid: An ongoing process influenced by student need and teacher feedback. | Rigid: An unchanging measure of what the student achieved. |
| Instructors and students adopt the role of intentional learners. | Instructors adopt the role of auditors and students assume the role of the audited. |
| Instructors and students use the evidence they gather to make adjustments for continuous improvement. | Instructors use the results to make final "success or failure" decisions about a relatively fixed set of instructional activities. |
| Method | Description |
|---|---|
| Observations |
Anecdotal Notes: These are short notes written during a lesson as students work in groups or individually, or after the lesson is complete. The instructor should reflect on a specific aspect of the learning and make notes on the student's progress toward mastery of that learning target. The instructor can create a form to organize these notes so that they can easily be used for adjusting instruction based on student needs. Anecdotal Notebook: The instructor may wish to keep a notebook of the individual observation forms or a notebook divided into sections for individual students. With this method, all of the observations on an individual student are together and can furnish a picture of student learning over time. Anecdotal Note Cards: Instructors can create a file folder with 5" x 7" note cards for each student. |
| Questioning | Asking better questions affords students an opportunity for deeper thinking and provides teachers with significant insight into the degree and depth of student understanding. Questions of this nature engage students in classroom dialogue that expands student learning. Questions should go beyond the typical factual questions requiring recall of facts or numbers. Paul Black, a noted authority on formative assessment, suggests that "more effort has to be spent in framing questions that are worth asking: that is, questions which explore issues that are critical to the development of students' understanding." (Black et al., 2003) |
| Discussion | Classroom discussions can tell instructors much about student learning and understanding of basic concepts. Instructors can initiate discussions by presenting students with an open-ended question. The goal is to build knowledge and develop critical and creative thinking skills. Discussions allow students to increase the breadth and depth of their understanding while discarding erroneous information and expanding and explicating background knowledge (Black and William 1998; Doherty 2003). By activating students as learning resources for one another there is the possibility of some of the largest gains seen in any educational intervention (Slavin, Hurley and Chamberlain 2003). Student understanding can be assessed by listening to the student responses and by taking anecdotal notes. |
| Exit/Admit Slips | Exit Slips are written responses to questions the instructor poses at the end of a lesson or a class to assess student understanding of key concepts. They should take no more than 5 minutes to complete and are taken up as students leave the classroom. The instructor can quickly determine which students get it, which ones need a little help, and which ones are going to require much more instruction on the concept. By assessing the responses on the Exit Slips the instructor can better adjust the instruction in order to accommodate students' needs for the next class. Admit slips are exactly like Exit Slips, but they are done prior to or at the beginning of the class. Students may be asked to reflect on their understanding of their previous night's homework, or they may reflect on the previous day's lesson if the question required a longer response time. Exit and Admit Slips can be used in all classes to integrate written communication into the content area. |
| Learning Logs / Response Logs | Learning Logs are used for students' reflections on the material they are learning. This type of journal is in common use among scientists and engineers. In the log, students record the process they go through in learning something new, and any questions they may need to have clarified. This allows students to make connections to what they have learned, set goals, and reflect upon their learning process. The act of writing about thinking helps students become deeper thinkers and better writers. Instructors and students can use Learning Logs during the formative assessment process, as students record what they are learning and the questions they still have, and instructors monitor student progress toward mastery of the learning targets in their log entries and adjust instruction to meet student needs. By reading student logs and delivering descriptive feedback on what the student is doing well and suggestions for improvement, the instructor can make the Learning Log a powerful tool for learning. Response Logs are a good way to examine student thinking. They are most often connected with response to literature, but they may be used in any content area. They offer students a place to respond personally, to ask questions, to predict, to reflect, to collect vocabulary and to compose their thoughts about text. Instructors may use Response Logs as formative assessment during the learning process. |
| Graphic Organizers | Graphic organizers are visual models that can assist students in organizing information and communicating clearly and effectively. Students can use graphic organizers to structure their writing, brainstorm ideas, assist in decision making, clarify story structure, help with problem solving, and plan research. |
| Peer/Self Assessment | Peer and self assessment help to create a learning community among students. When students are involved in criteria and goal setting, self evaluation becomes a logical step in the learning process. Students become metacognitive and are more aware of their personal strengths and weaknesses. With peer assessment students begin to see each other as resources for understanding and checking for quality work against previously determined criteria. Instructors can examine the self assessments and the peer assessments and identify students' strengths and weaknesses. |
| Practice Presentations | Just as in sports, practice before a classroom presentation is vital. Through practice and peer review, students can improve their presentation skills and the content of the presentation itself. The practice presentation should take place a few days before the final presentation due date. Students run through their presentations with the audience, their peers, evaluating the performance based on the previously established rubric criteria. An easy way for students to furnish feedback is through a T-Chart. Students use the left column of the chart to comment on the positive aspects of the presentation, and they use the right columns to suggest changes that the presenter might make to improve the quality of the presentation. |
| Think-Pair-Share | Think-Pair-Share (Lyman, 1981) is a summarizing strategy that can be used in any content area before, during, and after a lesson. The activity involves three basic steps. During the "think" stage, the instructor tells students to ponder a question or problem. Next, individuals are paired up and discuss their answer or solution to the problem. Finally, students are called upon to share with the rest of the class. There is also a Think-Pair-Square-Share. In this strategy, partners discuss answers with another pair before sharing with the class, ensuring that all students are interacting with the information. Instructors can use this activity in the formative assessment process as they walk about the room listening to student conversations. |
