Formative Assessment

Jennifer Partrick
Sep 08, 2008

Formative assessments can play a vital role in classrooms to improve teaching and learning, if their purpose is clearly understood. Popham (2008) states, "Formative assessment is a planned process involving a number of different activities" (p. 6). If teachers use formative assessments to drive instruction, there need to be identified stopping points within the lesson to determine to what degree information taught has been learned and what to do if the students did not understand what was taught. At these points teachers use different strategies to determine how well students have learned the information taught thus far. Information gleaned at this time is used by teachers and students to decide what to do next. Time for teacher and student reflection is important in this process.

When teachers use formative assessments to enhance instruction, they use the data to decide how and when to adjust their teaching so that learning and understanding are the outcomes for their students. Formative assessment helps students make adjustments to their learning so they are better able to understand the body of information being taught. In order for teachers and students to make better use of formative assessments, there needs to be a shift in classroom culture. Rather than rely on assessments simply to determine grades and to compare students to each other, data from formative assessments are used to generate evidence to make decisions on what to do next in regards to teaching and learning. Lastly, schools should consider using formative assessments to support teaching and learning. Professional development and learning communities are two ways to support formative assessments within schools.

Formative assessments need not be only pencil and paper tests. There are many simple strategies that teachers can use to gain information about how well their students are learning.

White boards: Teachers ask students to respond to questions by writing the answer on the boards. In addition, teachers could pose a multiple choice question and students write their choice on the board.

Letter-cards: Each student is given a set of cards ranging from A-D, T, and F. The teacher poses a question, and students choose their answer and show the appropriate card. True/False questions are also posed.

Talk-Time: The teacher poses a question and students answer it in pairs. The teacher walks around the class as students are talking and gleans information this way.

Summarizing strategies: There many summarizing strategies that teachers can use to assess student understanding within a lesson.

Formative assessments supply the evidence teachers need in order to adjust instructional practices so that student learning is always the outcome.

Reference:
Popham, W. J. (2008). Transformative assessments. Alexandria, VA: Association of Supervision and Curriculum Development.