Assessments
Assessing our students requires us to be coaches rather than referees making a final call. However, evaluation often fosters the concept of a final summative judgment on an assignment or semester. Therefore, evaluation would seem to be in conflict with a constructivist approach to learning that focuses on student development. That does not have to be the case. Evaluations whose criteria are explained both prior to and after the evaluation can allow the students to internalize the judgments offered and assess their own learning and goals. “The difference between the two seems to lie not in the type of measure (e.g., multiple-choice or short-answer test, essay exam, composition, portfolio) but in when and why students and teachers are undertaking and/or reviewing the work” (Olson, 2007, p. 330).
Assessments and evaluations also need to be assessed. So often creativity is not part of assessment or evaluation, and a prime tool for promoting critical thinking is lost. Assessments and evaluations—discussion, observational, performance, standardized testing—must also vary in that only one type of assessment or evaluation will provide a faulty interpretation of an individual student’s learning. I use creative assessments (art as an analysis tool), project based assignments that allow for student choice in expression, student designed projects (especially for my Transcendentalism unit), and inquiry units where I articulate the ultimate goal(s), but students propose their method of achieving these goals. I do use multiple-choice tests that mirror the standardized tests that students will take, but I do so in order to allow students to assess their weak areas and work with me to structure ways to achieve the desired result. Dialogue is a key tool that I use to both assess and evaluate. Informal discussions illustrate understanding and critical thinking about a concept and text, and formal seminars act as an evaluation by me and a self-evaluation by the students as they interact with their peers in discussing key ideas raised by the text.
By assessing we see what is happening in our classroom and ultimately the aim of such assessment is a self-evaluation by the student that is internal rather than one that is external and imposed by us (Tchudi and Tchudi, 1999, p.57). “We have a responsibility…to see that the students we certify really understand or can do what we teach, to see that the grades and credits and degrees we give really have the meaning or currency they are supposed to have” (Elbow, 1986, p. 55). And in the course of fulfilling this responsibility we also have the responsibility of seeking to understand our students and what they have to teach us because we too are being assessed and being evaluated by the most important judges of all—our students.
Image: Students presenting their Shakespeare Madness Box Scene for The Comedy of Errors
References and Sources Consulted
Burke, J. (1999). The English teacher’s companion: A complete guide to classroom, curriculum, and the profession. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Elbow, P. (1986). Embracing contraries: Explorations in learning and teaching, New York: Oxford University Press.
Jago, C. (2001). Beyond standards: Excellence in the high school English classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Marshall, J. (2009). Divided against ourselves: Standards, assessments, and adolescent literacy. In L. Christenbury, R. Bomer, and P. Smagorisky (Eds.)Handbook of adolescent literacy research. (pp. 113-125). New York: The Guilford Press.
Olson, C. B. (2007). The reading/writing connection: Strategies for teaching and learning in the secondary classroom, 2nd edition. Boston: Pearson Education.
Tchudi, S.J. and Tchudi, S.N. (1999). The English language arts handbook, second edition. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
White, E.M. (2007). Assigning, responding, evaluating: A writer teacher’s guide, fourth edition. Boston Bedford/St. Martin’s.