Reading all this articles
about assessment, testing, evaluation, I realize that when we were at secondary
school these words did not have any sense; they were just the words to blame
for our bad scores, or simply these words made our teacher more detestable.
At that time we only knew
about terrible exams which used to be the ones to demonstrate if we were good
or not in certain subjects. Teachers never gave as feedback about anything;
exams said almost everything about the performance of a student.
I think that feedback is an important aspect in education, students need to know about their performances in order to increase the quality of their processes.
But nowadays in my position
as a teacher I must to say that assessment is amazing, and that the process of
a student is more important that their scores, assessment give as the tools to improve
processes, give solutions to problems and to make the students aware of their
own stiles of learning.
It is a shame to say
that there are still teachers who do not appreciate the power of assessment as
a one of the most important processes in education. They just apply some exams
to fulfill a requirement but where are their journals? Where are their reflections? Where are their
proposals to try to solve problems?
These are some of the
advantages of assessment for both teachers and students.
Teachers can:
- Identify skills and conceptual
understandings that need reinforcement;
- Identify and respond to misconceptions
about, and misapplications of, content knowledge and processes; and
- Monitor student progress.
Students can:
- Revisit and revise work based on known
criteria;
- Use models of successful work
(exemplars) as a “target” for their own learning; and
- Self-monitor their progress.
I think the core of the under-appreciation and misconception of assessment is that most teachers actually have no idea about the existence of alternative ways of assessment. I dare to say that is the reason why the term assessment has been relegated to the implementation of traditional tests to evaluate our students. We could also say and it is the reason why the thought of being evaluated results terrifying, not to mention boring for our students. The task of transforming and expanding the concept of assessment in classrooms should start with educating teachers so we, at the same time, can educate our students. It is also important to show teachers and students all the forms of assessment so everybody can appreciate the benefits it brings not only to a classroom, but to the personal growth of both parts.
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