Challenging the mind, touching the heart : assessment for learning in a secondary school

Abstract

Over these last twenty-five years there has been an explosion of developments in assessment. Ideas about assessment expressed in the National Minimum Curriculum are based on the principles of the model of assessment that considers assessment to be in dynamic interaction with teaching and learning. The NMC calls for assessment practices that are formative in nature. The main concern of this essay is to clarify the meaning of formative assessment and show how formative assessment practices can be a powerful tool to secondary school teachers, a tool that can enhance the learning process and motivate students to learn in a meaningful way. Formative assessment has a number of features: it can empower students as learners, it can make a decisive impact on a student's self, it challenges school administrators and teachers to develop approaches and techniques that support the educational ambitions of the new millennium as suggested in the NMC. These features are explored in this essay together with strategies to implement formative assessment practices. This essay includes a survey of current assessment practices in an area secondary school. The research tool used to collect the data was a questionnaire given out to teachers; 53 out of 67 (83%) of the teachers returned the completed questionnaire. Results show that current assessment practices are either summative or formative; however, there is an emphasis on the summative type of assessment. There is also evidence that teachers are not quite informed on the meaning, significance and benefits of formative assessment practices. A number of recommendations are made directed at policy makers, secondary school administrators and teachers to develop formative assessment practices and therefore enhance the educational experience in local secondary schools.