How Can We Make Assessments Meaningful?
By Heather Wolpert-Gawron
July 31, 2012
I think meaningful assessments can come in many shapes and sizes. In fact,
to be thoroughly engaging and to draw the best work out of the students,
assessments should come in different formats.
Thankfully, with the Common Core standards exemplifying the 4Cs --
Creativity and Critical Thinking (through performance-based assessments),
Collaboration, and Communication (through the use of interdisciplinary
writing) -- we are looking at a more fluid future in testing formats. As long as
the format itself is aligned with real-world skills, a meaningful assessment
does not need to be lockstep with a particular structure any more.
When I think about my own definition of a "meaningful assessment," I think
the test must meet certain requirements. The assessment must have value
other than "because it's on the test." It must intend to impact the world beyond
the student "self," whether it is on the school site, in the outlying community,
the state, country, world, etc. Additionally, the assessment should incorporate
skills that students need for their future. That is, the test must assess skills
other than merely content. It must also test how eloquently the students
communicate their content.
Criteria for a Meaningful Classroom Assessment
To address these requirements, I ask myself the following guided questions:
1. Does the assessment involve project-based learning?
2. Does it allow for student choice of topics?
3. Is it inquiry based?
4. Does it ask that students use some level of internet literacy to find
their answers?
5. Does it involve independent problem solving?
6. Does it incorporate the 4Cs?
7. Do the students need to communicate their knowledge via writing in
some way?
8. Does the final draft or project require multiple modalities (visual, oral,
data, etc.) in its presentation?
Clearly not all assessments achieve every single characteristic listed above.
But in our attempt to address some of these elements, we will have made our
classroom assessments so much more meaningful. It is vital that students
connect with the value of their assessments. After all, if a student trusts that
the assessment is meaningful and will help them later on, it helps with both
their achievement and with your own classroom management.
Transparency and Why It's Important
It's important that we inform the students why a particular assessment has
value. Some teachers still balk at this job, as if students should just trust that
what we do in school has value to what happens outside of school. However,
kids are smart. They know that bubbling with a #2 pencil is antiquated. They
know that much of the content we teach them can be found through Google.
But as savvy as students are, they don't know everything about
communicating their content, and we owe it to them to make sure that not only
are our tests aligned with skills they must know for their future, but to make
sure that we've been transparent in our rationale.
So how can high-stakes assessments be meaningful to students? For one
thing, high-stakes tests shouldn't be so high stakes. It's inauthentic. They
should and still can be a mere snapshot of ability. Additionally, those
occasional assessments need to take a back seat to the real learning and
achievement going on in every day assessments observed by the teacher.
The key here, however, is to assess every day. Not in boring, multiple-choice
daily quizzes, but with informal, engaging assessments that take more than
just a snapshot of a student's knowledge at one moment in time.
But frankly, any assessment that sounds cool can still be made meaningless.
It's how the students interact with the test that makes it meaningful. With the 4
Cs in mind, ask if the assessment allows for the following:
Creativity Are they students creating or just regurgitating? Are they being
given credit for presenting something other than what was described?
Collaboration Have they spent some time working with others to formulate
their thoughts, to brainstorm, or to seek feedback from peers?
Critical Thinking Are the students doing more work than the teacher in
seeking out information and problem solving?
Communication Does the assessment emphasize the need to communicate
the content well? Is writing involved, as well as other modalities? If asked to
teach the content to other students, what methods will the student use to
communicate the information and help embed it more deeply?
Rubric on Meaningful Assessments
So as an activity for myself, I created a rubric to look at whenever I
was wondering if an assessment was going to be a waste of time or was
going to connect with the students. (Click the chart to download the PDF.)
Credit: Heather Wolpert-Gawron
Click to download the PDF of this chart. (275 KB)
Another way to ensure that an assessment is meaningful, of course, is to
simply ask the students what they thought. Design a survey after each major
unit or assessment. Or, better yet, if you want to encourage students to really
focus on the requirements on a rubric, add a row that's only for them to fill out
for you. That way, the rubric's feedback is more of a give-and-take, and you
get feedback on the assessment's level of meaningfulness as soon as
possible.
Credit: Heather Wolpert-Gawron
Click to download the PDF of this chart. (209 KB)
Download the example (left) of a quick rubric I designed for a general writing
assessment. I included a row that the participants could fill out that actually
gave me quick feedback on how meaningful or helpful they believed the
assessment was towards their own learning. As an instructor and lesson
designer, I want a quick turnaround between when I assign an assessment
and if I need to adjust the assessment to meet the needs of future learners.
By also giving them a space to fill out, they own the rubric even more, and will
pay more attention to what I fill out knowing that I gave them an opportunity to
also give me feedback. It's one way the students and I can learn reciprocally.
So how do you ensure that your classroom assessments are meaningful?
