The "Framework" and NGSS bring to the forefront the role of language in doing science and in learning from doing science. Yet, most existing science assessments for elementary learners do not integrate or attend to aspects of scientific language and literacy that are essential components of science proficiency. Accordingly, there is a…

After passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) in 2015, states assumed greater responsibility for designing their own accountability and assessment systems. ESSA requires states to measure "higher order thinking skills and understanding" and encourages the use of open-ended performance assessments, which are essential for…

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) opened up new possibilities for how student and school success are defined and supported in American public education. States have greater responsibility for designing and building their assessment and accountability systems. These new opportunities to develop performance assessments are critically important…

This article describes ten key assessment practices for advancing student learning that all professors should be familiar with and strategically incorporate in their classrooms and programs. Each practice or concept is explained with examples and guidance for putting it into practice. The ten are: learning outcomes, performance assessments,…

Learn everything you need to know to implement an integrated system of assessment and grading. The author details the specific benefits of formative assessment and explains how to design and interpret three different types of formative assessments, how to track student progress, and how to assign meaningful grades. Detailed examples bring each…

The widespread application of personal computers to educational and psychological testing has substantially increased the number of test administration methodologies available to testing programs. Many of these mediums are referred to by their acronyms, such as CAT, CBT, CCT, and LOFT. The similarities between the acronyms and the methods…

This discussion on assessment and evaluation in the online environment includes the use of different forms of rubrics. (Contains 5 tables and 2 figures.)

Computer aided assessment is a common approach used by educational institutions. The benefits range into the design of teaching, learning, and instructional materials. While some such systems implement fully automated marking for multiple choice questions and fill-in-the-blanks, they are insufficient when human critiquing is required. Current…

"Classroom Assessment in Action" clarifies the multi-faceted roles of measurement and assessment and their applications in a classroom setting. Comprehensive in scope, Shermis and Di Vesta explain basic measurement concepts and show students how to interpret the results of standardized tests. From these basic concepts, the authors then…

This article argues that if multimodal and new literacies are to become common practices in schools, they have to be included in both school and provincial/state large-scale assessment programmes. Building on current criterion-referenced testing in Newfoundland and Labrador which assesses a range of literacies (viewing, reading, writing,…

This article describes the development of a Web-based instrument that is part of a strategic planning initiative in technology in K-12 schools in Nebraska. The instrument provides rubrics for self-assessment of essential conditions necessary for integrating and adopting of technology. Essential conditions were defined by an extended panel of…

This article reports the results of an investigation of the convergent criterion-related validity of two computer-based tools for scoring concept maps and essays as part of the ongoing formative evaluation of these tools. In pairs, participants researched a science topic online and created a concept map of the topic. Later, participants…

Current educational theories emphasize assessment as a vital part of teaching-learning process. Alternative assessment techniques aim to expose and promote the process of the learning rather than the final outcome. Concept mapping is a technique for representing conceptual knowledge and relationships between concepts in a graphical form. Requiring…