At one Pennsylvania school, building a model airplane is a learning experience used to assess the abilities of students with reading difficulties. Specific model-building behaviors that can be observed are gathering information, employing prior knowledge, summarizing, visualizing, predicting, self-monitoring, evaluating, measuring, calculating,…

Describes use of portfolios with middle school students, highlighting assessment purpose, structure, evidence, implementation, grading, validity, and cost considerations. Portfolios have the potential to revise schools' roles in preparing students for the future. Convincing parents and the public that portfolio completion is a demanding task will…

Discusses the purpose of alternative assessment in language arts classes in the middle school setting. Notes how alternative assessments encourage higher order thinking skills, provide an alternative to failure, encourage students to experiment, and keep teachers interested. Provides directions and scoring guides for examples of alternative…

Discusses connections between global education and interdisciplinary teaching and learning, cooperative learning, active learning, and authentic assessment at the middle school level. Considers differences between multicultural education and the broader scope of global education to include international events and interactions among cultures…

Testing is a technology, a socially mediated, value-laden endeavor. Technologies embody trade-offs between what is desired and real-world constraints of cost, time, thought, and energy. Although alternative assessments offer exciting prospects for middle schools, these new forms must not be misused or naively accepted as defensible, consummate…

The essential idea of alternative assessment modes is for students to create some product and reflect on it. The authenticity of tasks means using regular classroom instruction as an opportunity for student assessment. Reflective self-evaluation should be an integral part of every classroom assignment, not an obligatory afterthought. Developing…

Investigates the effect of mathematics portfolio assessments on middle school students' achievement. Discusses portfolio contents, students' attitudes toward the ability of portfolios to reflect their achievement and toward their active involvement in assessment, and the success of the evaluations. (JPB)

Historically, student teachers learn to evaluate students much as they do many teaching elements--from personal classroom experiences. In 1992-93, four faculty members at California State University (San Marcos) piloted a team-taught middle-level teacher education program that modeled effective teaching and assessment practices for use with young…

Traditional assessment of student progress focuses on product and emphasizes only the academic aspects of student development. Teachers are often frustrated by the teach-test-report model, since grades cannot truly reflect a student's progress. A Canadian secondary school teacher's experience with grade-2 cooperative learning helped restructure…

Teachers at an interdisciplinary magnet middle school in Pensacola, Florida, collaboratively developed performance assessments to help them evaluate defined student processes and outcomes shown in student writings, oral and electronic presentations, and other portfolio offerings. In interdisciplinary schools, collaboration between curricula and…

Unlike traditional objective testing methods, alternative assessments encourage student involvement in real-life problems and challenges. The teacher's role is to help students determine and identify assessment tasks and criteria, participate in ongoing assessment of work in progress, and propose alternative ways to meet criteria. This article…

Conceptual differences between two popular alternative assessment methods must be clearly differentiated. Portfolios reflect individual development, whereas performance-based assessments reflect curriculum mastery. In combination, these methods provide a complete picture of the student as a learner and constitute a rigorous alternative to…

In a cooperative research program, classroom teachers and university researchers developed and implemented a contextualized performance-based assessment in mathematics. The assessments were intended to model what students may do in the course of daily activity and designed to assess problem solving, and conceptual and procedural understanding.…