Over the last two decades, there has been renewed interest in formative assessment, in large part due to the increasing pressures and prevalence of "high stakes" summative assessments. As states try to meet the requirements of the No Child Left Behind law, teachers and administrators are realizing that formative assessment offers an…

Many reports have identified a perceived lack of quality in regard to assessment feedback in higher education contexts. One research study in 2007 on undergraduate university students found that less than half of the students (46%) collected their formative feedback, suggesting that from their perspective feedback clearly was not fulfilling the…

Classroom assessment techniques (CATs) are teaching strategies that provide formative assessments of student learning. It has been argued that the use of CATs enhances and improves student learning. Although the various types of CATs have been extensively documented and qualitatively studied, there appears to be little quantitative research…

The authors tell about their heterogeneous 91 person research and evaluation unit at an operating foundation in St. Paul, Minnesota. They focus on evaluation for program improvement, one of several purposes of studies they work on. The three authors write from their different manager positions within the unit. Included are the context of the…

Rubrics are a means to communicate the standards or criteria of an assignment and to assess student work formatively or summatively by faculty, peer, and/or self. Given that assessment is a necessary and mandated component of education, this study sought to summarize what is known about rubrics as an assessment tool for student learning. In this…

This research is part of a larger study of commercial reading programs used in Canada in grades 1-6. The specific purposes of the results reported here were to identify and quantify the assessment techniques suggested for the selections that contain scientific content, to show how the assessments differ by grade, to evaluate the nature and quality…

As a result of the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2002, the field of education has seen a heavy emphasis on the use of "scientifically based research" for designing and testing the effectiveness of new and existing educational programs. According to NCLB, when addressing basic cause and effect questions scientifically based…

Assessment of and for learning has occupied center stage in education reform, especially with the advent of the No Child Left Behind Federal legislation. This study examined the formative function of assessment--assessment for learning--recognizing that such assessment needs to be aligned, at least in part, with the summative function of…

The development of European Community administrative authority has greatly influenced the development of an evaluation culture among the southern and central member states of the European Union. The present case study from Spain provides an example of this diffusion through the use of an empowerment evaluation approach to build evaluation capacity…

Research and development on formative assessment has paid little attention to part-time adult basic education in informal community-based settings. A three-year project funded by the Nuffield Foundation, the National Research Development Centre for Adult Literacy and Numeracy, and the Quality Improvement Agency addresses that gap in vocational and…

This paper outlines an approach to improving learning and teaching that combines two strong research bases: The research on formative assessment or assessment for learning provides information about what to change; research on teacher learning communities guides decisions about how to change. In this paper we describe the content and process for…

Our project to embed formative student assessments in the Foundational Approaches in Science Teaching curriculum required a close collaboration between curriculum developers at the Curriculum Research & Development Group (CRDG) and assessment developers at the Stanford Educational Assessment Laboratory (SEAL). This was a new endeavor for each…

This study examines how mathematics and science teachers' classroom assessment practices were affected by the National Board Certification process. Using a 3-year, longitudinal, comparison group design, evidence of changes in teachers' classroom practice were measured on six dimensions of formative assessment. The National Board candidates began…

Community development partnerships for youths offer valuable resources for school improvement. Unfortunately, these resources may not be tapped because school leaders have not been prepared to understand these partnerships. The evaluative research reported partnership-related understanding, aiming to prepare leaders to contribute to, and benefit…

Concepts of formative and process evaluation are discussed, and their applications in health promotion and disease prevention are reviewed. Process evaluation fulfills the need for information on program implementation, whereas formative evaluation aims to help develop and improve programs from an early stage. Both evaluations can increase program…