The High Expectations Learning Process for Standards-Driven Units of Study (HELPS) enables teachers to connect classroom teaching to standards and assessment. Workshops take teachers through a seven-step process: identifying standards, developing ideas for a culminating event, aligning this event with standards, identifying unit blocks, creating…

Discusses the failings of standardized tests and the benefits of performance-based assessment, which supports high-quality teaching and learning, noting what is necessary for assessment reform and what parents can do. (SM)

Describes an elementary school teacher's implementation of authentic assessment strategies, in her science class. Discusses her use of different strategies including science logs, performance assessment, creative drama, scrapbooks, and interviews. Highlights factors that contributed to successful implementation of assessment strategies,…

This article presents a procedure found effective for including students with special needs in daily instructional activities within a general classroom. Steps in the procedure include individualized instruction incorporating student choice of materials, feedback from teacher-designed rubrics, application of student-constructed reading logs, and…

Points to weaknesses of traditional tests and comments on the theoretical background and necessity of performance assessment. Presents specific information on performance assessment and provides assessment examples. (Author/VWL)

Presents a conceptualization for the competence of child care directors based on knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Describes the Illinois Director Credential, earned through validation of accomplishments in five competency components: general education, early childhood/school-age knowledge and skills, management knowledge and skills, experience,…

Questions the claims by advocates of educational assessment reform, highlighting the work of Wiggins, who introduced authentic assessment. Discusses the origins of authentic tests, authenticity and validity, and assessment and educational philosophy, concluding that promotion of authentic assessment is flawed because "authentic" is misleading, and…

Reviews developments in educational assessment and in journals devoted to assessment during the editor's tenure with this journal, with a special focus on the place of performance assessment. Discusses the problem of generalizability in many new forms of assessment. (SLD)

Addresses issues relating to performance-based learning and serves as a guide to the process of developing a performance task. (Author/VWL)

Compared holistic and analytic scoring methods to explore how the alternative scorings can make differences for performance assessment using the many-faceted Rasch model. Results based on social studies responses of 43 students show that scoring rubrics could be improved by investigating rating scale categories. Discusses implications of scoring…

This article discusses important principles for assessing language arts instruction for gifted learners. It stresses the importance of multiple measures and approaches being employed at formative and summative stages of the instructional process. Examples of rubrics, portfolios, and performance-based models are provided, along with ideas for…

As standardized tests increase in importance but remain fundamentally unchanged, they will guarantee the continued narrowing of instruction (as teachers concentrate on preparing students to pass them). Short-answer questions keep the focus on isolated fragments of learning. Writing samples are treated as formulaic exercises. Today's schools sorely…

Points out the difficulties of student assessment based on classroom participation and recommends a rubric. (YDS)

Educators of professionals often want to determine the quality of student performance and its impact on those they serve. Performance assessment in the education of teachers, medical practitioners, and counselors, for example, currently receives much discussion and debate in the literature (Vaugh & Everhart, 2004; Howley, 2003; and, Urbani et al.,…

Alignment has taken on increased importance given the current high-stakes nature of assessment. To make well-informed decisions about student learning on the basis of test results, assessment items need to be well aligned with standards. Project 2061 of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has developed a procedure for…