Table 1. Features of Assessment of, for and as Learning
Assessment and evaluation both describe a process of gather and expound of verification for some purpose. They both involve decisions about what evidence to use, the collection of the evidence in a systematic and planned way, the explanation of the evidence to produce a judgement, and the communication and use of that judgement. “Assessment” refers to the action of gathering proof and building discernment related to the outcomes, such as students' achievement of particular goals of learning or teachers and others' understanding. The term 'assessment' is an attempt of enquiry undertaken by the teachers and students that is driven by the motive of refining the practice of teaching and learning for the better outcome of the same. The conclusive goal of AfL is therefore to involve pupil's in their own assessment so that they can reflect on where they are in their own learning, recognise where they need to go next and work out those steps to reach the goal. Present research article has been undertaken by keeping the following research questions in mind. What are the different concepts of assessment? Does assessment change its perspective from constructive perspective? Does assessment enhance pupil learning? What is the theoretical base for the different aspects of assessment? The present research study is useful for teacher educators, teachers, parents and educationalists.
The term assessment wraps a comprehensive range of practice used to gather information relevant to understanding the function of pupils in educational setups. It includes standardised testing; observation, parent and teacher appraisal and evaluation of work samples, their records and environment factors. Assessment serves another essential function that is progress evaluation. Assessment has to be seen as the consistent part of teaching and learning. The notion of assessment is one that hub on reporting student learning, point out where every student is in his or her personal learning, continues recognising any difficulties students may be having in their learning and providing direction to the teacher and the student for the steps to be taken to enhance learning.
Assessment and evaluation both set out a process of collecting and expounding of evidence for some purpose. They involve decisions about what evidence to use, the collection of the evidence in a systematic and planned way, the explanation of the evidence to produce a judgement, and the communication and use of that judgement. “Assessment” refers to the process of accumulating confirmation and building judgements relating to outcomes, such as students achievement of particular goals of learning or teachers and others' understanding. The activity of assessment and evaluation are similar but the kind of evidence, the purpose and the basis on which judgements are made differ. This research article provides extensive insight into Assessment from different perspectives. The research has been undertaken by keeping the following research questions in mind. What are the different concepts of assessment? Does assessment change its perspective from constructive perspective? Does assessment enhance pupil learning? What is the theoretical base for the different aspects of assessment? This Research article will be useful for teacher educators, teachers, parents and educationalists.
“Assessment is broader than testing and measurement because it includes all kinds of ways to the sample and observes students' skills, knowledge and abilities. Assessment is the operation of gathering, synthesizing and explicating information to aid decision making".
“The term 'assessment' refers to all those ventures undertaken by teachers and by their students in assessing themselves, which provide information to be used as reaction to alter the teaching and learning pursuits in which they are engaged”.
Assessment means work. For example, examination, assignment, practical, performance, that a student is required to complete at different reasons. The fulfillment of educational purpose is to motivate learning, to provide feedback, to provide a basis for an official record of achievement or certification of competence and to permit grading the students.
Assessment for learning provides substitute perception to traditional assessment in schools. Assessment for learning is planned to give teachers information that will allow them to alter teaching and learning venture in which students are engaged to differentiate and understand how individual student approach their learning. Such assessments suggest that students are all learning in a characteristic way, a kind of unique learning, and helps in recognising the expected patterns and pathways that many students go through. The information from carefully designed assessments can be used to determine not only what students know, but also to gain intuition into how, when and where students use their knowledge so that teachers can efficiently target instructions and resources. Assessment for learning involves social interactions between teachers and students who have a shared vision of learning (Berry, 2008).
When teachers are doing assessment for learning, they assemble a extensive range of data for a different purpose, so that they can change the learning of their students. They expertise assessment tasks that open a window on what students know and can do in advance, and use the insights that come from the process to design the next steps in instructions. To do this, teachers use various techniques like observation, worksheets and questioning in the class. Students teach through seminars and whatever mechanism is likely to give them information that will be useful for their planning and teaching. Considering student work which is not designed to assign marks and making comparative judgement among the student's strength and weaknesses, provide them with feedback that will further enhance their learning.
In the assessment for learning, teachers use their personal knowledge of the students and their understanding of the situation of the assessment and the curriculum targets to identify particular learning needs. Assessment for learning takes place in the middle of learning, often more than once, not at the end. It is collective among teachers; it helps to provide assistance as part of the assessment. It helps teachers provide the feedback to scaffold the next steps. And it depends on teacher's diagnostic skills to make it work.
Practice in a classroom is worthy of students development if the achievement of the students in adverse areas could be found and analysed. The same is then interpreted and used to understand the future course of action directed towards the development of the students. The action so taken will be way better than the action taken without the interpretation.
Assessment for learning covers those every day classroom practices through which teachers, peers and learners try to find, notice, recognize and respond to student learning, which aims to enhance student learning, his capacity and autonomy. Assessment for learning also needs to be reflective of, responsible to and build on from how particular disciplines generate and legitimise meaning.
Assessment for learning is the process of seeking and interpreting evidence for use by learners themselves to decide where the learners are in their learning, where they need to go and how best to get there.
The ultimate goal of AfL is therefore to involve pupil's in their own assessment so that they can reflect on their own present progress and accordingly work on their drawbacks of learning and take steps to overcome the same. The research literature sometimes refers to this as the process of self-monitoring and self-regulation. In other words, pupil need to understand both the desired outcomes of their learning and the process of learning by which these outcomes are achieved, and they need to act on this understanding.
AfL aims to inform and improve student learning within the regular flow of teaching and learning through students becoming active meaningful makers and thoughtful judges of their own learning.
Theoretical support for AfL principles and practices has also been established, For example, from contemporary psychology and the contention that understanding is created by the learner. According to Biggs (1996), learning theory termed constructivism enjoys a long history in the field of cognitive psychology, having the central idea that "What the learning has to do to create knowledge is the important thing". Implicit in the concept of learning are notions of change and development of understanding or ability.
In the constructivist view of learning, the development of understanding involves a process of construction and reconstruction of knowledge by the student. It is the view of learning that provides a basis for the active participation of the learners in the classroom where the formative assessment is practiced. Most approaches to a AfL have been developed within a cognitive constructivist framework for understanding learning.
Constructivist approach assumes knowledge not as a fixed, identifiable entity to be absorbed by the learner, instead constructed by students based on their own understanding which is influenced by their background perspectives and experience. As a result this type of assessment tends to be more flexible, integrative, contextualised, process oriented, criteria referred and formative. This assessment for learning approach encourages student independence and self evaluation, and can lead to active and deeper learning.
In the Constructivist paradigm which underlies in the AfL ideas into practice in a educational setup with a Constructivist framework, students are seen as active collaborators in the building of knowledge. Learning takes place through interaction, existing in the transaction between students and student, student and text, and student and teacher. Viewed from a Constructivist perspective then, assessment procedures are inevitably a part of the dialectic of teaching and learning part of the process which defines what knowledge is, what is learned, and how students learn. Assessments which reflect this perspective provide a means for engaging students in selfreflection and for acknowledging their role as collaborators in the learning process. In sum, a Constructivist perspective acknowledges the reciprocity and interdependency of assessment and curriculum. The emphasis here is an effective assessment promoting student engagement with peers and teachers in the collaborative construction of understanding and meaning, and promoting student reflection on this process. Thus connection with Constructivist learning principles and formative assessment is commonly made and referred as AfL (Biggs, 1998).
Paul black and Dylan William published assessment group in 1998 (U.K) (Black & Wiliam, 1998). They studied strong evidence that formative assessment can promote learning and raise the level of student achievement. AfL has become an established element in official education policy throughout U.K (Daugherty et al., 2008), In Europe the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report recognised that formative assessment is a powerful teaching and learning tool in the new century. Teacher's using formative assessment approaches to guide students toward development of their own learning to learn skills that are increasingly necessary as knowledge, is quickly out-dated in the information society. Lee (2007) also observes that the classroom potential for AfL has become increasingly recognised and impacted classroom assessment practices in places such as Hong Kong and Australia. In 2006 Annual International Conference on Assessment for Learning has been held, and most recently in New Zealand in 2009. AfL has become part of education in such places like Singapore, Malaysia and Hong-Kong. James et al. (2007) wrote "the immense absorption in assessment for learning in recent years is because it shifts assessment practices to serve formative purposes to improve not just measures learning" (New Zealand Education Gazette, 2002).
Assessment for learning focuses on the next step to improve learning. This involves both response and feed forward. Assessment of learning describes/ summarises what a learner had attained, a snapshot of achievement. It also informs teachers how much of and how well a group of learners has progressed against the deliberate learning outcomes (Black et al., 2006; Black, 2003).
The chief kind of assessment in schools is assessment of learning. Its purpose is summative, intentional to certify learning and report to parents and students about students' progress in school. This kind of assessment that still influences most classroom assessment activities, especially in secondary schools, with teachers steadily causes change of both creating and marking the tests. Teachers use the tests to assess the quantity and accuracy of student work, and the proportion of teacher effort in assessment is taken up on marking and grading. A strong significance is placed on comparing students, and feed back to students comes in the form of grades, with little direction or advice for improvement. These kind of testing events indicate which students are doing well and which ones are doing poorly. Typically, they don't give much information of particular ideas or concepts, because the test content is generally too limited and the scoring is too simplistic to represent the broad range of skills and knowledge that has been covered. Assessment of learning and grading have a long history in education. They have been widely accepted by parents and the general public (Ecclestone, 2004; Ecclestone, 2002).
Assessment of Learning is the assessment that becomes public and results in students' progress in the form of statements or symbols. It often contributes to fundamental decisions that will affect students' future. So it is important that the underlying logic and measurement of assessment of learning be credible and defensible (James & Brown, 2005).
Teachers have the authority to report student learning accurately and fairly, based on the evidence obtained from a variety of contexts and applications. Effective assessment of learning requires that teachers provide a rationale for undertaking a particular assessment of learning at a particular point in time (Harlen, 2006; James & McCormick, 2009).
Assessment as learning is a subset of assessment for learning, that gives emphasis on using assessment as a process of developing and supporting metacognition skills of students. By introducing the notion of assessment as learning as a subset of learning, it helps to reinforce and extend the role of students not only as a contributor to the assessment and learning process, but also as a significant link between learning and assessment. Assessment as learning focuses on the role of the students as the clinical connector between assessment and their learning. This is the regulatory processing metacognition. It occurs when students personally monitor what they are learning and uses the feedback from this monitoring to make adjustments, adaptations and even major changes. When teachers focus on assessment as learning, they use classroom assessment as the tool for helping students develop and practice the necessary skills to become clinical thinkers who are comfortable with the reflection and critical analysis of their learning.
Effective assessment empowers student's range of approach for learning and for acting. Over time, students move forward in their learning when they can use personal knowledge to construct meaning and having skills of self- monitoring to realise that they do not understand everything and have ways of deciding what to do next.
Almost all classroom assessment in a traditional environment focused on measuring learning after the face, and used it for categorising students and reporting the judgement to others. A few teachers use assessment for learning by building up a diagnostic process. Formative assessment and feedback at stages in the programme give the students second chance to improve their marks and hopefully their learning. Systematic assessment as learning is almost non-existent.
Obviously there are times when information about students' achievement of key outcomes and the degree to which they compare with others is important and the approach should be assessment of learning.
The contribution of assessment to learning classroom assessment will always have an impact of some kind on students and on their learning. Teachers use assessment to make decisions about things such as what to teach to achieve student's development, communicate with parents with respect to their progress and accordingly promote to the next grade. Students also make decisions on assessment about such things as their sense of personal accomplishment, their feelings of self worth and their willingness to engage in academic work of schools. It defines consolidation of learning and affects the development of enduring learning strategies and skills. Ultimately, it influences the value that students attach to education. If assessment has this kind of impact, it deserves very careful attention so that it supports learning rather than obstruct it.
Just doing classroom assessment doesn't necessarily contribute to learning. However remember most class room assessment summarises assessment of learning. Using performance assessments or portfolios or records of achievement takes only a small step toward using assessment that really makes student progress.
The short term class room assessment includes:
Using assessment process to add to learning means paying attention to student engagement and motivation. It means making connections, referring to progression of learning, and to learning goals and planning relationships and linkages between instruction and assessment. It means thinking about students individually as well as collectively. It means reinforcing important ideas, identifying gaps or misconception and building on student's beliefs to steering them towards clear understanding.
Assessment as learning is the metacognitive process where learners are responsible for their learning and for determining how to move forward. It is in fact the process of learning. The ultimate goal in assessment as learning is for students to acquire the skills and the habit of mind to be metacognitively aware with increasing independence. Assessment as learning focuses on the explicit fostering of student capacity over time to be their own best assessors, but teachers need to start by presenting and modelling external structured opportunities for students to assess themselves.
Table 1. Features of Assessment of, for and as Learning
Assessment as learning uses classroom assessment to maximize student learning. Assessment to improve student learning as "Formative assessment”, although more recently the phrase "assessment for learning" had also become common.
Assessment for learning informs students about outcomes and gives feedback to students so that they can understand the quality of their current achievement and how they need to develop further. Afl is the principle that all assessment, within the overall package should contribute to help students to learn and to succeed. Afl helps the learner to be self-learners and autonomy of learners. It is one of the key professional skills of a teacher. It helps every learner on how to improve in teaching learning process and develops the capacity for self assessment. It helps to share pupils learning and learning becomes visible. It helps to improve teacher effectiveness and their professional skills. It helps to regularise students' learning every day. Afl helps students to become self-directed learners by developing their self assessment skills. Students need to learn to self-assess so that they can use the descriptive feedback from the teachers to its best advantage. Present theoretical views provide extensive insights into the nature of assessment in a class. Contemporary school education has changed from teacher centred to learner centred, so evaluation process need to be student centric. Learning all the things during the time of examination, and forgetting the very next minute is of no use as nowadays the concept of knowledge is changing every now and then. So pupils need to internalise their knowledge, and rather than evaluating product of education, we the teachers need to evaluate process of education. It helps to check their educational development along with their growth and development. If we change it to assessment as learning, learning and assessment go hand in hand, and gives importance to students' metacognition. In this students are active assessors of their knowledge. Assessment associated with metacognition aims to create autonomous learners. It requires learners to be aware of what is required from them, and monitors and assesses their own learning during the learning process. With the information obtained, they can regulate their learning to meet the goals they set earlier.
The present study can be best implemented in the different spectrum of education sector. Every teacher should be aware of the changing teaching methodologies, hence the assessment concepts also changes. Nowadays the students need to assess all the domains of their personality, i.e., cognitive, affective, psychomotor, so assessing just predetermined objectives is of no use, so as the time passes, assessment of learning becomes assessment for learning. Assessment for learning places more emphasis on the process of learning rather than product of learning. So as the days further progress it becomes assessment as learning, that means learning and assessment goes together. Learning and assessment are the two faces of the same coin. This view of assessment stresses the learner's active role in learning and focuses on student's awareness of his or her learning. In this students need to reflect and assess their learning so they can come up with strategies to improve their learning. By engaging in self-assessment students learn how to come up with their own understanding of the learning outcomes. They can identify their strengths and limitations in learning.
The main purpose of assessment of learning is to sum up what each individual achieves and provide this information in a way that is suitable to use beyond the programme such as access to further stages of education. It uses evaluation of what students know and can do in planning future learning activities and to help the students to improve. It is a cost effective method of evaluation. Assessment as learning helps a learner to become selfhelp learners. Good learning is always a part of good assessment, and that is why assessment and learning goes hand in hand. The present article provides a theoretical frame work. However, more empirical studies have been conducted in these areas of studies. Assessment as learning helps students to become lifelong learners.