PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF TEACHERS with respect to GOOD ASSESSMENT PRACTICES

Blogg 2
Examining Assessment Conference Proceedings October 1999
Compiled by Bev Webber
NZCER

Hi fellow readers. I've been reading over the weekend, inparticular the above titled document. One of our recommended readings (yeah)
I'd like to entice comment from one of the concluding paragraphs.... about professional development and assessment practices.

"It is also clear that the nation's teachers need continuous training, guidance and assistance in deriving, applying and interpreting good assessment practices, whether these have formative or summative purposes...As the array of assessment tasks becomes ever larger, and the responsibilities of teaching become greater, the professional development of teachers is cruical to their understanding and use of good assessment. (Webber 1999 p.107)

As I sit here and reflect on my own professional development and assessment practices, I can say that through our schools (secondary school) professional learning time we have been developed to some extend. In a full staff we had fellow colleagues from a range of departments present the sorts of formative assessment that made their teaching and students learning journey successful. The tasks ranged from a simple 'fist of 5' feedback to the collation and tabled record keeping of student voice answers. Whaow. There was alot of positive, constructive and directed 'assessment' happening that had a purpose. Following a full staff meeting we returned to smaller cluster groups and reflected on our departments formative assessments. The next step could/should have been to choose an assessment task that we hadn't used before, applly it and give feedback on how it went.

The first question to my readers is, "When was the last time your knowledge of assessment practices was professionally developed?"

When have you had the opportunity to share the types of assessment you present to your students, or work with fellow colleagues to develop assesment tasks that work for your area of education or when was the last time you were critiqued for the assessment processes you present in your class?
(Is this too much in one sentence?)

Webber (1999) writes, "it is impossible to spearate good formative assessment from good teaching and learning"

How do we as professionals know when our assessments wether they be formative or summative are 'good'?

CHEERS I look forward to your comments

SANDY

Educational Assessment: How much pressure are we putting on our students

Hi readers
Just a thought to see if I get any replies.
Educational Assessment, how much pressure are we putting on our students?
As a secondary school teacher, assessing to the NCEA, I am often frustrated by the responses I get when summative assessments are required. There is such a range of responses/attitudes from student, I wonder if there is too much or too little pressure going on them. One example, perhaps because of a lack of pressure taken by some students is a 'who cares attitude'. "I'll do as much as I need to to pass (That is get an Achieved), its worth the same credits as an excellence".
These days our students appear not to put education at the top of their priority, rather it is balanced between, sports, afterschool jobs for money and socialising.