Assessment and Evaluation: Key Words and Concepts
Evaluation: "Evaluation" and "Assessment" are terms used nearly interchangeably in composition. But for our purposes today, I am going to use "evaluation" to talk about what we as teachers do when we grade student work or provide suggestions for revision.
Assessment: I am using the term "assessment" when I refer to attempting to discern what student learning, attitudinal changes, or student engagement occurred in my class as the result of my pedagogical practices and course design. Though assessment, I collect data that helps me teach better, design better courses, and be more attuned to shaping courses to meet the needs of my students. I am attempting not to test students’ innate ability, but what learning has been facilitated while students are in my classroom.
Multiple assessment tools–Most researchers suggest that single assessment tools lead to nearly certain failure of the assessment to gather valid data (White "Rhetorical Problem 138-450). Varied assessment measures are most likely to provide the teacher with a more varied reading of what is happening in the classroom. Are students happy, challenged, and engaged? Have they improved their ability to undertake specific writing tasks? Is their writing process better organized, is their product better (and in what ways?)? Are students more confident about their writing? Do most of the students who begin your class finish it with passing grades? We need to pull together all of this information to assess the quality of the classroom experience.
Student-based Assessment: By involving students in the assessment of their learning experiences (collecting qualitative as well as quantitative data), a researcher creates the opportunity for a more complete, accurate assessment of the classroom experience.
Outcomes-based Assessment: Outcomes-based assessments consider primarily educational outcomes–what can students do at the end of a course, a college career, etc. Because most outcomes-based assessments have little concern for where students began their educational journey, such assessments do little to show what growth individuals have made as the result of educational experiences. They may be useful as gate-keeping tools, but are less useful for assessing the teacher’s success in planning and delivering the course.
Summative Evaluation: Summary of the evaluator’s evaluation. Applies criteria and evaluates–in writing situations this would tend to be a letter grade and the teacher’s grade justification. Comments like "Good job!" are summative.
Formative Evaluation: Evaluation that involves dialogue working toward improvement toward meeting agreed upon goals.
Directive Evaluation: Evaluation with teacher-generated direction for change.
Facilitative Evaluation: Evaluation that attempts to facilitate students’ ability to make good writing choices. Tends to be dialogic and involve student in self-evaluation and goal setting.
As writing professionals, we need to help students see that good writing is effective writing, which is achieved by making appropriate, informed choices for specific audiences and purposes. We want our evaluation to help students achieve their own writing goals while internalizing evaluation. Involving students in evaluation is one way to help them become reflexive and reflective writers.
Assessment is one way we become reflexive and reflective teachers. Assessing what’s happening in the class can both provide a rationale for what we do in the classroom and point to areas of our course design or pedagogical practice that are not doing what we hoped. It makes the class become a dialogue between students and teacher.
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