Integrating assessment with learning: What will it take to make it work?

Dylan Wiliam and Marnie Thompson, ETS. To appear in C. A. Dwyer (Ed.), The future of assessment: shaping teaching and learning. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates (2006). Retrieved from http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:MECx2VkO0tMJ:extranet.das.pac.dodea.edu/principal/Professional%2520Articles/Assessment/assessment%2520with%2520learning%2520wiliam.doc+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

This article begins by explaining the significance of having an effective teacher in the classroom. Studies have shown that classrooms that have effective teachers show a significant improvement in student achievement, as opposed to classrooms that do not. It has also been shown that the benefit of having an effective teacher outweighs the benefits of reducing the classroom size. Eric Hanushek estimated that a teacher ranked at an 84^th percentile of effectiveness would get a .22 standard deviation of student success, while a teacher ranked at a 95^th percentile of effectiveness would get a .36 standard deviation higher than the average teacher, of student success. In layman’s terms, if a student is taught by one of the most effective teachers, they will learn in six months what students taught by an average teacher would learn in a year (Wiliam, D. & Thompson, M., 2006). In comparing variation size of having an effective teacher and a smaller class size, the standard deviation for math was .1 while reading was .075. Increasing teacher effectiveness by one standard deviation would increase student achievement by two to three times as compared to reducing class size (Hanushek, E., 2004). These findings are significant. Effective teachers know their students and recognize the areas of concern so that they can in turn modify their teaching technique to meet the needs of each student. This process leads to better student retention of the subject matter and eventually student achievement. In order for a teacher to be deemed effective, they have to take strides in knowing their students, and an absolute manner in which to do this is through formative classroom assessments.

The article follows on to discuss the nature of formative assessments. They are as follows:

·      Provides information on where the student is in their learning

·      Gives information on where the student’s learning is going

·      Reveals the needs of the student in order to move them towards their goal

This list provides the three key processes that assessments should meet (Wiliam, D. & Thompson, M., 2006). Formative assessments are designed to assist the teacher in recognizing areas that may have been missed when instructing so that she can repeat or modify her instructing technique. In this manner the teacher ensures that the gaps are addressed and the student is prepared to move on.

When formative assessments are given, the teacher can pinpoint the areas of concern. Once this is established, they can continue in using the five strategies that Black and William presented, to promote a more effective learning environment.

The five key strategies of formative assessment are presented as follows:

1.     Clarifying and sharing learning intentions and criteria for success

2.     Engineering effective classroom discussions, questions, and learning tasks

3.     Providing feedback that moves learners forward

4.     Activating students as instructional resources for one another

5.     Activating students as the owners of their own learning

The idea behind using these strategies is to modify instruction to better meet the needs of each student. Using formative classroom assessments is a tool that can initially be utilized to find the gaps, lead the teacher to using the five key strategies which ultimately leads to student success.

The final section of this article discusses professional learning communities (PLC’s) and the significance of having these in regards to formative assessments. When focusing on specific content, teachers can address gaps in their own knowledge of content matter, which can be remedied by discussions with their colleagues (Wiliam, D. & Thompson, M., 2006). Communication between colleagues leads to the understanding of grade level needs, which in turn promotes the creation of assessments that are uniform throughout.