Assessment in the Classroom: Moving away from grades

The idea of failure is often feared in the classroom. No student wants to be labeled as the one who failed his or her math test. After receiving back an assignment students tend to skim past the teacher's feedback and flip right to the numeric aspect of their assessment. I can admit that to this day I still find myself doing this as well. Grades are important to students, especially those who are competing for scholarships and entrances into post-secondary institutions. The issue I find with having to produce a quantified measure of achievement for students is that there is no way to mark for effort, growth, or development. Looking back on my own personal education, I question myself and think, did I only put forth all that effort so I could see a mark above 90% on my tests or was I actually interested in the topics that I was learning. If I'm being honest with myself, I think the A's on my report cards were often my main motivation to work hard. This often lead to me to be a tired and stressed student as I tried to juggle my extracurricular and my academics. Would it have just been easier for me to accept failure and be happy or succeed and be overworked. Sarah Le discusses her opinion about grades on her blog Le's Learning. Do grades really define who you are? Should formal assessment really be he main form of assessment in the classroom? How can teachers assess without assigning a quantified grade?

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Today in schools across Canada there are three types of assessment;

Assessment OF Learning (AoL):

This type of assessment is often referred to as summative. It is designed to determine what the student has learned and whether or not they have met the goals of the curriculum. It is the assessment that is quantified and given as a letter or percentage. It is often the most important assessment to students as it will contribute to and affect their future.

Assessment FOR Learning (AfL):

This type of assessment is also know as formative and occurs throughout the learning period. The main idea of this assessment is to make each student's understanding of the subject visible to the teacher so he or she can decide how they can aid in their student's learning process. Students have their own individual strengths and weaknesses and teachers can use this form of assessment to find out where their students need help and how they can help them. This is also a way for teachers to enhance motivation for learning within the classroom.

Assessment AS Learning (AaL):

The final form of assessment focuses on students with an emphasize on the development of self-assessment. It brings forth the idea that learning in not just a matter of depositing knowledge from teacher to student, but rather that it is an ongoing process. We want students to monitor their own learning and to be able to connect their prior knowledge with the present. Being able to identify what learning strategies have work best for them in the past, and then being able to modify and adjust them will lead to greater success in the future. 

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For these three assessments to be successful teachers must be able to interconnect them. There are also three key elements that ensure effective assessment practices;

Validity: The degree to which an interpretation or conclusion based on assessment data is appropriate and meaningful. In other words, does the assessment measure what it it suppose to measure?

Reliability: The degree is consistency of the assessment results. The assessment produces consistent results no matter what form, where or when it is assessed or who scores it.

Fairness: All students have equal opportunity to succeed no matter what gender, teacher bias, prior knowledge, or any other circumstance that is unrelated to what was assigned. Refer to the Growing Success document for more information. 

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While we know that there are three forms of assessment, I believe the glorification of Assessment of Learning needs to be reduced in the classroom. Students need to be more aware of the other forms of assessment and the idea of growth. Assessment as Learning seems to be a great way for students to be able appreciate the lower mark they may receive at the beginning of the school year. There is nothing wrong with failure as long as you are able to learn from it and use it to better yourself for the future. Sometimes those who fail learn more than those who continuously receive A's. Unfortunately, grades are still the running force of the classroom, especially in high school, due to their importance towards post-secondary education.
How can we as educators stress the importance of assessment without glorifying the quantitative aspect of it? In other words, how can we get our students to read our feedback before they look at their mark?

References

Drake, S. M., Reid, J.L., & Kolohom, W. (2014). Interweaving Curriculum and Classroom Assessment: Engaging the 21st Century Learner. Don Mills, ON:Oxford University Press.

Le, S. (2013, July, 25). Would getting rid of grades make for happier students?. Retrieved from: http://leslearning.blogspot.ca/2013/07/would-getting-rid-of-grades-make-for.html

Manitoba Education. (2006). Rethinking Classroom Assessment with Purpose in Mind, Manitoba Education, Citizenship and Youth, School Programs Division. Retrieved from: http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/assess/wncp/full_doc.pdf

Ontario., & Ontario. (2010). Growing success: Assessment, evaluation and reporting in Ontario's schools: covering grades 1 to 12. Toronto: Ministry of Education.

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