Professional Studies Assignment 2

Assessment

Term 2

Graham Slarke

Contents

Introduction                                                        Page 3

Summary of Gipps & Stobart                        Page 3

Summary of MacMillan                                        Page 4

Summary of Black & Wiliam                                Page 5

Policy of School X                                                Page 6

Critical Evaluation of School X’s Policy        Page 7

Conclusion                                                                Page 8

References                                                                Page 9

Appendices                                                                Page 10

Introduction

Grant Wiggins (1998) has used the term 'educative assessment' to describe techniques and issues that educators should consider when they design and use assessments. His message is that the nature of assessment influences what is learned and the degree of meaningful engagement by students in the learning process. Wiggins contends that assessments should be authentic, with feedback and opportunities for revision to improve rather than simply audit learning.

As I concur with the sentiments of Wiggins, for the purpose of this assignment I will consider “evaluation” as an inherent part of assessment

GIPPS, C. & STOBART, G. (1993) The Role of Assessment

Pupils currently going through compulsory education in England and Wales will be amongst the most assessed the state education system has ever produced. Properly used, assessment is a valuable and essential part of the education process. However, assessment can easily be misused. Gipps and Stobart warn of the weaknesses of relying on solely examination achievements as assessment of performance. They cite examples of how test results can depend upon gender and can easily be influenced by the type and wording of questions.

Gipps and Stobart also provide some interesting observations regarding the correlation between assessments and the differing social classes.

Their argument centers around the fact that children from lower social classes are not less intelligent or less academically capable but that children from middle and higher social backgrounds are able to do better at school because of the correspondance of cultural factors between home and school. These factors include the sort of activities, books and language used, attitudes to reading and success at school and the parental contributions towards informal and formitive feedback. Gipps and Stobart (1993) suggest that parental advice and attitude towards school achievements is far more widespread in middle classes. Furthermore, parents are able to contribute to their children’s formitive assessment if they have been academically successful. Statistics demonstrate that middle class parents have had greater academic success than their counterparts in lower social groups.

Though individual children from non-middle class families do, of course, obtain academic success, the fact is that in percentage terms, it is much lower than those from more advantaged homes.

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The writings of Gipps and Stobart have confirmed my previously held thoughts on the correlation between social class and educational achievement. Gipps and Stobart propose a quite credible reason for this – that the parents of middle classes contribute to assessment by providing feedback and assistance at home – and this phenomena can be observed, to varying degrees, in the performance results of local schools.

McMillan, James H (2000) Fundamental Assessment Principles for Teachers and Administrators.   Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 7(8) Available Online    downloaded on 15.03.03

McMillan emphasises the role of assessment as being critical to ...

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