"Assessment tools" refers to a range of "devices" that we would use to record the assessment process. The evidence of learning that we discuss has been presented in a number of possible ways as we discussed in the previous activity. At times the evidence is tangible and easy to assess at leisure e.g. assessing an essay. At other times the assessor must capture the assessment as the evidence is evolving. For instance, during a group discussion a teacher would need an assessment tool that will help him/her to assess what he/she observes of the learners.

In this activity we will examine various assessment tools and create a few tools to support the assessment methods that we identified in Activity 4A.

Most assessment tools have a few things in common. Assessment tools include:

• the name of the learner
• a description of what is being assessed e.g. contribution to group discussion
• a list of criteria that are being assessed.
• a place of the level of assessment (a mark or a comment or a tick) to be added.

The assessment criteria

Earlier in this module we indicated that assessment included a continuous process of formative feedback that is designed to be integrated with learning and to enhance that learning. The quality of feedback lies in the detail with which the teacher informs the learner of what the ideal behaviour should be. For example, if a teacher is assessing groupwork and allocates a mark to listening, "Listening" does not fully describe what good listening skills are about. How can the learner be expected to develop this skill. Detailed and useful criteria could rather be worded as follows: "You listened attentively to the opinions of others and tried to understand their point of view" or "You took appropriate turns in conversation and paid attention to others when they were speaking". This describes good learning practice and the learner immediately knows what to strive for in perfecting this skill.

Types of assessment tools

The memorandum is the traditional assessment tool. It contains the correct answers to the test or exam that the teacher refers to when marking the scripts. In the best case scenario learners are given the script after the exam. Language and history teachers (and other teachers that mark essays) have been using rubrics for some time. For impression marking this rubric was often restricted to a number matrix as follows (a very simplified version):

It should be obvious that such a rubric is nothing but a tool for impression marking, and that this marking could vary vastly from teacher to teacher according to their interpretation of what is good "language and style" or good "content and originality". Good rubrics are very different and are designed to be fair and formative.

Click here to read about checklists

Click here to read about rubrics

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Click here to go to Activity 6 - Assessing information literacy.