University of Sunderland

School of Education

EDP381 – Subject Studies 2018-19

Student name Paraic Garry

Registration/student number 179182976

PAT name Allison Griffiths

Title of study or hypothesis or Drawing upon relevant literature and upon your own experience from
title question teaching or observation, evaluate the purpose of both formative and
summative assessment. In your response consider the impact on
student learning, how formative assessment is used to overcome
student misconceptions, and the impact on achievement.
Submission date 17th February 2019
Word count 2000

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Please check the feedback you received from your Commentary assignment and copy the bullet points
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Bullet points for improvement from How you have addressed them in this
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1 Extend your range of reading, as this will Attempted to locate a wider range of
support you to make the connections between literature, particularly with several contrasting
different learning theories and to present views.
contrasting perspectives.
2 Minor punctuation errors, mainly around the use Proof read the assignment, asked my mentor to
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Introduction
The following essay will discuss the purpose of formative and summative
assessment and its impact on student learning. Assessment is a crucial
component of the education process. Assessment allows the teacher to identify
which predefined learning outcomes have been met (summative), as well as
aiding learning throughout a course (formative). Assessment is also a valuable
tool for educators to use to advance their teaching methods. Assessment
contributes to a high quality learning environment. Lamprianou and Athanasou
(2009) discuss how assessment is linked to the educational goals of “diagnosis,
prediction, placement, evaluation, selection, grading, guidance or
administration”. Therefore, assessment is a crucial process which delivers
information regarding student progress, as well as the strength of teaching,
while also clearly defining to students what the teacher expects of them.
(Biggs, 1999)

Literature
The terms ‘summative’ and ‘formative’ are used to differentiate purpose in
assessment rather than form. They are used to make a distinction between
using assessment to guide learning and using it to record learning, however, in
practice, there is not a large divergence between the two (Absolum, 2006).
Below is a list of key characteristics for each type of assessment.

Formative (Harlen 2007):

 Providing feedback to students including advice for next steps to make
progress while avoiding comparisons with other students.
 Ensuring students understand goals and have a clear idea of what quality
work is.
 Students carrying out self-assessment so that they can identify areas
they can improve on to move forward.
 The teacher asking open and person-centred questions to engage
students in expressing their understanding and skills.
 Collaboration between teacher and students to encourage reflection of
learning.
 The teacher adjusting strategies based on information from continuous
learning.

Summative (Harlen 2007):

 Used to express achievement of broad goals as appose to goals specific
learning activities.
 Not used as part of everyday learning and results are recorded at specific
times.
 Uses evidence collected from when students partake in certain tasks or
everyday work.
 Can be based on the judgement of the teacher and/or examinations.
 Each student’s achievements are marked against the same criteria or
benchmark.
 Reliability is ensured through certain measures.
 Rarely provides opportunities for student self-assessment.
It is noteworthy that in both cases, the process remains the same. Also, many
methods of assessment can be used in both formative and summative contexts
(Harlen 2007).

The above lists assert the differences between the two aims of the respective
types of assessment. This distinctions need to be clearly known and kept in
mind by the teacher, especially when they are carrying out both. For formative
assessment to realise its full value, teachers must not assume that all
frequently carried out assessment is formative. Unless it is used to aid
continuous learning, this is not the case (Sadler, 1998). Phelan et al (2011)
carried out research to show the interpretation of formative assessment as a
means to test understanding. The intervention (including professional
development) showed an increase in performance, particularly with higher
achieving students. This was contrasted with research by Black and William
(1998a) where the greater gains were observed in lower achieving students.
While summative assessment is generally accepted to be necessary for various
reasons including keeping records of a summary of student progress, formative
assessment is seen as ‘voluntary in that the teacher decides the extent to
which it is implemented. The nature of formative assessment being integral to
teaching means it is often invisible while summative is usually very visible.
Research from Pollard (2000) has shown that if summative assessment is
allowed to dominate the classroom ethos, there is a risk of driving out
formative assessment. In such a case, achieving a high grade becomes more
important that evidence of ongoing progress. Therefore, because summative is
necessary, it is crucial that it is done in a way that does not impact negatively
on formative assessment (Wiliam, 2007).

Vignette
The Author’s experience of assessment is in an International Bachelorette
Primary Years Programme (IB PYP) school. The PYP places heavy emphasis on
formative assessment. The PYP strives to enable students to connect their
learning to real world applications (Harlen & Johnson 2014). Thus, teachers are
asked to keep a record of how students initiated actions as a result of their
learnings. After the unit ‘Human migration’, some students researched their
family lineage whilst other students collected school supplies to be sent to
African schools in need of them. Other forms of formative assessment used to
make judgements about student understanding are student self-assessment
and peer-assessment. An activity used for both these methods is the ‘two stars
and a wish’ activity. At the beginning of the year, students assess themselves
by writing down two things they learned or did well during a lesson as well as a
work-on/goal for the next lesson. As students get used to the system, they
progress to peer assessment where they give the same feedback to a partner.
A third method used assess student learning is peer assessment of student
work using a rubric. Students are then encouraged to think of misconceptions
they themselves may have had during the lesson or unit, revealed to them
while assessing their peers. The author also continuously practices observing
and monitoring, as well as questioning students to assess student interest,
engagement and enthusiasm for the topic and how this is affecting their
learning.

Whilst regular formative assessment is implemented, the school does require

students to carry out high stakes summative assessment to assess student
achievement in the form of Cambridge primary checkpoint assessments for
Mathematics, Science and English at the end of the year. These exams are
delivered in school and then sent to Cambridge for marking. This provides an
international benchmark of student performance. Feedback is given to
demonstrate how a student has performed against all students who have taken
that exam in the world (Cambridge Assessment, 2019). The teacher also
delivers regular multiple-choice quizzes, usually at the end of a unit to gauge
the knowledge students have acquired during the unit. However, the author
also incorporates lower stake, continuous summative assessment in the form of
student portfolios. Teachers in the school are encouraged to keep portfolios of
student achievements through the use of ICT and other methods. These
methods document both the process and the product of learning. Images and
evidence of students in the process of developing meaning, are recorded. An
example the author used of this type of assessment, was during a unit entitled
‘Sharing the planet’. Students were required to create a poster which
demonstrated their understanding of the factors that can lead to the extinction
of plants and animals. Each poster was subsequently uploaded to the class
blog of which parents also have access. The teacher then marked the portfolios
based on a fair rubric. The graded portfolios act as an accurate representation
of student learning and development over a period of time.

Evaluation
The relevant literature shows that when students are afforded opportunities to
take ownership of their own learning by self-regulating and self-monitoring,
their rate of progress is dramatically increased, possibly even doubled (Wiliam,
2007, p. 3). The author’s use of student self-assessment strategies for
assessment for learning evidently gives a central role for meta-cognition in
student learning, where the student self-monitors and reflects on their own
thinking (NRC, 2001). During this process, students collaborate with teachers to
develop a shared understanding of where the student’s level of learning is at
and what misconceptions they may had, so that they can effectively plan the
next steps (Sadler, 1998). Student self-regulating is intrinsically linked to meta-
cognition, whereby students have the ability to determine which cognitive
strategies to use during a task (Winne, 1996, p. 327). Through this method of
formative assessment, students can develop a range of cognitive tactics to
improve their learning. Even when there are student misconceptions where the
learner is not experiencing success, they can learn to recognise ability as
something that they can develop through their response to challenges (Dweck,
2000). However, Stiggens (2006) noted that the support of the teacher is
crucial to ingraining such a self-assured and enduring student approach.

The author discussed peer-assessment as a natural successor to self-

assessment as it can take time to train students how to peer assess
successfully, with self-assessment first offering students training in assessing
work without feeling peer pressure (Absolum, 2006). Slavin, Hurley, and
Chamberlain (2003) revealed that when students act as learning resources for
their peers, it has a large positive impact on student learning. However, for
peer assessment to be beneficial, it is crucial that students develop
collaborative skills to ensure they work ‘as a team’ and not just ‘in a team’.
They also must be accountability to avoid bias scoring. The authors’ use of a
rubric is a good method for holding students accountable. Several advantages
for students working with other students work were pointed out by Sadler
(1989) as follows: the work is similar, student use a range of designs and
strategies to overcome problems, and students interact with a wide range of
misconceptions which can help them identify their own gaps in learning.

The Author mentions the use of observation and questioning which make up
the principal methods teachers use for assessment along with evaluation
(Wiliam, 2007). When assessing skills and attitudes, observation is most
appropriate. Observation often happens in real time, for example, as students
make measurements in mathematics or reading a poem they wrote in English.
It can also take place after the event, for example, when viewing student made
videos or blogs of them carrying out various activities (IB, 2007). The benefits
of observation is the wide range of student learning that can be assessed from
simple skills to complex problem solving (Wiliam, 2007). Evidence gathered
from observing students can be used to guide further work. Over time, the
teacher can build up a range of observed and recorded assessment that can be
used later as a means to make a summative Judgement (Sadler 1998).

The author discusses the use of external examining with is an example of high-
stakes assessment. This type of summative assessment is often seen as an
objective and fair means for assessing student learning (Kennedy, 2016). Kohn
(2004) discusses how high stakes testing results in positive learning outcomes
as both students and teachers need to be aware of what the need to learn and
teach. High stakes testing motivates teachers to teach better and push lazier
students to work better. Kohn (2004) also argued that students generally work
harder when they have high stakes tests (as cited in Bonner III, 2007).
References:

Absolum, M. (2006). Clarity in the classroom. Auckland: Hodder Education.

Biggs, J. (1999) What the student does: Teaching for enhanced learning. Higher
education research & development, 18(1), 57-75.

Dweck, C. S. (2000). Self-theories: Their role in motivation, personality, and

development. Psychology Press: Philadelphia, PA.

Gadsby, C. and Beere, J. (2012). Perfect assessment for learning. Crown House
Publishing: Carmarthen, UK.

Harlen, W. (2007) Assessment of Learning. Sage: London.

Harlen, W. and Johnson, S. (2014) A review of current thinking and practices in

assessment in relation to the Primary Years Programme. Available at
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