CLASSROOM ASSESSMENT

By:

Amalia Renika Anantri (2018130004)

Sarah Al Annisa Arsya (2018130024)

Syafira Rahmahsari (2018130034)

ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND CULTURE DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND CULTURE

DARMA PERSADA UNIVERSITY

2021
 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background
Assessment becomes very important issue in education because in the learning process,
assessing is needed by the teacher to evaluate the development, ability and responsibility
of the students. There is a massive progress in assessment of education. The usual
assessing technique is in the form of multiple-choice test. When multiple choice is
considered not appropriate to achieve the objective of the learning then lecturer will try to
find another alternative. Alternative assessment is different from traditional testing in that
it actually asks students to show what they can do. Students are evaluated on what they
integrate and produce rather than on what they are able to recall and reproduce.

Classroom assessment is important in learning process, so teacher would know how far
the capability of students in mastering the lesson. In assessing a teaching learning
process, teacher needs some aspects and techniques to measure the student’s
achievement. Therefore, in this paper we will explain about classroom assessment.

1.2 Purpose
a. To inform and guide teaching and learning
b. To understand how to help students set learning goals
c. To know how assign report card grades
d. To know how to motivate students
 CHAPTER II

THEORY AND DISCUSSION

2.1 Classroom Assessment

2.1.1 What is Classroom Assessment

Classroom assessment is both a teaching approach and a set of techniques. The approach is
that the more you know about what and how students are learning, the better you can plan
learning activities to structure your teaching. The techniques are mostly simple, non-graded,
anonymous, in-class activities that give both you and your students useful feedback on the
teaching-learning process.

2.1.2 How is classroom assessment different

Classroom assessment differs from tests and other forms of student assessment in that it is
aimed at course improvement, rather than at assigning grades. The primary goal is to better
understand your students' learning and so to improve your teaching.

2.1.3 How Classroom Assessments Improve Learning

Teachers who develop useful assessments, provide corrective instruction, and give students
second chances to demonstrate success can improve their instruction and help students learn.

The assessments best suited to guide improvements in student learning are the quizzes, tests,
writing assignments, and other assessments that teachers administer on a regular basis in their
classrooms. Teachers trust the results from these assessments because of their direct relation
to classroom instructional goals. Plus, results are immediate and easy to analyze at the
individual student level. To use classroom assessments to make improvements, however,
teachers must change both their view of assessments and their interpretation of results.
Specifically, they need to see their assessments as an integral part of the instruction process
and as crucial for helping students learn.

Make Assessments Useful

 • For Students
Classroom assessments that serve as meaningful sources of information don't surprise
students. Instead, these assessments reflect the concepts and skills that the teacher
emphasized in class, along with the teacher's clear criteria for judging students' performance.
These concepts, skills, and criteria align with the teacher's instructional activities and,
ideally, with state or district standards. Students see these assessments as fair measures of
important learning goals. Teachers facilitate learning by providing students with important
feedback on their learning progress and by helping them identify learning problems. Critics
sometimes contend that this approach means “teaching to the test.” But the crucial issue is,
What determines the content and methods of teaching? If the test is the primary determinant
of what teachers teach and how they teach it, then we are indeed “teaching to the test.” But if
desired learning goals are the foundation of students' instructional experiences, then
assessments of student learning are simply extensions of those same goals. Instead of
“teaching to the test,” teachers are more accurately “testing what they teach.” If a concept or
skill is important enough to assess, then it should be important enough to teach. And if it is
not important enough to teach, then there's little justification for assessing it.

• For Teachers
The best classroom assessments also serve as meaningful sources of information for
teachers, helping them identify what they taught well and what they need to work on.
Gathering this vital information does not require a sophisticated statistical analysis of
assessment results. Teachers need only make a simple tally of how many students missed
each assessment item or failed to meet a specific criterion. State assessments sometimes
provide similar item-by-item information, but concerns about item security and the cost of
developing new items each year usually make assessment developers reluctant to offer such
detailed information. Once teachers have made specific tallies, they can pay special attention
to the trouble spots—those items or criteria missed by large numbers of students in the class.
In reviewing these results, the teacher must first consider the quality of the item or criterion.
Perhaps the question is ambiguously worded or the criterion is unclear. Perhaps students
mis-interpreted the question. Whatever the case, teachers must determine whether these
items adequately address the knowledge, understanding, or skill that they were intended to
measure. If teachers find no obvious problems with the item or criterion, then they must turn
 their attention to their teaching. Indeed, teachers and students share responsibility for
learning. Even with valiant teaching efforts, we cannot guarantee that all students will learn
everything excellently. Only rarely do teachers find items or assessment criteria that every
student answers correctly. A few students are never willing to put forth the necessary effort,
but these students tend to be the exception, not the rule. If a teacher is reaching fewer than
half of the students in the class, the teacher's method of instruction needs to improve. And
teachers need this kind of evidence to help target their instructional improvement efforts.

The Benefits of Assessment

Assessments can be a vital component in our efforts to improve education. But as long as we
use them only as a means to rank schools and students, we will miss their most powerful
benefits. We must focus instead on helping teachers change the way they use assessment
results, improve the quality of their classroom assessments, and align their assessments with
valued learning goals and state or district standards. When teachers' classroom assessments
become an integral part of the instructional process and a central ingredient in their efforts to
help students learn, the benefits of assessment for both students and teachers will be
boundless.

2.2 Simple Assessment Strategies

1. An open-ended question that gets them writing/talking

Avoid yes/no questions and phrases like “Does this make sense?” In response to these
questions, students usually answer ‘yes.’ So, of course, it’s surprising when several students
later admit that they’re lost.

To help students grasp ideas in class, ask open-ended questions that require students that get
students writing/talking. They will undoubtedly reveal more than you would’ve thought to
ask directly.

2. Ask students to reflect

During the last five minutes of class ask students to reflect on the lesson and write down what
they’ve learned. Then, ask them to consider how they would apply this concept or skill in a
practical setting. Exit tickets using tools make this easy to administer and review student
answers.

3. Use quizzes

Give a short quiz at the end of class to check for comprehension.

4. Ask students to summarize

Have students summarize or paraphrase important concepts and lessons. This can be done
orally, visually, or otherwise.

5. Hand signals

Hand signals can be used to rate or indicate students’ understanding of content. Students can
show anywhere from five fingers to signal maximum understanding to one finger to signal
minimal understanding. This strategy requires engagement by all students and allows the
teacher to check for understanding within a large group.

6. Journal reflections

Students write their reflections on a lesson, such as what they learned, what caused them
difficulty, strategies they found helpful, or other lesson-related topics. Students can reflect on
and process lessons. By reading student work especially types of learning journals that help
students think—teachers can identify class and individual misconceptions and successes

7. Practice frequency

Check for understanding at least three times a lesson, minimum.

8. Use variety

Teachers should use enough different individual and whole group techniques to check
understanding that they accurately know what all students know. More than likely, this means
during a single class the same technique should not be repeated.
9. Peer instruction

Perhaps the most accurate way to check for understanding is to have one student try to teach
another student what she’s learned. If she can do that successfully, it’s clear she understood
your lesson.

10. “Separate what you do and don’t understand”

Whether making a t-chart, drawing a concept map, or using some other means, have the
students not simply list what they think they know, but what they don’t know as well. This
won’t be as simple as it sounds–we’re usually not aware of what we don’t know.

They’ll also often know more or less than they can identify themselves, which makes this
strategy a bit crude. But that’s okay–the goal isn’t for them to be precise and complete in
their self-evaluation the goal is for you to gain insight as to what they do and don’t know.

2.3 Classroom Assessment Techniques

Three broad categories of CATs:

• Techniques for assessing course-related knowledge and skills

A. Assessing Prior Knowledge, Recall, and Understanding

The CATs in this group focus on assessing declarative learning – the content of a particular
subject.
1. Background Knowledge Probe: Short, simple questionnaires prepared by instructors for
use at the beginning of a course or at the start of new units or topics; can serve as a pretest
2. Focused Listing: Focuses students’ attention on a single important term, name, or
concept from a lesson or class session and directs students to list ideas related to the
“focus”

B. Assessing Skill in Analysis and Critical Thinking

The CATs in this group focus on analysis—the breaking down of information, questions, or
problems to facilitate understanding and problem solving.
1. Categorizing Grid: Student complete a grid containing 2 or 3 overarching concepts and a
variety of related subordinate elements associated with the larger concepts
2. Defining Features Matrix: Students categorize concepts according to the presence or
absence of important defining features

C. Assessing Skill in Synthesis and Creative Thinking

The CATs in this group focus on synthesis — stimulating the student to create and allowing
the faculty to assess original intellectual products that result from a synthesis of course
content and the students’ intelligence, judgment, knowledge, and skills.
1. One-Sentence Summary: Students answer the questions “Who does what to whom, when,
where, how, and why?” (WDWWWWHW) about a given topic and then create a single
informative, grammatical, and long summary sentence
2. Word Journal: Involves a 2 part response; 1st the student summarizes a short text in a
single word and 2nd the student writes 1-2 paragraphs explaining the word choice

D. Assessing Skill in Problem Solving

The CATs in this group focus on problem solving skills — recognizing different types of
problems, determining the principles and techniques to solve them, perceiving similarities of
problem features, and being able to reflect and then alter solution strategies.
1. Problem Recognition Tasks: Students recognize and identify particular problem types
2. What’s the Principle?: Students identify the principle or principles to solve problems
of various types

E. Assessing Skill in Application and Performance

The CATs in this group focus on students’ application of conditional knowledge – knowing
when and where to apply what they know and can do.
1. Directed Paraphrasing: Students paraphrase part of a lesson for a specific audience
demonstrating ability to translate highly specialized information into language the
clients or customers can understand
2. Application Cards: Students generate examples of real-world applications for
important principles, generalizations, theories, or procedures
 • Techniques for assessing learner attitudes, values and self-awareness

A. Assessing Students’ Awareness of Their Attitudes and Values

The CATs in this group are designed to assist instructors in developing students’ attitudes,
opinions, values, and self-awareness within the course curriculum.
1. Classroom Opinion Polls: Students indicate degree of agreement or disagreement with a
statement or prompt
2. Double-entry Journals: Students record and respond to significant passages of text

B. Assessing Students’ Self-Awareness as Learners

The CATs in this group help students articulate their goals and self-concepts in order to make
connections between their goals and those of the course.
1. Focused Autobiographical Sketches: Students write a brief description of a successful
learning experience they had relevant to the course material
2. Interest/Knowledge/Skills Checklists: Students complete a checklist survey to indicate
their knowledge, skills and interest in various course topics

C. Assessing Course-Related Learning and Study Skills, Strategies, and Behaviors

The CATs in this group assist students in focusing attention on the behaviors they engage in
when trying to learn.
1. Productive Study-Time Logs: Students complete a study log to record the quantity and
quality of time spent studying for a specific course
2. Punctuated Lectures: Students briefly reflect then create a written record of their listening
level of a lecture. Repeat twice in the same lecture and 2- 3 times over 2 to 3 weeks

• Techniques for assessing learner reactions to instruction

A. Assessing Learner Reactions to Teachers and Teaching

The CATS in this group are designed to provide context-specific feedback that can improve
teaching within a course.
1. Chain Notes: On an index card that is distributed in advance, each student responds to an
open-ended prompt about his or her mental activity that is answered in less than a minute
2. Electronic Survey Feedback: Students respond to a question or short series of questions
about the effectiveness of the course.

B. Assessing Learner Reactions to Class Activities, Assignments, and Materials

The CATS in this group are designed to provide instructors with information that will help
them improve their course materials and assignments.

1. RSQC2 (Recall, Summarize, Question, Connect and Comment): Students write brief
statements that recall, summarize, question, connect and comment on meaningful points from
previous class
2. Group-Work Evaluation: Students complete a brief survey about how their group is
functioning and make suggestions for improving the group process

2.4 Types of Assessment

• Diagnostic assessments

Diagnostic assessments can also help benchmark student progress. Consider giving the same
assessment at the end of the unit so students can see how far they’ve come. Using prodigy of
diagnostic assessments helps you align the math questions your students see in-game with the
lessons you want to cover. To set up a diagnostic assessment, use your assessments tool to
create a Plan that guides students through a skill and automatically drops them down to pre-
requisites when necessary.

Some examples to try include:

• Mind maps
• Flow charts
• KWL charts
• Short quizzes
• Journal entries
• Student interviews
• Student reflections
• Graphic organizers
• Classroom discussions

• Formative assessments

Formative assessments help teachers understand student learning while they teach, and adjust
their teaching strategies accordingly. Formative assessments help you track how student
knowledge is growing and changing in your classroom in real-time. While it requires a bit of a
time investment especially at first the gains are more than worth it. Introducing students to
formative assessments in a low-stakes way can help you benchmark their progress and reduce
math anxiety when a big test day rolls around. Prodigy makes it easy to create, deliver and grade
formative assessments that keep your students engaged with the learning process and provide
you with actionable data to adjust your lesson plans.

Some examples of formative assessments include:

• Portfolios
• Group projects
• Progress reports
• Class discussions
• Entry and exit tickets
• Short, regular quizzes
• Virtual classroom tools

• Summative assessments

Summative assessments measure student progress as an assessment of learning and provide data
for you, school leaders and district leaders. They're cost-efficient and valuable when it comes to
communicating student progress, but they don’t always give clear feedback on the learning
process and can foster a “teach to the test” mindset if you’re not careful.

Try creating assessments that deviate from the standard multiple-choice test, like:
• Recording a podcast
• Writing a script for a short play
• Producing an independent study project

No matter what type of summative assessment you give your students, keep some best practices
in mind:

• Keep it real-world relevant where you can

• Make questions clear and instructions easy to follow
• Give a rubric so students know what’s expected of them
• Create your final test after, not before, teaching the lesson
• Try blind grading: don’t look at the name on the assignment before you mark it

• Ipsative assessments

Ipsative assessments are one of the types of assessment as learning that compares previous
results with a second try, motivating students to set goals and improve their skills.

When a student hands in a piece of creative writing, it’s just the first draft. They practice athletic
skills and musical talents to improve, but don’t always get the same chance when it comes to
other subjects like math. A two-stage assessment framework helps students learn from their
mistakes and motivates them to do better. Plus, it removes the instant gratification of goals and
teaches students learning is a process.

You can incorporate ipsative assessments into your classroom with:

• Portfolios
• A two-stage testing process
• Project-based learning activities

• Norm-referenced assessments
Norm-referenced assessments are tests designed to compare an individual to a group of their
peers, usually based on national standards and occasionally adjusted for age, ethnicity or other
demographics.

Unlike ipsative assessments, where the student is only competing against themselves, norm-
referenced assessments draw from a wide range of data points to make conclusions about
student achievement.

Types of norm-referenced assessments include:

• IQ tests
• Physical assessments
• Standardized college admissions tests like the SAT and GRE

Critics argue they don’t encourage complex thinking and can inadvertently discriminate against
low-income students and minorities.

Norm-referenced assessments are most useful when measuring student achievement to

determine:

• Language ability
• Grade readiness
• Physical development
• College admission decisions
• Need for additional learning support

While they’re not usually the type of assessment you deliver in your classroom, chances are you
have access to data from past tests that can give you valuable insights into student performance.

• Criterion-referenced assessments

Criterion-referenced assessments compare the score of an individual student to a learning

standard and performance level, independent of other students around them.

In the classroom, this means measuring student performance against grade-level standards and
can include end-of-unit or final tests to assess student understanding.
Outside of the classroom, criterion-referenced assessments appear in professional licensing
exams, high school exit exams and citizenship tests, where the student must answer a certain
percentage of questions correctly to pass.

2.5 Example of Assessment

Name: Description: What to do with the Time

data: required:
Minute During the last few minutes of Review responses and Prep: Low
paper the class period, ask students to note any useful In class:
answer on a half-sheet of paper: comments. During the Low
"What is the most important point next class periods Analysis:
you learned today?"; and, "What emphasize the issues Low
point remains least clear to you?". illuminated by your
The purpose is to elicit data about students' comments.
students' comprehension of a
particular class session.
Chain Notes Students pass around an envelope Go through the student Prep: Low
on which the teacher has written responses and In class:
one question about the class. determine the best Low
When the envelope reaches a criteria for categorizing Analysis:
student he/she spends a moment the data with the goal of Low
to respond to the question and detecting response
then places the response in the patterns. Discussing the
envelope. patterns of responses
with students can lead
to better teaching and
learning.
Memory Students fill in cells of a two- Tally the numbers of Prep: Med
matrix dimensional diagram for which correct and incorrect In class:
instructor has provided labels. responses in each cell. Med
For example, in a music course, Analyze differences Analysis:
labels might consist of periods both between and Med
 (Baroque, Classical) by countries among the cells.
(Germany, France, Britain); Look for patterns
students enter composers in cells among the incorrect
to demonstrate their ability to responses and decide
remember and classify key what might be the
concepts. cause(s).
Directed Ask students to write a layman’s Categorize student Prep: Low
paraphrasing "translation" of something they responses according to In class:
have just learned -- geared to a characteristics you feel Med
specified individual or audience are important. Analyze Analysis:
-- to assess their ability to the responses both Med
comprehend and transfer within and across
concepts. categories, noting ways
you could address
student needs.
One-sentence Students summarize knowledge Evaluate the quality of Prep: Low
summary of a topic by constructing a single each summary quickly In class:
sentence that answers the and holistically. Note Med
questions "Who does what to whether students have Analysis:
whom, when, where, how, and identified the essential Med
why?" The purpose is to require concepts of the class
students to select only the topic and their
defining features of an idea. interrelationships. Share
your observations with
your students.
Exam Select a type of test that you are Try to distinguish Prep: Low
evaluations likely to give more than once or student comments that In class:
that has a significant impact on address the fairness of Low
student performance. Create a your grading from those Analysis:
few questions that evaluate the that address the fairness Med
quality of the test. Add these of the test as an
questions to the exam or assessment instrument.
administer a separate, follow-up Respond to the general
 evaluation. ideas represented by
student comments.
Application After teaching about an important Quickly read once Prep: Low
cards theory, principle, or procedure, through the applications In class:
ask students to write down at and categorize them Low
least one real-world application according to their Analysis:
for what they have just learned to quality. Pick out a Med
determine how well they can broad range of
transfer their learning. examples and present
them to the class.
Student- Allow students to write test Make a rough tally of Prep: Med
generated questions and model answers for the questions your In class:
test questions specified topics, in a format students propose and High
consistent with course exams. the topics that they Analysis:
This will give students the cover. Evaluate the High
opportunity to evaluate the course questions and use the
topics, reflect on what they goods ones as prompts (may be
understand, and what are good for discussion. You homework)
test items. may also want to revise
the questions and use
them on the upcoming
exam.
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learning/resources/teaching-strategies/classroom-assessment-techniques-(cats)]. Retrieved on
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