Running Head:ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 1

Assessing Student Performance

Student’s Name

Institutional Affiliation

Course

Date
ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 2

Informal assessment is a natural technique of examining a child's abilities and

development in a non-threatening environment. It frequently entails monitoring children at play

or executing specific chores for them. Students' development and growth can be assessed through

informal observation, allowing teachers to gather qualitative information about their progress and

development without relying on grades from their schoolwork or reports from other instructors.

There are several advantages to informal observation over formal observation. For example, the

youngster is often unaware that they are being monitored and will not alter their behavior due to

this knowledge (Murray & Coppens, P 2018). They will be observed in an undisclosed state,

which will allow the teacher or other adult to see them get a more unbiased perspective. It is

possible to make informal observations by doing something as basic as watching several

youngsters play or observing group behavior within a school game. Even though teachers

constantly monitor their classes, this daily monitoring contrasts with an informal assessment in

several ways. This paper looks at evaluating both formal and informal assessments as used by

learners.

A teacher may observe that one child appears to be floundering with a subject or that

another exhibits signs of aggressive style during physical education, but this would not always be

considered an informal observation by the Department of Education. The distinction between an

informal inspection and the consistent monitoring of a class of pupils is that there will generally

be some loose structure for assessment in place for an informal assessment. This could be a

series of notes that a teacher is taking during the inspection or a determined form that they will

fill out while the observation occurs. During teaching, teachers must impart the knowledge they

have prepared, but they must also continuously monitor students' learners' motivation to ascertain

whether or not revisions are necessary to the curriculum. The complicated cognitive abilities
ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 3

required to improvise and respond to students' demands while simultaneously having the lesson's

goals and priorities in mind make this a more challenging task for beginning teachers than for

more seasoned teachers.

Observation and inquiry are the informal evaluation tools that teachers employ the most

frequently during instruction time. The most effective teachers pay attention to their students

from the moment they walk into the classroom (Harlin & Lipa 2020). A majority of educators

greet their pupils at the door to encourage them and evaluate their attitude and level of

enthusiasm. Are Sarah and Naomi still unable to communicate with one another? Is Ethan

carrying all of his materials with him? Obtaining answers to these kinds of questions can assist

the teacher in more successfully fostering student learning. Students' conduct is observed by

teachers during teaching so that they can get insight into their level of engagement in and

understanding of the topic or activity. Students' non-verbal conduct is observed, as is their

spoken language. Examples include observing students staring out the window rather than

paying attention to a science demonstration, overhearing students in their team posting remarks

that indicate they do not comprehend what they are intended to be doing, and observing students

looking at their phones rather than their books.

Observations also assist teachers in determining which young person to call on next, to

either slow down the pace of the learning experience, when more examples are required, when to

begin or finish an activity, how well pupils are conducting a physical exercise, and whether or

not there are any potential behavior issues. Many teachers have discovered that roaming around

the classroom allows them to see more pupils from various perspectives, which helps them be

more effective observers. On the other hand, teachers find it difficult to absorb as much material

as they would like in most classrooms because of the fast speed and complexity of most
ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 4

environments. Students' attention is maintained during the class by asking questions, which also

serve to highlight essential points and ideas, promote critical thinking, allow learners to study

from one another's, and provide information about learning. It is pretty challenging to come up

with good proper questions and then use pupils' responses to create effective instantaneous

educational decisions (Danwitz, S. 2017).

The following strategies can help you improve your questioning: planning and jotting

down the teaching questions to be asked, providing adequate wait time for pupils to respond,

paying close attention to what learners say rather than hearing for what is expected, various types

of questions asked, ensuring that some of the questions are greater level, and trying to ask

follow-up questions. However, while informal evaluation based on impromptu observation and

inquiry is vital for education, there are inherent challenges with the validity and reliability of this

information and its bias. Multiple choice, pairing, and true/false items are some of the most

common formal assessment forms teachers use. Students must choose from a list of responses

given by the instructor or test creator rather than generating their responses using words or

actions when responding to selected-response items.

Portfolio assessment is a phrase with many different meanings, and it is a procedure that

may be used to accomplish a range of tasks. A portfolio is a compilation of students ' work that

can demonstrate a student's efforts, growth, and accomplishments across a variety of subject

areas. A portfolio assessment can be an evaluation of samples of work activities and documents

related to the outcomes being evaluated selected by the students. It can discuss and support

efforts towards achieving learning excellence, including pupil efficacy. Portfolio assessments

have been utilized for various objectives, including large-scale assessment and monitoring,

school-to-work conversions, and certification requirements.

When the National Board evaluates expert instructors for Professional Teaching

Standards, portfolio evaluations are employed as a component of the evaluation process.

Portfolio evaluations can serve as both summative and formative opportunities to track progress

toward achieving specific objectives in a learning environment. Portfolios can converse factual

information about students' anticipated information and quality of work in specific academic

subjects by establishing criteria for content and outcomes. Portfolios can also serve as a means of

assessing students' improvements as they progress through the curriculum. When properly

constructed and evaluated, portfolios might provide educators with information about students'

thought processes, which can help them attain academic goals. Formal assessments are used by

teachers when they want to determine a student's level of knowledge following specific standards

and criteria. Traditional evaluation methods are used by instructors when they require factual

information that qualifies a student for the most appropriate learning phase, such as when a

student is transitioning from high school to college.

If you want to get rapid feedback on what a student has learned so far, informal

evaluation methods are the way to go. Informal assessments assist the instructor in identifying

learning gaps and directing training accordingly. You may think of it as a warm-up exercise

before a formal evaluation. Formative and summative assessments are two methods of evaluating

student achievement in schools that overlap and complement one another. While all assessments

have the same purpose of determining each student's development, strengths, and weaknesses,

each assessment method gives educators a different set of insights and actions. It is essential to

understand how each approach contributes to the end goals — raising school attainment levels

and enhancing individual pupils' learning — and to maximize the effectiveness of each method

in order to implement holistic assessment effectively. Even though both terms are commonly
ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 6

used, teachers may not be clear on the most effective sorts of summative evaluation and the most

innovative forms of formative assessment to implement. For example, according to our most

recent State of Technology in Education study, more instructors adopt online tools to track

summative assessments than formative assessments. However, this does not have to be the case.

On a single piece of writing, process portfolios are employed. Students' work is organized

into folders containing all of their work as part of the writing sample process. Consider the

following scenario: A student working on a historical fantasy piece about the American Civil

War will include research notes, manuscripts, revisions, instructor notes, and other material in

their portfolio that is directly linked to that assignment. Using this information, the students and

teachers will be able to go back and evaluate the progress of the student's work. The instructor

will have a clear image of the steps taken by the student to complete the final result.

Final portfolios are collections of accomplished student work that have been

accumulated over some time, such as a school year. Sometimes teachers encourage students to

include all of their final pieces of work in their portfolios, but more often than not, it contains

simply the most significant work they have produced. When a final portfolio showcases a

selection of students ' work, the educators are constantly engaged in the selection process, and

the instructor should provide requirements for the portfolio to follow. This portfolio may be

reviewed by a group of people, including teachers, guardians, and students, who can then

evaluate student improvement over time.

In conclusion, students are not required to retain material to respond to multiple-choice

test items; instead, they must recognize the proper answer. Tests containing these items are

referred to as objective tests since the outcomes are not impacted by the opinions or meanings of

the scorers, and as a result, they are frequently machine scored. Although eliminating possible
ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE 7

mistakes in scoring improves the reliability of tests, instructors who rely solely on objective tests

run the risk of reducing the relevance of their assessments since accurate tests are not ideal for all

types of learning objectives. Assessment techniques must be aligned with learning activities and

goals to be effective in both assessment for and assessment of learning contexts.

Murray, L., & Coppens, P. (2018). Formal and informal assessment of aphasia. Aphasia and

related neurogenic communication disorders, 66-91.

Harlin, R., & Lipa, S. (2020). Emergent literacy: A comparison of formal and informal

assessment methods. Reading Horizons: A Journal of Literacy and Language Arts, 30(3),

4.

Danwitz, S. M. W. (2017). Formal versus informal assessment: Fragmentation versus holism.

Topics in Language Disorders, 1(3), 95-106.