Authentic Pupil Assessment
What Is Authentic Assesment?
Authentic assessment of educational achievement directly measures actual performance
in a subject area. Standardized multiple- choice tests, on the other hand, measure
test-taking skills directly and everything else either indirectly or not at all.
Also called "performance," "appropriate," "alternative," or "direct" assessments,
authentic evaluation includes a wide variety of techniques: written products, solutions
to problems, experiments, exhibitions, performances, portfolios of work and teacher
observations, checklists and inventories, and cooperative group projects. These
assessments may evaluate regular classroom activity or take the form of tests or
special projects.
Authentic evaluations indicate what we value by directing instruction toward what
we want the student to know and be able to do. They are aapropriate to the student's
age and level of learning and the subject being measured, and are useful to both
teacher and students.
All forms of authentic assessment can be summarized numerically or put on a scale.
Therefore, individual results can be combined to provide a variety of information
about aggregate performance at the classroom, school, district, state, and national
levels. Thus, state and federal requirements for comparable quantitative data can
be met.
Developed First In The Arts And Apprentice Programs
Authentic assessment was developed in the arts and in apprenticeship systems, where
assessment has always been based on performance. It is impossible to imagine evaluating
a musician's ability without hearing her sing or play an instrument, or judging
a woodworker's craft without seeing the table or cabinet the student has built.
It is also impossible to help a student become a better woodworker or musician unless
the instructor observes the student in the process of working on something real,
provides feedback, monitors the student's use of the feedback, and adjusts instruction
and evaluation accordingly. Authentic assessment extends this principle of evaluating
real work to all areas of the curriculum.
Use In Writing Is Widespead Today
The most widely used form of authentic assessment in education today is in writing.
For example, over half the states, the National Assessment of Educational Progress
(NAEP), and many other nations ask students to write on assigned topics. The essays
and stories are graded by teams of readers (usually teachers) who assign grades
according to standard guidelines. The readers are trained and retrained throughout
the process to maintain reliable standards, a process that produces a high degree
of agreement among judges. This methodology can be used to evaluate classroom work
that has been collected in a portfolio; it only has to be adjusted for subject area
and student age.
Uses In Other Curricular Subjects
Similar procedures are now being followed with open-ended mathematics questions.
These ask students to write their own response to a problem. There is no single
way to find a "right answer" because the question is designed to see how a student
thinks through a problem, thereby indicating her ability to use math. The answers
are scored by groups of teacher-readers, again following a standard grading procedure.
History/social studies assessments frequently require group projects, such as preparing
a history of the neighborhood or discovering how a group of people changed a law
or policy, tasks which all students must perform to demonstrate that they grasp
important concepts about history and about democratic processes. Foreign language
assessments ask students to use the language in a real-life situation, orally and
in print.
For young students, reading is best evaluated by having a student read aloud from
material of varying levels of difficulty, while keeping a record of "miscues" that
reveal the reader's strengths and weaknesses and the strategies she uses to solve
problems. The reading can be taped and reviewed by teacher and student for further
analysis and to monitor progress. For older and younger students, the material can
be discussed to evaluate comprehension and critical thinking. A writing assignment
responding to the ideas of the reading passage can reveal the student's proficiency
and thinking in both reading and writing.
All these assessments can be designed to closely follow the curriculum. They provide
continuous, qualitative data that can be used by teachers to help instruction. They
can be used by students, who can learn to assume responsibility for their portfolios
and records and thereby engage in regular self analysis of their work and progress.
They provide a direct measure of achievement and therefore are worth the time spent
preparing for and doing them. They also encourage an intelligent, rich curriculum
rather than the dumbed-down, narrow curriculum fostered by teaching to and coaching
for multiple- choice tests.
Assisting Teachers Is Desirable
Teachers can and should be assisted in the evaluation process by community groups,
parents, administrators, and university faculty. Outside participation can ensure
that racial or cultural bias does not distort the assessment process. For example,
a team can examine student portfolios and then compare its evaluations with those
of the teacher. These teams should also be helpful in strengthening the evaluation
capabilities of teachers by providing feedback.
Authentic evaluation will provide far more information than any multiple-choice
test possibly could. The costs of teacher involvement in designing, administering,
and scoring new assessments can be counted as part of professional and curriculum
development, since no other activity involves teachers more deeply in thinking about
their teaching, its objectives, methods and results. Schools and communities will
see that authentic assessments are promoting the thinking curriculum everyone wants
for our children, and thereby providing genuine accountability.
This FastFacts excerpts the FairTest Examiner The National Center for Fair
& Open Testing, 1991.