Review of the literature

Review of the Literature

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Assessment for learning “is any assessment for which the first priority in its design and practice is to serve the purpose of promoting students’ learning. It thus differs from assessment designed primarily to serve the purposes of accountability, or of ranking, or of certifying competence. An assessment activity can help learning if it provides information that teachers and their students can use as feedback in assessing themselves and one another and in modifying the teaching and learning activities in which they are engaged. Such assessment becomes “formative assessment” when the evidence is actually used to adapt the teaching work to meet learning needs.” (Black and Wiliam 2004, page 10) It asks learners to be actively involved in their own learning, to appropriate the goals of assessment, and to carry out self and peer assessments. It asks teachers to encourage learners’ involvement in assessment, to guide them in understanding assessment goals, to provide feedback useful in learner development, and to adapt lesson planning in consequence of assessment outcomes (Black & Wiliam, 1998a; 1998b; 2004). Indeed, Brookhart (2005) found that true formative assessment has evolved over time to encompass four increasingly complex stages, which she characterized as 1) gathering information about the learning, 2) teachers using this information for instructional decisions, 3) students using the data for improving their own performance, 4) which serves to motivate students to achieve more as well as take ownership of their learning.

Achievement

Several research studies indicate that making formative assessment an integral part of classroom practice serves to improve student learning. Black and Wiliam (1998) found that innovative informal assessment practices relate to significant learning gains. “There is a body of firm evidence that formative assessment is an essential component of classroom work and that its development can raise standards of achievement.”(p. 10). Formative assessment provides feedback to the teacher and the student about current levels of understanding that also feeds forward into what the next appropriate instructional steps for the student should be. When formative assessment is integral to classroom practice, student achievement is enhanced. (Heritage, 2006) These improvements occurred in both stronger and weaker learners, with the latter appearing to benefit from the increased support and motivation formative assessment provided. (Black, 2006)

Watson (2006) summarized several areas which make a difference in achievement; one of these areas included assessment by students, i.e. giving students the responsibility for identifying gaps and planning how to work through these, After reviewing a series of studies, Guskey (1986) found that when students were given this opportunity there were significant achievement gains seen at all grade levels and in all content areas. Students not only achieved at higher levels and show less variability in that learning, there was a positive effect on learning retention as well. Zimmerman (2008) too found that students learn material and retain the information longer compared to students in a traditional curriculum.

With the accountability standards of the No Child Left Behind legislation, the dominance of competitive exams prevents full implementation of the principles of formative assessment. (Carless, 2005) With a lack of a deep understanding of the purposes of assessment on the part of many teachers, a lack of time and the effort needed to change, Carless found that formative assessment takes a back burner in many classrooms. However, according to Stiggins (2005), for assessment to become truly useful, politicians, school leaders, and society in general must come to understand the gross insufficiency of these tests as a basis for assessment for school improvement. Although Colby-Kelly (2007) found teachers to be hesitant about formative assessments, worrying that these assessments would take over as the primary goal of the classroom, Gearhart (2004) observed that as teachers began to deepen their knowledge they came to appreciate the importance of assessment, of knowing what students know and using this information to shape their instruction. In fact, it was found that formative assessment produces tangible benefits in terms of externally mandated assessments, with percentile of achievement improvements of up to 25% being possible. (Wiliam, 2004)

A key component of formative assessment is mastery learning, zeroing in on those objectives not mastered and taking steps to supplement learning in those areas. Traditionally, schools focus on rote learning where the student is passive, the teacher directs the learning and students are only to spit back facts presented to them by their teachers. (Campos, 2007) Indeed, many students see school as a series of unrelated activities and are unable to see the purpose for their learning activities. According to Black and Wiliam, (2004) the main problem is that pupils can assess themselves only when they have a sufficiently clear picture of the targets that their learning is meant to attain. Surprisingly, and sadly, many pupils do not have such a picture, and they appear to have become used to receiving classroom teaching as an arbitrary sequence of exercises with no overarching rationale. To be successful, mastery learning requires that learning objectives be well defined and appropriately sequenced and emphasizes that student learning be regularly checked and immediate feedback be given. (Guskey, 2005)

One study (Yin, 2008) did not show a significant gain in achievement after implementation of formative assessment. It was concluded that timely feedback by teachers to the data from these assessments is critical. Of importance is teacher use of this information gained to modify teaching (Yin, 2008; McMillian, 2008) Ayala (2008) found that immediate feedback was a critical component of the success of assessments embedded within units. Indeed, it was seen that the placement of these assessments at points where student feedback is necessary is important in helping students improve their understanding and skills, indeed as a check point of what learning has occurred and what has yet to take place. Watson (2006) also noted this need for tests to be used as formative, not only summative, with immediate feedback being given. As well as being timely, feedback should be focused on the learning goals to improve learning. (Heritage, 2006) As teachers implement good lessons, they need to investigate children’s thinking and build activities and discussion upon children’s understandings (Gearhart, 2004) Zimmerman (2008) found that by assessing discrete skills, giving additional remediation, and permitting opportunities to retest, a correlation to improved performance on high stakes testing was seen.

Motivation

According to Black’s article, “learning is a knowledge construction process that learners have to undertake for themselves; you can support learners, by you cannot do the learning for them.” (2006, p124) Can formative assessment help motivate students to learn? Campos found that using formative assessment practices shifts the focus from sorting students to providing a classroom environment where students expect to succeed. Formative assessment allows the teacher to create a culture of confidence. As the teacher involved the students in assessing, tracking, and setting goals for their learning, students were more apt to work towards goals they set for themselves. Within a supportive learning environment, which includes a sense of control and choice, an opportunity to self-assess, and frequent feedback on performance, students build upon this intrinsic motivation. (Campos, 2007) This is what leads to mastery.

Formative assessment techniques help move students towards mastering goals they have set for themselves. With a mastery goal, individuals are oriented toward developing new skills, trying to understand their work, improving their level of competence or achieving a sense of mastery based on self-referenced standards. Ames found that it is a mastery goal orientation that promotes a motivational pattern likely to promote long-term and high-quality learning. Mastery goals are associated with a wide range of motivation-related variables that are conductive to positive achievement activity and that are necessary mediators of self-regulated learning. (Ames, 1991) Students motivated by mastery goals are interested in learning content, noting improvement and acting on that information to learn more. (Kaftan, 2006) Self evaluation of progress towards these goals, indeed the control and ownership of their progress, is a key motivational factor for student achievement. (Ames,1991)

How does this motivation manifest itself in the classroom? Guskey’s synthesis of research (1986) found that students engaged in formative assessment practices with a mastery goal orientation displayed two forms of motivation: they spent more time engaged in learning and developed a more positive attitude and confidence about their ability to learn than students in traditional classes. Indeed, teachers displayed improved motivation as well, in that they began to hold higher expectations for students, felt more personal responsibility and displayed more positive attitudes about teaching than teachers in traditional classes. In an interview, Rick Stiggins has said that “When students are involved in the assessment process, they can come to see themselves as competent learners. We need to involve students by making the targets clear to them and having them help design assessments that reflect those targets. Then we involve them again in the process of keeping track over time of their learning so they can watch themselves improving. That’s where motivation comes from.” (Sparks, 1999).

Colby-Kelly (2007) found that although the teacher-student feedback of the formative assessment cycle appears to be useful and motivating to some learners and may benefit their learning, the process may not be beneficial to all; for students who don’t take the process seriously; additional learning components were necessary in order to benefit learning. Kaftan (2006) saw that teaching students about formative assessment was crucial. Students were used to receiving a grade for things they turned in, hence educating students about this change in process was critical for success. It is important to make distinctions between what a learner can understand from assessment criteria and can take responsibility for improving, and what requires teacher intervention. (Kitsantas, 2004)

Self-Assessment, Reflection and Goal Setting

When students self assess their own learning, it is more than just assessing subject matter, it is also a self-assessment of their metacognitive skills. (Watson, 2006) Black found that successful learners try to learn and are conscious of the strategies they employ, i.e. they are intentional learners. As teachers encourage pupils to reflect on the skills they are developing, and through the modeling give encouragement to reflect on the process of learning, this develops in the learner the desire to take responsibility for their learning (Black, 2006) Successful learners can monitor their own understanding by metacognition strategies (thinking about their learning), realizing when they understand something and using self-regulating mechanisms for improvements like setting and monitoring goals for learning. Indeed, Kitsantas found that students who engaged in this self-evaluation of their work, comparing their work against a standard and making adjustments, were shown to have enhanced performance on learning tasks. They were more likely to attribute poor performance to a strategy deficiency rather than to effort or ability. (Kitsantas, 2004) Students become aware of their learning, of their progress, when objectives are made clear to them. (Watson, 2006) Then, when comparing earlier assessments with later assessment results, individual progress could be observed. (Ayala, 2008) Ultimately, students who self-monitor use the insight they gain from their errors to prepare to retake tests to earn a higher grade. (Zimmerman, 2008) In this way, we are training the students to be more of a self-teacher. They are responsible for their own learning as they review, engage in remediation and retest. This cycle of learning requires the learner to exercise a degree of autonomy from the teacher as the assessor and judge of quality. This practice contributes to a shift in conceptions of roles for both teacher and learners. (Black, 2006)

The perception of control appears to be significant factor affecting children’s engagement in learn and quality of learning. (Ames, 1991) Although formative assessment is used with success at the preschool-early elementary levels, the outcome here is a change in the teacher’s behavior and instructional plan; it is only later that the students themselves can take responsibility for their learning. (Doig, 2006) Indeed, the ultimate user of assessment information needs to be the student. Students need to have a clear understanding of what they have done wrong and how to make it right. In order for this to be effective, according to Black and Wiliam (1998) feedback to any pupil should be about the particular qualities of his or her work, with advice on what he or she can do to improve, and should avoid comparisons with other pupils. This feedback from these types of assessments can be used to help students with goal setting. This encourages the student to pay attention to the learning goal, to take responsibility for their learning and become more independent learners. Thinking in terms of reaching goals is a difficult task for some students, however this has shown itself to be a key factor in a student developing the skills to manage their learning for themselves. (Black and Wiliam, 1998) To ensure this learning takes place, formative assessments must become a routine part of the classroom activities. When done well, assessments can be used to build a picture of individual student’s progress toward the goals of instruction