Education is a hot topic. From the stage of presidential debates to tonight's dinner table, it is an issue that most Americans are deeply concerned about. While there are many strategies for improving the educational process, we need a way to find out what works and what doesn't work as well. Educational assessment seeks to determine just how well students are learning and is an integral part of our quest for improved education. The nation is pinning greater expectations on educational assessment than ever before. We look to these assessment tools when documenting whether students and institutions are truly meeting education goals. But we must stop and ask a crucial question: What kind of assessment is most effective? At a time when traditional testing is subject to increasing criticism, research suggests that new, exciting approaches to assessment may be on the horizon. Advances in the sciences of how people learn and how to measure such learning offer the hope of developing new kinds of assessments-assessments that help students succeed in school by making as clear as possible the nature of their accomplishments and the progress of their learning. Knowing What Students Know essentially explains how expanding knowledge in the scientific fields of human learning and educational measurement can form the foundations of an improved approach to assessment. These advances suggest ways that the targets of assessment-what students know and how well they know it-as well as the methods used to make inferences about student learning can be made more valid and instructionally useful. Principles for designing and using these new kinds of assessments are presented, and examples are used to illustrate the principles. Implications for policy, practice, and research are also explored. With the promise of a productive research-based approach to assessment of student learning, Knowing What Students Know will be important to education administrators, assessment designers, teachers and teacher educators, and education advocates.

In a context where schools are held more and more accountable for the education they provide, data-based decision making has become increasingly important. This book brings together scholars from several countries to examine data-based decision making. Data-based decision making in this book refers to making decisions based on a broad range of evidence, such as scores on students’ assessments, classroom observations etc. This book supports policy-makers, people working with schools, researchers and school leaders and teachers in the use of data, by bringing together the current research conducted on data use across multiple countries into a single volume. Some of these studies are ‘best practice’ studies, where effective data use has led to improvements in student learning. Others provide insight into challenges in both policy and practice environments. Each of them draws on research and literature in the field.

This book is based on the belief that decision making is perhaps the most critical of all teaching skills and that good assessments lie at the core of good decision making. To become better teachers then, teachers must learn to make informed decisions about both individual students (learning decisions) and about groups of students (teaching decisions). This book gives equal status to both types of decisions and shows how assessment is integral to both. The organization of the book is sequential, mirroring the way in which information should be used to make decisions. It begins with a conceptual framework linking information to decision making, then moves to the design of assessment instruments and the collection of assessment information, then to the interpretation of assessment information and, finally, to reporting the results of both the assessment and the decision-making process. There is an emphasis throughout on linking why teachers assess with what and how they assess. Other key features include: * Practical Framework -- The book's framework corresponds to the framework that teachers use to grade their students: conduct (classroom behavior), effort (student motivation), and achievement (student learning). * Unique Chapters -- There are separate chapters on interpreting assessment information prior to decision making and on reporting assessment information to parents, teachers, and administrators. * Flexibility -- Because of its modest length and price, and its practical focus on the links between assessment and everyday teacher decision making, this text can be used either in full-length assessment courses for teachers or to teach the assessment units in educational psychology or integrated methods courses.

The first comprehensive examination of the field, this book brings together stakeholders representing a variety of perspectives to explore how educators actually use data and technology tools to achieve lasting improvement in student performance. Contributors: David V. Abbott, Carrie Amon, Jonathan Bertfield, Cornelia Brunner, Fred Carrigg, Jere Confrey, Katherine Conoly, Valerie M. Crawford, Chris Dede, John Gasko, Greg Gunn, Juliette Heinze, Naomi Hupert, Sherry P. King, Mary Jane Kurabinski, Daniel Light, Lisa Long, Michael Merrill, Liane Moody, William R. Penuel, Luz M. Rivas, Mark S. Schlager, John Stewart, Sam Stringfield, Ronald Thorpe, Yukie Toyama, Jeffrey C. Wayman, and Viki M. Young. “If you want to understand usable knowledge, read Data-Driven School Improvement.” —Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, Harvard University “It is reassuring to know that at least some of the data being generated in our data-driven age are being used to make wiser decisions. We can all learn from these illustrative accounts.” —David C. Berliner, Mary Lou Fulton College of Education, Arizona State University “Replete with examples from real schools and districts, this volume provides a multi-layered portrait of what it takes to establish a culture of data use. Readers will come away with an appreciation of the systemic changes needed to reap the full potential of data-driven decision making.” —Barbara Means, Center for Technology in Learning, SRI International

"Marzano concisely and effectively shows how his three domains of learning and the New Taxonomy can be operationalized for teachers and administrators. This book integrates objectives, instructional approaches, and assessment options so that these critical aspects of teaching are aligned to promote student learning." —James McMillan, Professor and Chair, Foundations of Education Virginia Commonwealth University A hands-on guide for applying the New Taxonomy to develop meaningful and targeted educational objectives and assessments. Translating mandated standards into concrete objectives and then creating appropriate tasks to assess student learning of those objectives can be a challenge for educators. This practical resource provides a step-by-step process that shows readers how to make designing educational objectives and creating appropriate assessment tasks a part of their day-to-day practice. Written as a stand-alone volume, Designing and Assessing Educational Objectives reviews the framework and basic principles of Marzano′s New Taxonomy and illustrates how educators can utilize Marzano′s model to assess student performance on a broad scale or for a specific unit of instruction or grading period. The book explores objectives and tasks for each of the six levels of mental processing—retrieval, comprehension, analysis, knowledge utilization, metacognition, and self-system thinking—and features: Benchmark statements that provide a starting point for the process Step-by-step models, helpful diagrams, and useful charts Numerous detailed examples from multiple subject areas and grade levels Application of the taxonomy′s three domains of knowledge: information, mental procedures, and psychomotor procedures Comprehensive and profound, this resource is essential for teachers, school and district administrators, curriculum directors, and assessment specialists seeking to apply standards to curriculum and instruction for measurable results.

The National Science Education Standards address not only what students should learn about science but also how their learning should be assessed. How do we know what they know? This accompanying volume to the Standards focuses on a key kind of assessment: the evaluation that occurs regularly in the classroom, by the teacher and his or her students as interacting participants. As students conduct experiments, for example, the teacher circulates around the room and asks individuals about their findings, using the feedback to adjust lessons plans and take other actions to boost learning. Focusing on the teacher as the primary player in assessment, the book offers assessment guidelines and explores how they can be adapted to the individual classroom. It features examples, definitions, illustrative vignettes, and practical suggestions to help teachers obtain the greatest benefit from this daily evaluation and tailoring process. The volume discusses how classroom assessment differs from conventional testing and grading-and how it fits into the larger, comprehensive assessment system.

"Gathering data and using it to inform instruction is a requirement for many schools, yet educators are not necessarily formally trained in how to do it. This book helps bridge the gap between classroom practice and the principles of educational psychology. Teachers will find cutting-edge advances in research and theory on human learning and teaching in an easily understood and transferable format. The text's integrated model shows teachers, school leaders, and district administrators how to establish a data culture and transform quantitative and qualitative data into actionable knowledge based on: assessment; statistics; instructional and differentiated psychology; classroom management."--Publisher's description.

This book brings together internationally recognised scholars with an interest in how to use the power of assessment to improve student learning and to engage with accountability priorities at both national and global levels. It includes distinguished writers who have worked together for some two decades to shift the assessment paradigm from a dominant focus on assessment as measurement towards assessment as central to efforts to improve learning. These writers have worked with the teaching profession and, in so doing, have researched and generated key insights into different ways of understanding assessment and its relationship to learning. The volume contributes to the theorising of assessment in contexts characterised by heightened accountability requirements and constant change. The book’s structure and content reflect already significant and growing international interest in assessment as contextualised practice, as well as theories of learning and teaching that underpin and drive particular assessment approaches. Learning theories and practices, assessment literacies, teachers’ responsibilities in assessment, the role of leadership, and assessment futures are the organisers within the book’s structure and content. The contributors to this book have in common the view that quality assessment, and quality learning and teaching are integrally related. Another shared view is that the alignment of assessment with curriculum, teaching and learning is linchpin to efforts to improve both learning opportunities and outcomes for all. Essentially, the book presents new perspectives on the enabling power of assessment. In so doing, the writers recognise that validity and reliability - the traditional canons of assessment – remain foundational and therefore necessary. However, they are not of themselves sufficient for quality education. The book argues that assessment needs to be radically reconsidered in the context of unprecedented societal change. Increasingly, communities are segregating more by wealth, with clear signs of social, political, economic and environmental instability. These changes raise important issues relating to ethics and equity, taken to be core dimensions in enabling the power of assessment to contribute to quality learning for all. This book offers readers new knowledge about how assessment can be used to re/engage learners across all phases of education.

Scientific Study from the year 2016 in the subject Pedagogy - Miscellaneous Topics, , language: English, abstract: The present study focuses on the assessment of oral skills during lifelike situations in normal classrooms in Beninese secondary schools. Quantitative data (questionnaire) was collected from 20 EFL teachers from two schools. The results show that teachers felt that it is difficult to assess oral skills, and the most common reason for this was the lack of time, which again was the cause of big class sizes and tight schedule. It also seemed that the assessment they do is not consistent, and that there are a lot of personal differences between teachers, and these differences influence their classrooms massively. When they did find time for assessment, teachers focused mostly on aspects of oral language such as vocabulary and pronunciation.