Formative Assessment in the Classroom

Formative Assessment in the Classroom

What is formative assessment?

Assessment is generally divided into 2 categories: formative and summative. A lot of people picture a final test when they think of assessment. This falls under the summative category and is typically used to see what a student has learned and to determine a student's grade. Formative assessment, however; serves a different purpose. Formative assessment is a tool that the teacher can use to adjust future lessons, differentiate the classroom to meet students at their current level, and see what general progress has been made. This happens while the student is learning rather than after. Some examples of formative assessment methods include a pop-quiz (not graded), observations, exit tickets, entrance tickets, discussion, graphic organizers, and more.

Is formative assessment necessary?

Formative assessment is very important in the classroom. According to Andersson & Palm (2017), "An earlier study showed that the changes in teachers' classroom practice, after participation in a professional development program in formative assessment, significantly improved student achievement in mathematics." The obvious benefits of using formative assessment in the classroom are that 1) the teacher gets to see what students' strengths and weaknesses are, 2) the teacher can use this data to individualize learning for all students, and 3) the teacher can gauge where the whole class is in regards to learning goals.

How do I implement formative assessment methods in the classroom?

There are countless ways to formatively assess students in the classroom. These are some methods that I, personally, plan on using in my own classes:

• Use technology like Quizizz, Google Forms, or Kahoot for quizzes
• Create polls for students
• Exit/entrance tickets
• Individual students can respond to questions with mini-whiteboards
• Observations
• Student self-assessments and reflections
• Peer feedback and evaluations

With all of these methods, it is important to have a system for keeping the data and a system for grading such as a rubric. Through my research, I think the easiest way to collect data would be digitally. With the technology I mentioned above, students' data is automatically collected when they answer and the teacher can easily see who got which questions correct or not. However, I do not work in a school that gives all students access to technology. So, I will also write down observations and analyze students' work without technology. I would like to have some sort of binder to organize this data for my students or maybe they can organize their own. I found some great examples of student data collection here. 

My Experience with Formative Assessment in the Classroom

I currently teach ESL to 7th and 9th-grade students at a private secondary school in Vietnam. I assign formative assessment tasks often and am constantly observing, analyzing, and evaluating this data (mostly in my head). One formative assessment task I've done with my students was a game where they move to one side of the room to answer "growth mindset" and move to the other side of the room to answer "fixed mindset." So, I would give them a sentence like, "When I fail, I learn." and ask everyone if this came from a growth mindset or a fixed mindset. Students had to walk to either the "growth mindset" or the "fixed mindset" side of the room. Before doing this activity, I explained the procedure as simply and clearly as possible with demonstration. After that, we started the game. It gave me some data on students' knowledge, but it was clear that some students were not paying attention and would just follow the person in front of them. I think that to improve this activity we could've tried practicing first. Also, maybe the group was just too big (30 students) and needed to be split into smaller groups. I hope that next time I can have some more success with this activity.

Overall, formative assessment plays a very important role in the classroom and I hope to continue finding more ways to use this valuable tool.

References:

Andersson, C., & Palm, T. (2017). Characteristics of improved formative assessment practice. Education Inquiry, 8(2), 104–122. doi: 10.1080/20004508.2016.1275185

Christison, M. (2018). Student Involvement in Assessment. The TESOL Encyclopedia of English Language Teaching, 1–7. doi: 10.1002/9781118784235.eelt0357

Heick, T. (2019, December 15). 8 Most Common Sources Of Formative Assessment Data. Retrieved from https://www.teachthought.com/learning/8-frequent-sources-formative-assessment-data/

Staff, S. (2019, March 29). 4 Keys to Effective Formative Assessment in the Classroom. Retrieved from https://www.hmhco.com/blog/4-keys-to-effective-formative-assessment-in-the-classroom