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Educational assessment is a very controversial subject in today’s teaching environment. With more and more emphasis on high-stake exams, educators are concerned that these tests do not accurately reflect the quality of the students’ education. Many educators now understand that in our new information age successful students must have the ability to access, analyze, and use information to make decisions, not only the basic reading and arithmetic skills that are featured on standardized assessment tests. It is generally understood that what gets assessed is what gets taught and many policymakers were hoping that assessment tests would force teachers and schools to do things differently, like set more appropriate targets for students, increase professional development of teachers, encourage curriculum changes, and improve instructional materials.

Some of these challenges have been met, but most educational assessment tests are themselves flawed. Multiple-choice and true/false questions test facts and skills in isolation without requiring students to apply them to real-life situations. In addition, standardized tests encourage passive learning and make emerging content standards difficult to incorporate into the curriculum. Many educational professionals are now looking beyond standardized tests to find a more accurate educational assessment tool.

So as a response to the changes in the skills and knowledge needed for success and the weaknesses of most standard assessment tests, other forms of educational assessment are being carefully examined for possible incorporation into schools. Instead of standardized tests, some school districts are considering a mixture of classroom assessment and alternative assessment in addition to the high-stakes testing. Classroom assessment is the day-to-day measurement of the students by the teacher who communicates regularly to students and parents about the students’ performance. This is a much more traditional assessment method and has the strength of incorporating both parents and students into the educational process. Alternative assessment requires students to produce responses themselves rather than guess from a list of possible answers. Alternative assessment better measures the more complex learning goals of students and is becoming more common for that reason.

How students are assessed is also of critical importance. For example, criterion-referenced assessment is used to identify a student’s strengths and weaknesses in relation to a skill or a particular body of knowledge rather than compare students to other students. Norm-referenced assessment is designed to compare a student’s performance to that of a peer group. Both types of analysis are valid and should be used in appropriate settings. It is also recommended that the educational assessment include a section devoted to hands-on exploration. It has been proven that students learn most easily when incorporating new information into what they already know with concrete applications.

Each of these methods is an important piece of today’s educational assessment. Unfortunately, there are some pitfalls to changing educational assessment. Too many schools try to change everything at once without input from staff, leading to resistance at the teacher level. For this reason teachers should be given time to prepare material, change teaching strategies, and consider how to incorporate the needed changes. Educational assessment is a fascinating subject that is constantly in flux as new demands for information and application arise for teachers and their students.

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