Create Balanced Assessments

To be an effective technology leader, you should stay on top of emerging issues and trends in education and technology, such as balanced assessments, and create ways to develop expertise in these issues within your district.

Monitoring how well students are learning requires a balanced assessment system – one in which assessments are used not only to measure knowledge at the end of instruction, but also to improve learning during instruction, and one that measures both core subject mastery and 21st century skills.

There is increasing interest – and research and development activity by school districts, higher education and assessment companies – in new kinds of assessments that can fulfill these needs.

A balanced assessment system should include both summative and formative assessments. Summative assessments provide valuable information about student understanding of expected outcomes. These assessments should measure more than recall of information and should include assessment of 21st century skills needed in the workplace and college, such as critical thinking and problem solving.

Formative assessments should balance summative assessments. These interim and benchmark assessments and classroom evaluation tools help educators gauge how well students are progressing toward specific outcomes, which may be assessed on a summative assessment, and demonstrate students' current knowledge and skills.

Formative assessments can be incorporated, for instance, into classroom discussions, teacher-student conferences and student work. These assessments can help teachers assess critical thinking and problem solving skills, work ethic, and communication and collaboration skills, as well as content knowledge. Used appropriately, these assessments can have an immediate impact on daily instruction and learning.

Technology has a role to play in both summative and formative assessments. Technology-based assessments can give teachers and administrators instant diagnostic information they can use to make better decisions and improve instruction.