Coming up next, there are three areas to cover when we talk about the tools and processes we have to assess literacy and numeracy.
- Different kinds of assessments
- The Literacy and Numeracy for Adults Tool
- How to address environmental and affective factors
Different kinds of assessments
First, we need to talk about different kinds of assessments. And let’s also be clear on what we mean by assessment before we get too far ahead.
The term “assessment’ refers to:
- All the tools and processes we use to provide us with information that we can then use to modify our teaching and learning activities.
Sometimes we get this feedback from activities that we undertake and sometimes we get our students to assess themselves.
The terminology below tends to pop up in any discussion about assessment. You’ll probably know some or perhaps all of these.
If you know these words and what they mean, then please treat this as revision or skip ahead.
But if you’ve never quite figured out what people mean when they talk about formative and summative, then now is the time.
Here’s what we’re going to cover. We want to make sure that you’re familiar with the following kinds of assessments:
- Diagnostic
- Formative
- Summative
- Contextualised
- Non-contextualised
- Self
- Collaborative
And don’t worry if any of this terminology seems strange. We’ll cover each one and explain in plain English.
Also, keep in mind that one assessment can be used for multiple purposes. For example, depending on where you used it, a single assessment could provide both formative as well as diagnostic information.
