5.+Assessing+Change

Assessing Change

**Is it working?** When it comes to change, whether on a school level, district level or whole system reform, such as Ontario, there must be accountability. Are the changes implemented in the classroom making a difference to student learning? Should we be using high stakes testing to determine if educational reforms are improving student learning? Do standardized tests accurately measure the desired outcomes addressed by the change implemented by the professional learning community? Here is an excerpt from an interview with Michael Fullan explaining the need for the EQAO when it comes to assessing change. The full interview can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxjLqHphsVY.

media type="custom" key="11438208" align="center"

Although Fullan makes it clear that standardized test like the EQAO are necessary for transparency and the public wants this information, he is also a strong proponent of assessment for learning and believes in the professional abilities of teachers to use effective assessment strategies in their classrooms. When educators collaborate on assessment practices they strengthen their learning network, while gaining further knowledge and understandings of practices that will enable students to achieve higher level learning outcomes.

**Practice what you teach** Assessment for Learning (AfL), a term first coined in 1998 in England by the Assessment Reform Group, is now part of education systems around the world. Nearly every Canadian province includes assessment for learning in their policies, has developed resources and provides professional development to help educators effectively use AfL to increase student learning. British Columbia's //Accountability Framework// promotes using evidence based practice to provide students with on going descriptive feedback, while Saskatchewan has developed units based on AfL (Earl et al., 2011). When this type of assessment is properly implemented it provides learners with where they are their learning, where they need to go and how to get there. AfL is more than simply using self and peer assessment and regular assessment as a tool as it creates a "shift in thinking about what matters in schools. It moves the focus from categorizing students to learning for students" (Earl et al., 2011).

 Teachers involved in creating change should also be using AfL to gauge where the change is, where it still needs to go and how to get there. We can't expect the changes to happen over night and by employing the same methods of assessment in our own practice that have been researched and proven to increase student learning we become more familiar with it and can be accountable.

"The cognitive sciences teach us that if information is to become knowledge, a social process is required. This makes great pedagogical sense. Information stays as information until people work through it together in solving problems and achieving goals. This is why assessment literacy, when teachers collectively focus on student performance and develop action plans to improve it, is so powerful" (Interview with Michael Fullan: Change agent, 2003). Assessment literacy will provide teachers with valuable information about student learning as well as adding to the professional learning community since teachers are examining student assessment together and reflecting on their own teaching and learning. The professional learning community, instructional practices and student learning are all interconnected.

"When teachers share the decisions about how to assess, there will be fewer discrepancies in student assessment standards and procedures between grades and/or classes, they will develop a deeper understanding of curriculum and of individual students, and they will engage in the intense discussions about standards and evidence that lead to a shared understanding of expectations for students, more refined language about children and learning and consistent procedures for making and communication judgments" (Earl, 1988). .

Reflect: For our final discussion question please return to the eClass discussion on Moodle.