Systematic Assessment Practices In My School

Student Name: Professor: Course Title: Date Assessment has been labeled as an outcome of the 20th century. This concepts has been defined differently in the existing literature. Assessment of the children refers to the systematic process that involves gathering information concerning the progress of children that are geared towards learning goals. Indeed, assessment is a significant element of learning and teaching which alludes to the process of information collection about the progress of the children. In fact, the performance of the children can be measured using different ways, which include, the conventional paper pencil tests, student self-report, observation by teachers, authentic task performance, as well as extended responses in form of essays. In order to better understand the aspects of assessment, it is important to distinguish between testing and measurement. A test refers to an instrument used to measure a sample of behavior whereas measurement alludes to the process of getting a numerical description of the extent to which a person has a given characteristic. In most western countries, children are often encouraged to fully take part in classroom activities. In fact children are currently being asked to utilize their academic knowledge, cognitive development and language skills in order to read, understand, synthesize, evaluate, compare and contrast, write, articulate and analyze whatever they learn in classrooms. This kind of encouragement creates the foundation for other alternative approaches of assessment to be utilized in the classrooms in order for teachers to be able to measure the incremental gains by the learners. The assessment conducted on children in their earliest years of their life from birth to a round the age of 8 is often very difficult since it is the time when the rates of physical motor and the linguistic of young children are outpacing the rates of growth at all other growth stages. At this stage, growth is very rapid and episodic which are greatly influenced by the environmental factors: learning setting, quality care giving and nurturing parents. Moreover, young children learn in a manner and at the rates that are different from the adults and older children. The most reliable technique for assessing these has always been the traditional paper-and-pencil assessment. This is indeed the most common approach utilized in most schools. However, the assessment practices must be tailored towards meeting the interest of the young children as well as for the older children. This is because young children come to acknowledge things by doing as well as by listening, and since they better represent their knowledge through showing rather than by writing and talking, a paper-and-pencil testing might be adequate though not very sufficient. Since young children do not possess the experience to comprehend the objectives of formal testing, the interactions of testing may be very impossible or difficult to be appropriately structured. Children learn and develop rapidly and therefore the tests that are offered at one point in time might not be appropriate in displaying the complete picture of learning. Indeed, the achievement of children at a particular time are as a result of the complex mix of their capacity to learn as well as the opportunities for the past learning. It will therefore be mistakable to have an interpretation of the past learning of the children as an indication of whatever should be learned. Therefore, for these reasons. There is need for a special attention on how an assessment for children is conducted and how such assessment is framed. Whatever functions that might do well for the older children and adults might not be fit for being applied to young children because their needs are unique. Therefore, a paper-and-pencil approach should be carefully tailored to fit the needs of children in their development cycle. Elsewhere, paper-and –pencil tests are often prepared by the individual teachers. Indeed, most education researchers content that the use of the teacher-made-test are often very commonly utilized. Specific teachers are well aware of the curriculum; they have got the insights on what should be covered in particular tests. As a general practice therefore, utilizing the test banks extracted from many textbooks, or from all commercially extracted worksheet assessments, or those produced by other teachers who have taught similar subjects in the past raises the issues on the validity of such assessments. That is why most schools use teacher-made assessments on paper – and – pencil tests across all level subjects in classrooms. However, even though teachers often make classroom tests to indicate the extent of their teaching, they still make use of the items or tests that are written by other individuals from textbooks and worksheets. In addition to the traditional paper-and –pencil assessment, observation is also utilized as a form of children assessment. The technique provides important information...