Integrated task design in school-based assessment

1. Integrated task design in school-based assessment Steve Andrews & Matthew Clarke

2. Overview Different ways of conceptualizing assessment The implications of these conceptualizations for assessment task design: Rethinking classrooms as �communities of practice� �Activity� as a core practice that integrates teaching, learning and assessment Scaffolding activity in the language classroom

3. Thinking about assessment: Purposes Summative assessment Designed to retrospectively (looking backwards) evaluate learning External examinations at the end of a course or year Formative assessment Designed to prospectively (looking forwards) inform learning In-class assessments integrated into teaching-learning cycle

4. Thinking about assessment: Scope Convergent assessment Pre-specified answers expected Knowledge controlled by teacher (examiner) Student role = receiver who regurgitates knowledge Divergent assessment Provisional, exploratory answers accepted Knowledge jointly constructed by teachers and students Student role = participant in community of practice Divergent assessment offers scope for building on and extending traditional, convergent assessment practices Divergent assessment assists with integrating teaching, learning and assessment

5. Classrooms as communities of practice Communities of practice involve: Mutual engagement in a Joint enterprise or project Using a repertoire of shared language-discourse Communities of practice include: More expert members (teachers) Less expert or novice members (students) Novices gradually become more expert through participation in community activities

6. Activity: The core of integrated teaching, learning & assessment Thinking of assessment tasks as activities enables teachers to Integrate teaching, learning and assessment Integrate process and product Mutually negotiate learning with students Thinking of assessment tasks as activities enables students to Mutually negotiate learning with peers Be motivated by a purpose that reflects authentic practices of the wider community Direct their learning towards a genuine audience Find diverse scope for engagement Offer multiple responses as part of their transformation of knowledge

7. Activity 1 Look at the task in the handout In small groups, work out ways that you could redesign it to reflect the features of integrated activities in the last slide we viewed.

8. �But my students can�t do it�� The central role of scaffolding in enabling performance Scaffolding includes: Modeling Feeding back Instructing Questioning Task structuring Cognitive structuring Tharp & Gallimore, 1988 Lantolf & Thorne, 2006