Administrative Procedure: 360
TESTING AND ASSESSMENT
Background
The evaluation of students, programs, and schools is necessary for the continued improvement of the District’s educational program. Therefore, an appropriate testing and assessment program shall be implemented to provide the information required by evaluators at all levels within the District.
Procedures
1. Learning assessment activities are to be undertaken for the following purposes:
1.1 To inform teaching practice and to improve student achievement
1.2 To provide information useful to school improvement efforts;
1.3 To maintain the confidence of the students, the parents and the community.
2. The student assessment program is intended to:
2.1 Encourage the use of school-based assessment programs that provide for the appropriate diagnosis, remediation and evaluation of students.
2.2 Encourage teachers to utilize a variety of formal and informal evaluation approaches which take into account the strengths and weaknesses of students.
2.3 Ensure that assessment and evaluation activities take into account the full scope of the curriculum and provide for higher level thinking.
2.4 Encourage the use of classroom evaluation practices that include criterion-referenced evaluation.
2.5 Ensure the consistent and equitable means by which student progress is assessed and reported on. This includes, but it not limited to, the adaptations and accommodations outlined in a student’s individual education plan (IEP) and/or any other formal plan of support for a student.
Reference: Sections 65, 85, School Act
Revised: May 31, 2022
APPENDIX A – BELIEF STATEMENT ASSESSMENT AND EVALUATION
Delta educators compiled the following document with the intention of fostering the most promising assessment practices so that student learning and achievement is maximized.
Belief Statement
The mission of the Delta School District is to enable all learners to succeed and contribute their full potential to the future. To ensure that goal is realized, our assessment and evaluation practices must inform our planning for the most effective means to facilitate learning and teaching of all students. To this end, the Delta School District supports and encourages all educators to engage in continuous learning related to all aspects of our professional practice, which includes assessment and evaluation.
The District believes Assessment and Evaluation are undertaken for a variety of purposes:
• To maximize student learning and achievement.
• To provide timely and specific feedback that informs students and teachers about what students have learned, have yet to understand, and what will move learning forward.
• To provide information useful to Classroom, School, and District improvement efforts.
• To maintain the trust of the students, the parents, and the community.
Assessment and evaluation practices must be ethically and theoretically sound. Accordingly, it must benefit all students. That means it must promote learning, be fair, equitable and sensitive to individual needs. Assessment must be manageable and efficient for teachers. Therefore it must not be all consuming in terms of teachers’ time and energy. Also, it must involve a reasonable number of well-designed high-quality tools (Cooper, 2010).
Assessment and Evaluation
Formative Assessment:
Assessment for Learning is the ongoing process of gathering and interpreting evidence about student learning for the purpose of determining where students are in their learning, where they need to go, and how best to get there. Teachers use the evidence gathered to inform planning and instruction, as well as to differentiate instruction. As well, teachers and students will use evidence gathered to provide descriptive feedback to maximize learning.
Assessment as Learning is the process of developing and supporting student engagement in the assessment process by monitoring their own learning, using assessment feedback from teacher and/or peers to determine next steps, and setting individual learning goals. Formative assessment fosters motivation by emphasizing progress and growth in achievement rather than failure.
Summative Assessment (Evaluation):
Assessment of Learning is the process whereby the teacher collects evidence of student learning and then makes judgments about that learning on the basis of clearly articulated criteria. Unlike the first two assessment processes, Assessment of Learning involves evaluative feedback in the form of a number, a letter grade, descriptors or other symbols that reflect achievement at a given point in time.
Maximizing Student Learning
Assessment is embedded in the learning process. It is tightly interconnected with curriculum and instruction. As Dylan Wiliam and Paul Black (1998) note in their landmark study Inside the Black Box, assessment, explicitly designed to promote learning, is the single most powerful tool we have for raising achievement. Moreover, formative assessment has the potential to help all students and it yields particularly positive results with low achievers (Hattie, 2012).
The following diagram represents the elements of a comprehensive assessment approach that seamlessly intertwines assessment with instruction. (please translate this image using a translation app if required.)
Assessment explicitly designed to maximize student learning is responsive to the developmental differences of the learner. In recognition that students learn at different rates and in a variety of ways, instruction and assessment are differentiated. Classroom assessment, therefore, is not an event. It is naturally interconnected throughout the learning cycle.
Procedures
Formative Assessment: The purpose of formative assessment is to promote student learning and inform instructional practice.
In view of the embedded characteristics of effective assessment and evaluation, the following procedures should be part of regular classroom practice:
Clarifying sharing and understanding learning intentions and criteria for success
• Learning Intentions are focused on identified curriculum or competency standards.
• Criteria are based on the Learning Intentions derived from developmentally appropriate standards of performance (e.g. BC Ministry of Education Performance Standards, Individual Education Plan [IEP], Annual Instruction Plan [AIP]).
• Learning Intentions and criteria for success are written in student friendly language and communicated with students during the learning stage and prior to summative assessment.
• Examples, from varying levels, of achievement and exemplars are shared with students.
• Criteria, at times, are co-created with students.
• Assessment is tied to student learning and not to student behaviours.
Engineering effective classroom discussions questions and learning tasks
• Educators use ongoing assessment to inform their instruction and to determine the next steps in advancing student learning.
• Educators use a range of methods that assess both the process and the products of students’ knowledge, skills and understanding.
• Educators provide multiple opportunities for students to demonstrate their learning.
o Students are provided with opportunities for adjusting, rethinking and talking about their learning.
o Educators provide ample class time for students to engage in learning.
Providing Descriptive Feedback that moves learners forward
• Descriptive Feedback is connected to curricular Learning Intentions and criteria.
• Descriptive Feedback is timely and addresses what the student needs to do to improve.
• Descriptive Feedback, where appropriate, is linked to rubrics.
• Descriptive Feedback is on going and actionable.
• Descriptive Feedback is given peer to peer and from the teacher.
• Descriptive Feedback is followed up with students having the time and opportunity to reflect and act on it.
• Descriptive Feedback is not Evaluative Feedback.
Activating students as owners of their learning
• Students are engaged in monitoring and critically reflecting on their learning.
• Students participate in determining the next steps in their learning based on past performance.
• Students participate in setting criteria, and designing learning tasks.
• Students, when appropriate, have a choice in how best to demonstrate their learning.
Activating students as instructional resources for one another
• Students are coached by their teachers in how to give and receive Descriptive Feedback.
• Students are provided opportunities to engage in peer-to-peer instruction and feedback.
• Learning Intentions and criteria for success are used to provide peer-to-peer feedback.
Using evidence of learning to adapt instruction
• Students have an opportunity to use past performance indicators to set new learning goals.
• Assessment information is used to adapt instruction to meet student needs.
Summative Assessment (Evaluation): The purpose of summative assessment is to measure student learning and inform instructional practice.
• Students know in advance what knowledge and skills will be summatively assessed and will have previously received descriptive feedback on that learning.
• Summative assessments reflect previously taught learning standards that have been clearly articulated in shared Learning Intentions.
• Summative assessment reflects tasks completed.
• When student work is done in partners or groups, results are based on individual performance of the targeted Learning Intentions
• Summative assessment is tied to the learning and not behaviours. It is important to separate out unrelated elements from the learning standards.
• Students have the opportunity to be summatively assessed in more than one way to ensure comprehensive and consistent indications of student performance.
• Students who have adaptations for assessment in their IEP/AIP will be able to use these adaptations in any summative assessment activity.
• Indicators of achievement are consistent across a grade.
References:
Black, P. and Wiliam, D. (1998) Inside the Black Box: Raising Standards
through Classroom Assessment, London: King’s College School of Education.
Cooper, D. (2010). Talk about assessment: High School Strategies and
Tools, Toronto: Nelson
Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on
Learning, New York: Routledge.
APPENDIX B -ASSESSMENT, EVALUATION AND REPORTING
GUIDELINES – GRADES K TO 7
APPENDIX C – ASSESSMENT, EVALUATION AND REPORTING
GUIDELINES – SECONDARY GRADES 8 TO 12