1. Assessment Human Society and Its Environment 7-10 © 2007 Curriculum K-12 Directorate, NSW Department of Education and Training

2. What is Assessment? Assessment is the process of identifying, gathering and interpreting information about students' learning through both formal and informal activities.

3. Assessment ‘for’ Learning Assessment for learning involves teachers using a range of assessment strategies to provide students with feedback about the quality of their work and how it might be improved.

4. Assessment of learning (1) Assessment of learning involves an assessment task designed to provide quantitative data on student achievement in relation to standards, other students or self progression. Both assessment for learning and assessment of learning are intended to enhance teaching and improve learning.

5. Assessment of learning (2) Assessment of learning tasks can be: nominated tasks from a teaching and learning program a nominated part of a task from a teaching and learning program an additional task set for the purpose of assessment, including a test.

6. Assessment of learning (3) Tasks Tasks should be: nominated or developed to address identified outcomes and content clearly written and straightforward, not verbose or multifaceted explicit about the product in terms of, scope, format and length

7. Assessment of learning (4) Marking criteria The purposes of the marking criteria are to: identify different levels of student performance assist teachers to discriminate between student responses provide defendable guidelines for student assessments

8. Marking criteria (continued) For each assessment task, marking criteria should: be developed collaboratively reflect the outcomes and content being assessed incorporate the syllabus standard where possible, be informed by samples of student work from the task

9. Assessment of learning (5) Marking criteria and feedback One of the main purposes of assessment of learning is to provide quality feedback to students. Either before or after the assessment, depending on the level of detail, students should be able at have access to the marking criteria.

10. Other feedback Could include: Discussion of criteria with students Teacher reflection on strategies and pedagogy Teacher awareness of individual progress Students sharing marked tasks with each other