h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Different types of assessment in English Secondary schools. - A80563322
Author: nicki - U871201

An explanation of the different types of assessment is schools. This is something parents are often aware of through parents evenings and the media often say children are over assessed. This entry aims to explain how pupils are assessed and the importance of it.

It's a good idea for an Entry.

Two things:

Firstly, Initial Assessment is usually included when people talk about this topic.
It is vital to know the starting point to a) deal with any special needs or gaps in knowledge and b) to have a starting mark against which to judge progress.

Secondly, this is a comment on the style of the piece. While what you write is factually correct and definitely informative, it's possibly a little dry.
It could do with seeing a bit of your personality shine through - perhaps little tips on ways you or your collegues work, or trying to explain things in a less formal way. You want this to be read by parents who don't get the system, so try to speak to them on in a personal way, perhaps.

It's certainly not a bad Entry, and could go through, but I would love it to be not just informative, but exciting and informative at the same time.

Thanks. This is based on an essay I did when I was training to teach and did have some personal things I have done in but I took them out - Wasn't sure you were allowed to have them in when you are writing for the edited guide but I will go through and add some stuff in.

Will let you know when I have had a play which will be sometime today.

The first person thing is awkward. There is no specific rule forbidding the use of 'I' but it tends to be turned into 'This Researcher' which just doesn't flow right.

I think the main purpose of the 'no-first-person' rule is to make sure that the article comes across as fact, not opinion. So rather than saying 'I think that...' you can say 'It is commonly thought that...'. The second sentence carries more weight and sounds less personal.

Quotes from you (and other teachers here) could work. Descriptions of formative assessment games that you play with your pupils might be good as examples. Nerdy teacher jokes (if you have any).

Above all, a light-hearted approach makes information-rich articles easier to absorb, especially for bears of very little brain such as myself.

Ive done a little bit.

Going to have a break and may come back to it. I have put some examples in and a ! appears .

Its hard when I understand it and have had it drummed into me to work out what others would understand!

Do let me know if there is anything which doesn't make sense.

Does it have to all be in black? Can you add pictures?

Just thinking of ways to break it up a bit.

Putting in Header tags break it up, but that would also mean you have to use GuideML. Have a look at A69370509 to see if you think you would give it a go.

Your opening paragraph is already much better!

I haven't got time to read all through the rest, I'll come back when I can.

I'm afriad I don't know what you mean by having it all in black - do you mean the text? In which case yes, the text needs to be in black so that it works in all skins.

More than one picture is rare unless it is the only way to explain something. If you have an image that you have taken yourself it may be possible to add it to the Entry.

I've had a re-read, and I've got some comments.

It would be really great to get some other comments on this too *nudge nudge* but I think, on consideration, it goes into too much depth.

Before I start, I will say that I understand what I am proposing is a lot of work. I understand if you don't want to take on board my comments.



When I researched for my PTTLS qualification this was the sort of thing that I came up with too, but we're not trying to get our readers to pass their PTTLS, we're just giving them an intro to the subject.
If one of your parents wanted to know in five minutes the difference between initial, formative, and summative assessment, I worry that they would find this Entry a little hard going. Is there any way to distill your paragraphs into something simpler? Try to imagine it as a conversation with someone, rather than a paper.



I like your personal touches. In fact, I was wondering if you would like to make them the way of explaining the types of assessment, rather than explaining the assessment in words and then illustrating it. Something like:

"To see if the students have remembered the definitions of new words, a teacher could hand out a crossword puzzle with the clues being the definitions of the new words. The students can see themselves how much they have remembered as they are completing it, and how far they get is a good indication for the teacher as to how much information they have absorbed."



Including the confidence-boosting aspect of formative is something I wouldn't chop out, but I would still try to summarise a little more.

I love your graph example, it so clearly shows the benefit of proper constructive criticism - both praising for what is right and giving something to work on in the future that's tailored to the needs of the student.



Record keeping is only tangentially related to the title. It needs a mention, I agree, but I wouldn't worry about mark books and so on.

I think that covers my main suggestions. Let me know if you've decided to change anything.

I'm going to echo what VIP's said. There's a lot of very useful information here, but image that you were a parent trying to find out about the assessment your daughter's teacher would be doing. Would this be something you'd find and want to read?

I would, but I like to know as much as possible about something. I suspect schools give out brief summaries these days anyhow, it's the sort of thing they'd chuck into their brochures, like the insistant way all the nurseries are telling me about student led learning as I look round them.

Plus is is such a big thing in schools these days, I think it demands a full on treatment like this.

So I'm afraid I like the comprehensiveness of this. In fact, I had a couple of pleas for slight expansions. One, there's some convincing research on the fact that giving grades is bad for formative learning, which might be nice to mention. Because it's the sort of thing people don't believe intuitively. I know I was quite surprised.

The other one was the traffic lights example of plenary assessment. Could you give a fuller example of how that works? I thought you could put it with the bit about self assessment though as it's also an example of that. I remember thinking that was a very clever technique when I saw it done, and I'm not sure people will know what it is without, and they should!

My final suggestion is about style. There's a bit of repetition here. I think when you put in the intro, it mirrors some of the things you say in the first paragraphs of each section of formative and summative assessment, so perhaps some pruning could be done. Also, you tend to repeat the phrase 'formative assessment' or 'summative assessment' a lot, whereas you could perhaps replace them with synonyms or whatever.

Anyway, I have a lot to say on the topic (why oh why oh why do the ptb think that summative assessment can only be done by tests, for example, But I shall be saving that rant for when this appears on the front page.

The title's a bit long - how about just "Assessment in English Secondary Schools."

Sorry, I mean "Assessment in English Secondary Schools" - you don't need a full stop at the end of a title.

The reason that this entry isn't the sort of thing a parent would want to read isn't that it contains too much information. It's because it's very dry, and written like an essay.

Try reading it out loud? is that how you'd talk? Imagine how you'd explain this to your mum, if she wasn't a teacher. It's a worthy subject that people would be interested in reading, but not in its current form because the style is too off putting.

I'm aware that you'll think that I'm overly negative, but I do think that this is a good subject for the guide, and something that people will want to read. However The style really needs changing to make it readable.

There are many different styles of writing, each of which has its own place depending on the context in which it wil be read. For H2G2 readers, the style which (generaly) works best could be described as 'factual without being formal'.

I think it's the style here that clouds what is otherwise good content. Part of its 'dryness' is in the repetition of jargon - again the context thing. For example in the opening paragraph, the terms 'summative' and 'formative' occur between them no less than 8 times. If I were writing that paragraph, I would go for something like this:

Assessment forms an important part of any teacher’s job. Summative assessment (end of year, or topic) is essential for all pupils and forms the basis of external exams. Formative assessment (continual assessment with feedback to pupils) on the other hand is classroom based but has a great importance in the teaching of pupils. Despite their differing roles, both types have a purpose, although there isn’t always a clear distinction between them; the way the work is used is the only real guide to which type it is. Both methods of assessment can be used in any activity. If the work is used to affect the teaching immediately then the work is likely to be formative, otherwise it is likely to be summative.

Note this only my way of writing it, but hopefully you'll see the point. With a little bit of effort, this has the makings of a good entry.


h5ringer - Scout

I agree with the other comments and I would like to add this is an eccellent entry.

The only comment I would make, that if this assesment is based upon legislation, if so what can you quote/or footnote referances and dates, so the interested reader can look up the full legislation.

This would might it more searchable on the www as well and thus give the peice and H2G2 more readers.

Should read

This might make it more searchable on the www as well and thus give the peice and H2G2 more readers.

I see H2G2 is dropping one of the letter Ls in double-Ls (my post 14) wil--> will and generaly--> generally

I had a quick look at this, thinking it wouldn't be of any great interest because it is about the English educational system, but it seems to be about education in general, with only a few examples to tie it to England. Could you expand it to be more general, and mention that the examples are based on England but the principles apply anywhere?

Actually, yes, a lot of these examples would be used in adult learning situations as well.

Hi

I have been playing with this a little bit and updated it. Any suggestions would be appreciated.