Week #11: Assessing Learning

I think assessment is the most important in teaching and learning. It provides opportunities for students to improve their knowledge, practice and receive feedback. When teachers assess the students their study is more effectively when they know what they are working towards and what their results are. In order to assess a student the teachers usually use the traditional test.   Although, the tests are very important to evaluate them, and have good structures in which the students demonstrate their knowledge, I think that it is not sufficient to demonstrate that students will keep that knowledge; since, some students use to study and memorize the topic one day before the test and then forget it. So, it is important to take into consideration alternative assessment in which the students can practice what they learn in each class.

As the reading mentions, “Alternative assessment uses activities that reveal what students can do with language, emphasizing their strengths instead of their weaknesses. Alternative assessment instruments are not only designed and structured differently from traditional tests, but are also graded or scored differently. Because alternative assessment is performance based, it helps instructors emphasize that the point of language learning is communication for meaningful purposes”. So, besides using tests, the teachers can use different activities to assess the students; for example, the teachers can ask the students for a final project in which can use a rubric to evaluate its content, they can ask to the students for presentation in which they put in practice the topic and their speaking, and where the teacher can use a checklists to evaluate the student performance, etc. To conclude, there are many activities that teachers can apply to assess a student, activities that can help them to practice the topic and keep in mind what is learned.