Alternative Assessment

Brief Overview

Summative evaluations of student knowledge are formal and deliberate, provide data, and are administered in order for educators to make a range of determinations and conclusions including grade distributions as well as whether or not learners have attained predetermined, end-of-term, grade-level, state, and national goals. The evaluation, generally at the end of a school year and consisting of standardized metrics or evaluations at the termination of a project or lesson (such as portfolios or culminating projects), were created as a result of various public reporting requirements including those of the No Child Left Behind Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. High-stakes standardized assessments vary in their impact upon individual learners.

Formative assessments are continuing reviews to augment learning at the same time as the learning progression is advancing. Rather than an exclusive focus on the information needs represented by local, state, and national educators, which is to be expected with summative assessment, the most helpful formative evaluations are learner focused and intended to update, influence, and boost student learning early enough in the teaching–learning process for the outcome to be used as a significant learner information and development means with a goal of increased achievement for all students. This is a significant crossroad for formative assessments: recognizing the need for and having the tools to assess different students by different means. The results may make available teacher feedback concerning lessons that have [Page 42]been taught well along with those that may need instructional refinements. It is of critical importance for student evaluations to measure what and how students have been taught as well as how and what they learned. These evaluations may be alternative in the sense that they may be unofficial or prescribed and may include techniques such as activity journals, spoken interviews, displays, live performances, and instructor observations.

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