Session Summary
Share...

Direct link:

45.016 - What Use Is Educational Assessment? Taking Stock and Looking Ahead (Co-sponsored with the American Academy of Political and Social Science and the National Academy of Education)

Sun, April 7, 9:55 to 11:25am, Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Floor: 100 Level, Room 104B

Session Type: Invited Speaker Session

Abstract

This session highlights the ongoing debate concerning the uses of educational assessments as well as recent advancements in the sciences of teaching, learning, and cognition, joined with advances in the theory and technology of measurement that forge a path toward greater benefits and lessened risks of assessment use. This session examines four commonly-accepted purposes of educational assessment and subsequent validity concerns: to provide broad-gauge indications of the performance of school systems; to inform and guide consequential decisions regarding placement and/or admissions in different types of educational institutions; to hold schools, school systems, and teachers “accountable;” and to equip classroom teachers with tools that enable them to make judgments of student learning and adapt their instruction accordingly. Looking to the future, the presenters describe and extend socio-cognitive theory to test design, including in a large urban district where assessment is embedded in curriculum design with the focus on redistribution of educational opportunities and epistemic justice.

Sub Unit

Chair

Participants

Commentators