Integrating Learning and Assessment: The Development of an Assessment Culture

“Good teaching is inseparable from good assessing. The question, therefore, is not whether to evaluate students, but how to measure performance in ways that will enrich learning, rather than restrict it.”1 Ernest Boyer’s words suggest a culture of assessment that goes beyond mere assignment of grades on a report card or a mark at the top of the first page of a test. This philosophy depicts assessment as a tool essential for learning to occur, one that teachers and learners value rather than dread. Appropriate assessments are used to determine individual student progress rather than to compare one student’s work to that of another student. The purpose of classroom assessment is twofold: 1. to inform the teacher, individual student, and caregivers of the student’s progress toward mastery of stated objectives, and 2. to inform the teacher about effectiveness of the curriculum approach and instructional strategies used to present the objectives to the students. Without well-planned effective assessment, educators lack data to make critical decisions about teaching and learning. In an integrated curriculum approach, assessment assumes the role of gaugin