Does YOUR assessment approach encourage a learning journey or does it measure a learning terminus? Consider the of, for and as of assessment

Although widely practiced, assessment is not just about the assessment of learning - the learning proof, which emphasises scheduled tests and written papers for institutional, summative grading purposes. Grades are often a normalised, comparative performance measure, and are rarely an exact representation of an individuals’ learning journey. High stakes assessment can create student “backwash,” a term used by Biggs and Tang (2007) to describe the process of students learning only enough to complete the task. This type of learning is often surface, measuring declarative knowledge (Earl, 2003). One approach to promote learning is to design assessment for learning -formative assessment/feedback, into the Learning and Teaching activities. The emphasis here is on the teacher guiding the learning of the student through the provision of regular formative feedback. By using a scaffolded approach to learning, teachers use constructivist pedagogy to facilitate deep learning, by aligning formative learning tasks to summative assessment events (Biggs and Tang, 2007). It requires students to take action in their learning and teachers to respond with thoughtful questions and responses (Young, 2005). This approach allows students to make mistakes and learn from misjudgements or lack of knowledge before assessment of learning occurs. Another method is utilising assessment as learning, where self-assessment is a reflective tool spurring student action (Young, 2005) – or self-reasoning. The emphasis is on what the student assesses they need to learn and accomplish in order to fill gaps in their knowledge and abilities. Student metacognition (Earl, 2003) drives their authentic, independent learning in an iterative cycle. Similar to assessment for learning, the teacher, peers and other stakeholders provide directions and feedback (Young, 2005). In combination, this approach is highly student centred. This poster considers the who, what, when, how and why of three different assessment approaches – of, for, as – and the effect these have on student learning – a question to consider; is there room in a course’s curriculum design for all three