ABSTRACT
This chapter describes and contrasts the professional purpose of assessment with the bureaucratic purpose of assessment. Professional assessment is that carried out by teachers to enhance learning and is known as ‘formative assessment’ or ‘assessment for learning’. By contrast summative assessment, associated with certification and selection, is used to inform pupils of what they have achieved at the end of a course, as a means of selection for jobs or higher education, and as data in the published annual ‘performance tables’ of schools.
