ABSTRACT
The focus of this chapter is on assessment, but we cannot decide how and when to assess pupils without thinking carefully about the relationships between assessment, learning and teaching. First, the form of assessment will have ‘backwash’ effects on the way in which learners approach their study and the way in which teachers approach their planning. Therefore, the format of the assessment should be chosen in order to encourage learners and teachers to adopt approaches that are more likely to lead to the desired outcomes. This is known as ‘constructive alignment’ (Biggs, 1996). This idea is more frequently voiced in higher education, as university teachers are able to choose the format of the assessment that students will face. However, it is equally applicable when we are evaluating the format of assessment adopted in the examination of school students. For example, higher-level courses frequently aim to develop students’ ‘holistic understanding’ of a subject. Therefore, the design of the assessment should encourage teachers and students to perceive this as a primary objective. If the form of the assessment focuses on individual parts of a specification, then teachers will train students to display a much more fragmented capability than the holistic understanding that is supposed to be the primary aim. Second, learners are more likely to make progress if they and their teachers have a clear idea of what students currently understand and what should be the next attainable level of achievement for which they should strive. This is the agenda of ‘assessment for learning’. ‘Constructive alignment’ and ‘assessment for learning’ require a clear sense of what is to be learned and this must be expressed in terms specific to a subject.
