ABSTRACT
Teachers tend to carry out two types of assessment - formal and informal. Formal assessment such as standardised tests, SATs, baseline test which are usually required by school policy, the LEA or government. Informal assessment, however, tends to be for teachers own use, done when and how they choose, in order to check on children's learning and progress. When teachers gave periodic tests, their function was to assess how well children were learning what was being taught. So, giving written tests was part of both formative and summative assessment. Watching was regularly used by teachers who found it helpful to build in time to stand back and observe groups of children in order to make judgements about them against criteria for National Curriculum records. Overall, some strategies appeared to be used MORE to assess a child's knowledge and understanding while others were used MORE to assess a child's learning strategies.
