INTERLINK

INTERLINK Curriculum Guide

9. Assessment

Assessment is often equated with grading and because grading is often foremost on the minds of students, teachers and sponsors, guidelines for grading are presented first. But, as H. Douglas Brown maintains,

"Assessment . . . is an ongoing process that encompasses a much wider domain. Whenever a student responds to a question, offers a comment, or tries out a new word or structure, the teacher subconsciously makes an assessment of the student's performance. Written work - from a jotted down phrase to a formal essay -- is performance that ultimately is assessed by self, teacher, and possibly other students. Reading and listening activities usually require some sort of productive performance that the teacher implicitly judges, however peripheral that judgment may be. A good teacher never ceases to assess students, whether those assessments are incidental or intended."

Three different types of assessment (Final Assessment, Needs Assessment, Instructional Assessment) are discussed below.

A. Final Assessment (Grading)

Whether we like it or not, in life it is hard to escape the phenomenon of evaluation. The question, "How did I do?" always comes up. Sports competitions end with a final score, products and services are appraised; books, movies and other artistic productions are critiqued and rated; and inevitably, school performance is graded. The value of grades may be questioned, in that an external goal (namely, getting a good grade) may become a substitute for a more meaningful, internal goal (becoming more proficient in English) and because low grades can adversely affect student self-esteem and even motivation and performance. Furthermore, the logistics of grading can be very time-consuming for the teacher and also shift focus and energy from the important task of helping students learn to the superficial task of managing scores. Nevertheless, we cannot dispense with grades and remain a functioning institution. Grades and a transparent grading system are required by sponsors, academic institutions and even accrediting agencies. Also, despite the drawbacks, grades can serve the useful functions of rewarding achievement and good work and pointing out deficiencies. In any case, since we must issue grades, our challenge is to develop a grading system consistent with our pedagogical beliefs and our mission of helping students learn.

To meet that challenge, we have established a two-stage assessment system consisting of: 1) proficiency standards for determining who is eligible for promotion to the next level and 2) a grading scale to determine the final grade earned by those students who meet the proficiency standards. Benchmarks provide a transparent, program-wide index of proficiency expectations for each level (see the Benchmark section for a fuller discussion). A student must meet the two established Benchmarks for each class to progress to the next level. Since each Benchmark has a value of 35 points, failure to meet either one results in a grade of less than 70% which is the minimum for promotion. Students who do not meet both Benchmarks receive the letter grade R (Repeat). A student who meets both Benchmarks has a grade of at least 70% and is deemed ready for work at the next level.

While Benchmarks determine whether or not a student moves to the next level, the letter grades (A, B, or C) of students promoted to the next level depend on the remaining 30 points which are allocated on the basis of overall academic achievement and performance as well as the cumulative results of tests, observations, and work submitted over the course of the term. Academic performance includes such factors as proficiency, diligence, progress, quality of assignments and participation, academic skills and readiness, and other criteria deemed important by the instructor. Individual instructors are responsible for devising and articulating the grading scale for each class. From the very beginning of the term, students must clearly understand how they will be graded and should know where they stand in terms of grades throughout the term. The final grade at the end of the term should never come as a surprise to any student. Grading criteria and other class policies and information must be presented to students before the end of the second week of the term in a class syllabus that must be approved by the Center Director prior to distribution to students. The Center Director is responsible for reviewing the content and making sure that criteria and policies outlined are consistent with the basic pedagogical principles outlined in this Curriculum Guide. All teachers must post all class syllabi in the Syllabus section of the Forum.

The formulation of grading criteria (assignment of the 30 points for those students meeting the Benchmarks and successfully completing the level) is the prerogative of each individual teacher. There are no center-imposed restrictions or limitations on a teacher's autonomy in allocating the 30 points, and no center-specific policy stating, for instance, that a certain percentage of the 30 points must be determined by proficiency or progress or other pre-determined criteria. The intent is for each teacher to have the freedom to assign students the grades they feel are deserved based on criteria determined to be appropriate for the course by the teacher, with approval from the Center Director.

Teachers may vary their grading criteria from class to class and from term to term, but students must be aware of the criteria for each class. Grading policies must also be consistent with INTERLINK instructional philosophy, the central aspect of which is focus on what is learned as opposed to what is taught. Grading should not be linked to attainment of specific knowledge or discrete skills but based on broader, more holistic assessment. For example, in a writing class, the quality of a student's writing should be assessed (as well as behavioral qualities impacting progress) and not discrete elements such as topic sentences, citations or use of specified syntactic structures or lexical items. That does not mean that such specific elements are not important or should not be worked on in class. It only means that it is the overall writing and not the discrete elements that should be the basis for assessment. After all, a student's writing may contain adequate topic sentences and citations and still be awful and conversely, writing might be generally quite good although deficient in specific areas. Rubrics, which pre-determine and specify what to look for in student achievement (for more on rubrics, click here), are antithetical to holistic assessment and should not figure in the grading process. By giving weight and focus to discrete elements, rubrics tend to obscure recognition of overall proficiency, neglect individual student needs and accomplishment, and place attention on elements that are taught instead of what is achieved.

The grading scale in the chart below shows conversion of number to letter grades. (Number grades are for teacher use only since many teachers find number scores most convenient to work with.)

Grades lower than 70% = R and the student must repeat the class. The grade F is for students whose failure is due to behavioral factors (excessive absence, complete lack of effort, etc.) and such students should have received Academic Warning Letters in the course of the term.

In summary, the Benchmark system prevents students lacking the required proficiency to move on to the next level. A student who does not meet both Benchmarks must repeat the class. There is no sliding scale for Benchmarks; either they are met or they aren't. Students who meet both the Benchmarks get 70 points for proficiency and the remaining 30 points are based on academic performance as determined by individual teachers. Our grading system can be seen as part pass/fail (for proficiency) and part conventional grading based on performance and achievement.

Grades are one form of assessment, but there are other modes of assessment that are equally significant, especially in the context of the INTERLINK curriculum and philosophy.

B. Needs Assessment (Ongoing Assessment)

Every student is different and in order for each student to achieve the best possible results, particular needs, abilities and circumstances must be addressed. One of the primary obligations of the INTERLINK teacher is to diagnose and prioritize the language, culture and academic needs of each student and to develop strategies for meeting those needs. Student needs change continually and must, therefore, be continually monitored. The most serious shortcoming of achievement assessment is that it is a final evaluation, coming, as it were, at the end of a chapter. It is final and unchangeable. Needs assessment, by contrast, is ongoing and dynamic, and focuses not on assessing what has been done but on identifying and correcting problems. Needs assessment is more central to the INTERLINK curriculum than achievement assessment because it represents the attempt to improve student skills rather than merely appraise them. Consider a writing class where a teacher collects and grades a paper, assigns and grades additional papers, and at the end of the term awards a grade based on the cumulative grades. Such a system represents an achievement assessment-based class. By contrast, imagine that a teacher assigns a paper, identifies the most serious problems, prioritizes them, and attempts to make the student aware of them and help overcome them. Throughout the revision process and assignment of new papers, the teacher tracks the identified problems and sees to what extent they have been corrected. If they remain problems, the teacher employs new strategies to deal with them. Needs assessment focuses on helping students overcome obstacles and improve proficiency.

C. Instructional Assessment (Self-Assessment)

The term assessment is immediately associated with student performance, but a fundamental tool of INTERLINK teachers is what we might call instructional assessment. This self-assessment includes evaluation of overall classroom dynamics, and management and evaluation of specific activities, materials and lessons. The key function of this assessment is to continually refine and improve instructional strategies and effectiveness. Continued professional growth requires careful scrutiny of one's methods and pedagogical experiences. Ongoing assessment of what works and what doesn't work, along with reflection about changing pedagogical perspectives, is one of the hallmarks of a good teacher.

The three forms of assessment distinguished above are not mutually exclusive and in actual practice are often integrated and mutually supportive. The following section is intended to illustrate in practical terms and through examples how assessment principles are applied in the classroom.

There are numerous opportunities for assessing student achievement, students' needs, and instructional quality in every Core Class. Assessment should take place every day of the term, and preferably in every activity. While assessment for the purpose of grading is necessary, assessment for the purpose of improving skills is central to our program. In our student-centered program, the teacher works on the student and the student works on the language, and without immediate and constant assessment, the teacher cannot work on the student. Since instruction at INTERLINK is process oriented, assessment must target each phase of the process rather than the final product. Let us consider the debate Core Project for CS 4 to see how assessment takes place.

If our program were product oriented rather than process oriented, a student might receive a grade for his or her performance in the actual debate, which is the culmination of 7-8 weeks of preparation. Because we are process oriented, we are more concerned with what is learned and what progress is made along the way than with the final product, and a student will have been evaluated 20-30 times in the course of the project and not just given a grade based on the debate itself. The curricular description of the debate indicates work on the following skills: listening, speaking, gathering information, organizing ideas, time management, cooperation, presentation, use of computers and AV equipment, note-taking, research. Each of these elements, and additional ones as well, should be monitored and assessed whenever possible in the course of working on this Core Project.

For example, one possible constituent element of the debate is viewing videotaped debates. Students' listening and note-taking skills may be assessed by administering a comprehension quiz based on the video or by asking students questions orally. A small group discussion after viewing the video presents opportunities for assessing listening, speaking, grammatical accuracy, pronunciation, and peer cooperation. Another constituent element is researching the debate topic. This activity provides opportunities to assess reading, summarizing, and computer skills. Every element of this Core Project requires students to engage in authentic language use, and every aspect of every activity affords scope for assessment.

Accumulating assessment data for every student from the beginning to the end of the term provides a basis for fair and accurate grading. If assessment information is shared with students, they should have no question as to how they are doing in class and the final grade will come as a surprise to no one. But what's more important than the achievement assessment used for grading is the opportunity for needs assessment as a part of the feedback loop for strengthening student skills. So, for example, if a student does poorly in a comprehension quiz based on a video, the teacher should explore the reasons for the result. Did the student take inadequate notes; was the student not paying attention; was the speed of the discourse too fast or the dialect too hard to understand; was the vocabulary too difficult; was the syntax too sophisticated; was the speech too vernacular or loaded with idiomatic or culturally arcane language? By working closely with the student, the teacher should be able to offer strategies to improve comprehension for the next time. The teacher's real interest is not in grading the student - that is a byproduct of the process - but in providing feedback for the correction of errors. In examining achievement and needs assessment results, the teacher is also reflecting on the efficacy of the materials, explanations, time frames, etc. used in executing the activity and building upon the experience to create an even more successful activity in the future. In other words, all three assessment modes are combined and integrated into a seamless whole.