Assessment+Resources

Assess, Don't Audit
A good local assessment system does more than audit performance. It is deliberately designed to model authentic work and to improve performance. The aim of teaching is not to master state tests, but to meet worthy intellectual standards. We must recapture the primary aim of assessment: to help students better learn and teachers to better instruct. Students are entitled to a more educative and user-friendly assessment system. They deserve far more feedback -- and opportunities to use it -- as part of the local assessment process. Those tasks should recur, as in the visual and performing arts and in sports, so there are many chances to get good at vital work. When assessment properly focuses teaching and learning in this way, student self-assessment and self-adjustment become a critical part of all instruction and are themselves assessed.

**Grant Wiggins,** president of Authentic Education, in Hopewell, New Jersey, is coauthor, with Jay McTighe, of //Understanding by Design//.
=**Assessment should occur before learning, during learning, and after learning.**=

__Before the unit begins:__ __During the unit:__ __After the unit:__ [|Complete Assessment timeline and accompanying unit]
 * * Brainstorming
 * Discussion || * Journals
 * World Map || * Newspaper Checklist and Rubric || * Revised Map
 * Journal
 * Decision-Making Checklist
 * Informal Interviews || * Project Rubrics
 * Final Essay Test Rubric || * Final Reflection ||

[|Intel Assessment Library] (create a login) To access this great resource, use the link to create a log-in. In some cases the log-in page will give a "Security Update" error message once you have logged in. If that happens, go to [|this page]; you should be able to access the Workspace by clicking on the link or the tab.

[|Rubistar] (create a login)