Summary provided by Robert Pulvermacher III in NIU’s Office of Assessment
Types of Assessment
Formative. Formative assessments are on-going assessments, reviews, and observations
in a classroom. Teachers use formative assessment to improve instructional methods and
student feedback through teaching and learning processes (William & Black, 1996). One way of
conceptualizing formative assessments are as “practice.” Students are not held accountable in
terms of grades with formative assessment, but rather receive information about their learning
progress as a means to self-assess their level of understanding. Examples of formative
assessment include criteria and goal setting, observations, questioning strategies, self and peer
assessment, and student record keeping (Garrison & Ehringhuas, 2007). Practical examples
include asking students to submit one or two sentences identifying the main point of a lecture,
having students submit an outline for a paper, and early course evaluations (Eberly Center for
Teaching Excellence, 2012).
Formative assessment is dependent on student involvement. Students must be involved
as both assessors of their own and other student’s learning. Teachers act as participants in the
learning process via identifying learning goals, setting clear criteria for success, and designing
assessment tasks (Garrison & Ehrnhaus, 2007).
Summative. Summative assessments are given to assess what students do and do not
know about a particular learning topic. They measure the level of success or proficiency that
has been obtained at the end of an instructional unit. Examples include final exams, state
assessments, end-of-unit chapter tests, and benchmark assessments. Summative assessments
are vital to gauging students understanding of learning topics, but because they happen after
the learning process, are less useful in providing information at the classroom level to make
instructional adjustments and interventions. In short, formative assessments tell “where we are
now,” while summative assessments tell “how well the course went.”
Course-Embedded Techniques
Course-Embedded Assessment involves the assessment of the actual work produced by
students in our courses. Student work in used to measure the achievement of course learning
objectives. Assessments are conducted not to grade (or further grade) the student but to assess
the learning outcomes of the course. Course-Embedded Assessment can have a variety of
advantages, including purposeful reexamination of course objectives, sequencing, and content
and feedback that allows instructors to redesign assignments and give clearer direction to
students about what is expected.
Course-Embedded Techniques Applied to Formative and Summative Assessment
Course-embedded assessments may be formative as well as summative. They can be
used to evaluate the development of student skills and provide feedback (formative) and they
can be summative as well (evaluating final student product (MSU.edu, 2012)). For example, one
could use the sentences that students wrote to sum up a lecture (formative) or a final graded
essay (summative) as units of a course-embedded assessment.
References
Ayala, C., & Shavelson, R. From Formal Embedded Assessments to Reflective Lessons: The
Development of Formative Assessment Suites. Applied Measurement in Education,
21(4), 315-334.
Colwell, J. L., Whittington, J., & Higley, J. B. (2004). Tools for Using Course-Embedded
Assessment to Validate Program Outcomes and Course Objectives. In asee.org.
Retrieved July 30, 2012
Eberly Center for Teaching Excellence. (n.d.). Formative vs Summative Assessment. In cmu.edu.
Retrieved July 30, 2012
Garrison, C., & Ehringhaus, M. (2007). Formative and Summative Assessments in the Classroom.
In amle.org. Retrieved July 30, 2012
Missouri State University Assessment. (n.d.). Chapter 2: Couse-Embedded Assessment. In
missouristate.edu. Retrieved July 30, 2012
William, D., & Black, P. (1996). Meanings and Consequences: a basis for distinguishing formative
and summative functions of assessment? British Educational Research Journal, 22(5),
537-548.