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Purpose:

To examine the connections among assessment, instruction and curriculum

Uses:

This activity is good as an opener (or brief reminder) in the early stages of a multi-activity professional development session to build a view of the rationale for changes in assessment, as described in Chapter 1.

It can be used with other activities (e.g., Activity 1.3—Post-itä Notes and Activity 1.6—A Comparison of Multiple Choice and Alternative Assessment) to construct understanding about, and shared language for, alternative assessment.

Rationale:

Making clear connections between instruction and assessment is an essential part of the development and use of alternative assessments that will be used for ongoing communication with students and parents. In this activity, participants bring their own perspectives to a definition that could equally be attached to assessment, instruction or curriculum. This activity also tends to surface assessment issues.

Materials:

• Overhead projector, screen, blank transparencies, transparency pens
• Overheads A1.4,O1—Seeing Wholes Purpose, and A1.4,O2—A Round of Jeopardy

Time Required:

10-20 minutes

Facilitator’s Notes:

1. Use Overhead A1.4,O1—Seeing Wholes Purpose, as needed, to describe the goal of the activity.
2. (10 minutes) Show Overhead A1.4,O2—A Round of Jeopardy and have participants ask a question for which the statement is an answer. Write responses on an overhead.

   Here’s an example of recently generated responses:

   What is life?	What is a portfolio?
   What is a performance task?	What is a good unit?
   What is curriculum?	What is peer review?
   What is ongoing assessment?	What is education?
   What is a system of coherent assessments?	What is performance assessment?

   3. (5-10 minutes) Points made by Dr. Baron to link the responses back to the concept of integrated curriculum and assessment:

      A good assessment system is the curriculum!

      A good set of assessment tasks has these features: they are coordinated, there is a sequence to them, kids learn the criteria, they become the owners of what quality work is, the act of learning the criteria is the curriculum. Learning events are the midwifery.

      Good curriculum is good assessment if criteria are specified.

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      *Developed by Dr. Joan Bycoff Baron at PACE, Harvard University, and used with permission.
      
      

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