What role school based assessments can play?

Why do we need school based assessments?

Board examinations in class 10 and 12 are often critiqued for assessing limited set of skills due to focus of assessment being on skills that can be assessed through written examination. Due to the high stakes nature of board examination, often the focus of teaching learning is centred around 'what gets assessed' in these exams. Students and teachers often turn a blind eye to important outcomes of learning that are core and essential for attaining the broader aims of education, the reason being these outcomes would not be assessed in board exams. Here are a few examples of such outcomes-

'Uses bilingual or multilingual ways to exchange ideas or disseminating information with the help of ICT, PPT, role play, street play, drama, written scripts, etc.' in Languages, 'Plans and conducts investigations or experiments to arrive at and verify the facts, principles, phenomena or to seek answers to queries on their own' in Science, 'Establishing linkages between mathematics and daily life experiences and across the curriculum' in Mathematics, and 'Illustrates decision making/problem solving skills' and 'Shows sensitivity and appreciation skills' in Social Science.

Recognizing these essential learning outcomes and incorporating them into the broader educational process, beyond the scope of board exams, is important for a well-rounded education. The important question here is how teachers, parents, and educational institutions can work together to create a balanced learning environment that nurtures these outcomes and prepares students for life beyond examinations?

What are school based assessments?

School based assessments that carry 20 to 30% of the weightage out of the total marks can address this issue- through providing a scope to assess the learning outcomes that are not feasible to assess in written examination. Such assessments should be ongoing and should provide valid and reliable measures of students learning. A variety of assessment methods can be used for school based assessment including Projects, Practical assessments, Oral Presentations, Group Discussions, Portfolios, Programming Assignments, Case studies and Communication skills.

School based assessments provides an opportunity to assess students' progress continuously and comprehensively throughout the academic year and ensure that learning is not solely dependent on a single final exam. These provide more holistic assessment of a student's overall performance and abilities beyond what can be measured in a written exam. Most importantly, such assessment also gives multiple opportunities to demonstrate learning which helps in reducing the pressure associated with a single high-stakes final exam and promotes a more balanced and stress-free learning environment. Internal assessments also provide the teacher autonomy to tweak content and instruction to meet individual needs and allow for all learners to make progress they are capable of, thereby promoting equity and fairness. 

What are a few things to keep in mind while designing school based assessments?

• Interdisciplinary- School based assessments that are long term, authentic and continuous in nature requires considerable amount of time and effort from both students and teachers. Planning interdisciplinary assessments such as projects can help overcome this challenge leading to a more comprehensive assessment as well as it helps to reduce work load on both students and teacher. 
• Role of a teacher- Long term school based assessments such as projects are complex to plan and execute. Therefore, the role of a teacher become crucial in-
• spacing the project work
• organizing periodic discussions and reviews at different stages
• guiding the students by providing necessary inputs, feedback, resources etc. to enrich the subject content 
• educating educate students about plagiarism and the importance of quoting the source of the information to ensure authenticity of project 
• Focus of assessments- School based assessments provide an opportunity to assess subject specific skills such as experimentation, critical reflection on social issues, creative expression and experimentation; and 21st century skills such as critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication. Therefore, the assessment should be planned to enable assessment of such content domains. A variety of assessment methods including practical assessments, oral presentations, group discussions, portfolios, programming assignments and case studies. Planning merely written tests and quizzes will fail to assess students comprehensively.
• Evaluation scheme- The focus of assessment should be on both process and product of learning. The evaluation scheme should be planned in such a manner that rubrics and checklists are created to ensure assessment of learning, assessment for learning and assessment as learning. In addition to this, specific assessment criteria for individual contribution be clearly defined for group assessments.

Stimulating your Assessments

What is the meaning of Stimulus?

Cambridge dictionary defines 'Stimulus' as something that causes growth, activity, or reaction. In the area of educational assessment, stimulus acts as a context for answering one or more questions. It helps in triggering thoughts, actions and emotions as indicated in educational standards defined for school education. The thought process invoked by a stimulus-based question is entirely different than those evoked by stimulus free questions. While teachers find such questions to be more useful in assessing higher cognitive abilities, students find them more engaging and interesting which leads to a better teaching learning experience. 

Subject specific examples for choice of stimulus

• Math- calendars, data tables, currencies, geometric shapes, etc.
• Language- poems, pictures, newspaper articles, railway tickets, posters, etc.
• Social Science- maps, sketches, date lines, historical sources, political cartoons, etc.
• Science- experiments, diagrams, objects, etc. 

An example of stimulus-based assessment item

One of the curricular expectations for Environmental Sciences as defined by NCERT is to acquire awareness about immediate/wider surroundings through lived experiences on various themes related to daily life for example Family, Plants, Animals, Food, Water, Travel, and Shelter etc. The following assessment items helps to assess ability to identify various means of communication, record observations, experiences, information places visited in different ways, voice opinion on issues observed and show sensitivity for diverse set of people. These are some of the core and essential skills for Environmental Sciences.

Refer the above stimulus and answer the following questions-

1. Can you identify the different vehicles shown here by hearing the sounds they make?
2. Can you also make the sounds of some of these vehicles?
3. How many of these vehicles have bells and how many have horns?
4. Which among all these make loud noises and how many do not make noise?
5. Can you think of ways of travelling other than given in the picture?
6. How do you travel when you go to meet your friends and relatives? Write a brief account of any recent visit to your relative home?
7. Ask your friends how they come to school and note their responses. Which is the most frequently used mode of communication?

Design considerations for stimulus-based questions

While stimulus-based questions are found to be more effective for assessing students learning in a more valid manner, designing such questions are often time consuming. Creating a good stimulus may cost time ranging from 3 to 4 hours which is way higher than designing stimulus free questions. A possible approach to combat this challenge is to design multiple questions based on one stimulus. This also works in favour of students as they engage with one stimulus in a deeper manner that in turn enables them to respond better.

It is also important to ensure that the stimulus chosen is clear, unambiguous, factually and conceptually accurate. Poor quality stimulus will lead to invalid assessments as it will be hard to assess if students have not responded to a question because of unclear stimulus or because the student has not attained the desired standard of learning. Also, it is important to note that including stimulus unnecessarily does not add any value to the assessment. A conscious choice needs to be made by the teacher in evaluating the pertinency of stimulus for assessing chosen educational standards. A stimulus might be avoided where a concept can be assessed effectively through stimulus-free questions. This also helps to lessen cognitive load on students.

To conclude, a good quality stimulus helps to stimulate our assessments through initiating and activating the desired cognitive abilities among students. However, it important to note that the question types (stimulus-free and stimulus-based) should be selected according to their specific strengths and weaknesses and should be tailored to the specific needs of the assessment.