Gayle Eyers reviews Lorna M. Earl. (2013). Assessment as learning: Using classroom assessment to maximize student learning (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin. 144 pp. ISBN: 978-1-4522-4297-2.

Gordon Stobart reviews Valentina Klenowski and Claire Wyatt-Smith. (2014). Assessment for education: Standards, judgement and moderation. Sage Publications, 171 pp. ISBN 978-1-4462-0841-0.

Assessment practices in higher education focus on evaluating student learning. Institutions are now expected to provide improvement-oriented assessments that help students to improve their work. Student learning outcomes are enhanced if students understand assessment and respond to it in a self-regulating fashion. Beliefs about assessment have been shown to have adaptive and maladaptive relationships to assessment ...

This article details the use of Q methodology (Q) for eliciting different views of classroom assessment among Singaporean teachers. Q is purported to be useful for studying the tacit decision-making process within the wide-ranging practical and controversial situations that Q researchers tend to prefer to investigate. This article asks a key question: Is Q helpful ...

Since 2007, substantial restructuring of New Zealand’s national school curriculum has occurred. This change has been paralleled by extensive revisions to New Zealand’s high-stakes assessment system, the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA), which makes the New Zealand context an important one for investigating how teachers come to terms with mandated assessment innovation. The New Zealand ...

This article describes the use of Rasch measurement to improve criteria-based analytical marking keys. The instruments and data described result from a research project which investigated the use and assessment of digital portfolios in the Western Australian senior secondary design course. The study involved two phases and two separate data sets. A criteria-based analytical marking ...

The implementation of a new national curriculum and standards-referenced assessment in Australia has been an opportunity and a challenge for teacher assessment practices. In this case study of teachers in two Queensland schools, we explore how annotating student or exemplar assessment tasks could support teacher assessment practice. Three learning conversations between the researchers and the ...

The report Directions for Assessment in New Zealand (Absolum, Flockton, Hattie, Hipkins, & Reid, 2009) envisages an “assessment capable” system where students are empowered to become self-regulated learners. This article explores the concept of assessment capability. It considers what it means to be an assessment-capable teacher in New Zealand, the lessons that have been learned ...

Each year several hundred New Zealand student teachers complete a final practicum before graduating to take on the critical role that teachers play in children’s learning. This final practicum is crucial to determining the student teacher’s suitability for entry into the profession. However, assessment of student teachers’ competence during ...

The successful implementation of electronically networked (e-networked) tools to support an inquiry-learning approach in secondary science classrooms is dependent on a range of factors spread between teachers, schools, and students. The teacher must have a clear understanding of the nature of inquiry, the school must provide effective technological infrastructure ...