Student Assessment

Student assessment -- knowing whether the learners have attained the objectives--is essential in the Instructional Design process. The key is to match the assessments to the objectives. It can be very frustrating for a student to be told they will have to do one thing but then be tested on something else.

The purpose of good student assessments is at least threefold: first, they provide invaluable information to the instructional design team about the success of the instruction itself. This information, if it is valid, reliable, and complete can be used to revise the instruction to improve its effectiveness. Second, it provides information to the teacher for grading, placement, and other activities. Finally, it provides information to the student or learner to help them know what they are doing well or poorly.

Student assessment can mean a lot more than just testing, however. Some objectives (like many intellectual skills) lend themselves to paper-and-pencil tests. Others do not. Can you imagine a paper-and-pencil test that really measures one's ability to play pool, for instance? Rather than restricting ourselves to tests, we need to broaden our outlook to include many different kinds of assessment. If you are teaching psychomotor skills, you can use rating scales or checklists to assess performance on them. Many other possibilities exist.