Assessment Literacy is essential for students and families
Assessment literate students and families understand how student assessment can empower them to better carry out their role in education, believe that assessment can improve teaching and learning, and put activities and behaviors in place to act on these beliefs.
Assessment Literacy Standards
Download the full set of standards and the companion glossary.
Elementary Students
Dispositions
Elementary students and their families who are assessment literate believe that students:
- Learn best when they know the targets for their learning.
- Learn from taking Quality Assessments.Quality AssessmentA judgment that an assessment is of high quality.
- Learn from effective Feedback on their work provided by their teachers. FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- Are responsible for their own learning.
- Need to use assessment results to learn more.
Knowledge
Elementary students and their families who are assessment literate know:
- There are different reasons for taking assessments.
1. Improving their achievement and learning
2. Student Accountability and Grading
3. Providing information that predicts their future performance/achievementAccountabilityHolding educators or others responsible for the performance of students, educators, or school programs.GradingRating an individual or program on the basis of external standards. - Different Types of Assessments are used in the classroom.
1. Selected response: Multiple-choice, true-false, matching
2. Constructed response: Short or extended written response
3. Performance: Written responses, presentations, or products
4. Personal Communication: Observations and InterviewsInterviewsIn this type of assessment, a teacher typically works with an individual student, asks a series of planned and/or unplanned questions, and records students’ responses to the questions.Personal CommunicationAn assessment conducted one-on-one between an adult and a student—sometimes an observation or interview.Types Of AssessmentDifferent ways of assessing students or programs. - Different Types of Assessments provide different types of information about what they know and can do.Types Of AssessmentDifferent ways of assessing students or programs.
- How to use Rubrics to assess their own work.RubricsA rubric identifies a coherent set of criteria for student work that includes expectations for performance at varying levels of quality.
- How to use assessment results to reflect on their learning and to set goals for future learning.
Performance
Elementary students and their families who are assessment literate:
- Use Feedback to improve their learning.
FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument. - Use Rubrics to look at their work and that of their peers.RubricsA rubric identifies a coherent set of criteria for student work that includes expectations for performance at varying levels of quality.
- Use assessment results to improve their achievement.
- Use assessments and assessment Feedback to improve their attitude toward learning.FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- Explain their assessment results to their teachers and their parents/guardians.
- Keep track of their own learning over time.
Secondary Students
Dispositions
Secondary students and their families who are assessment literate believe that students:
- Learn best when they know the targets for their learning.
- Learn from taking Quality Assessments.Quality AssessmentA judgment that an assessment is of high quality.
- Learn from effective Feedback on their work provided by their teachers.FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- Are responsible for their own learning.
- Can use self-monitoring to improve their achievement.
- Need to use their own assessment results to learn more.
Knowledge
Secondary students and their families who are assessment literate know:
- There are different reasons for taking assessments.
1. Improving their achievement and learning
2. Student Accountability and Grading
3. Providing information that predicts their future performance/achievementAccountabilityHolding educators or others responsible for the performance of students, educators, or school programs.GradingRating an individual or program on the basis of external standards. - Different Types of Assessments are used in the classroom.
1. Selected response: Multiple-choice, true-false, matching
2. Constructed response: Short or Extended Written Response
3. Performance: Written responses, presentations or products
4. Personal Communication: Observations and InterviewsInterviewsIn this type of assessment, a teacher typically works with an individual student, asks a series of planned and/or unplanned questions, and records students’ responses to the questions.Personal CommunicationAn assessment conducted one-on-one between an adult and a student—sometimes an observation or interview.Types Of AssessmentDifferent ways of assessing students or programs. - Different Types of Assessments provide different types of information about what they know and can do.Types Of AssessmentDifferent ways of assessing students or programs.
- How to use Rubrics to assess their own work.RubricsA rubric identifies a coherent set of criteria for student work that includes expectations for performance at varying levels of quality.
- That Feedback can be descriptive versus evaluative.FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- How to use assessment results to reflect on their learning and to set goals for future learning.
Performance
Secondary students and their families who are assessment literate:
- Use Learning Targets to understand the Standards and to support their learning.Learning TargetsThe knowledge and skills students must acquire to master the standards. StandardWhat a student must know and be able to do by the end of a course or grade level.
- Use Feedback to decide on how to improve their achievement.FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- Use different Protocols for looking at their work with peers and teachers.ProtocolsProtocols are an agreed upon set of guidelines for conversation; a code of behavior for groups to use when exploring ideas.
- Use assessment Feedback to improve their attitudes, aspirations, mindsets and achievement.FeedbackInformation about performance provided by another person or an instrument.
- Interpret and explain their assessment results to their teachers and their parents/guardians.
- Use multiple sources of data over time to identify trends in their learning.