Assessment is a conversation? Or is it solely objective?

When we consider the statement from Joe Bower, “Assessment is not a spreadsheet, it’s a conversation”, we can see there is a disconnect between the reasoning behind assessment and its reception. While we, as educators, try our hardest to attempt to give good feedback and ways to improve student’s work; students (for the most part) stop this conversation by merely glancing at the mark and tossing the assignment in their desks without any further questions. In an ideal world, our students would be rabid for feedback and a discussion on their thought process behind their work and where they could improve. However, this is rarely the case. While assessment is meant to assess a student’s learning, the impact of assessment is assessing a student’s success. These are two very different concepts. How did we get to this point? How do we return to the conversation? Let’s look at some of the supporting factors influencing the impact of assessment in the classroom. 

First, there is a disconnect between understanding the material, and the mark you receive on the assignment. A student can understand the concepts, but fail the assessment. This could be for multiple reasons: lack of sleep, learning disabilities, problems at home, hunger, etc. Yet, our assessments do not take any of this into account. On the other hand, the student can memorize the material for the exam, ace it, and promptly forget everything they learned. While we recognize that the best assessment is the conversation between a student and a teacher, it is becoming exceedingly difficult to maintain these conversations when focus is being placed specifically on results, and not the learning. The Saskatchewan education system has attempted to address this by instituting the outcome-based marking structure in elementary schools since 2010. This allows for teachers to focus more on learning than on results. However, due to the societal structure we have created in the past with percentiles, parents are not satisfied with this type of marking structure, as they are unable to determine if their child is succeeding. Furthermore, recently there has been a focus on the falling competencies in math in Saskatchewan. The government refuses to focus on the learning in the classes and effective assessments because they would then have to address the failing environments and structure they have created by underfunding education for decades.

Second, it’s becoming harder and harder to recognize the political influence on our curriculum when the curriculum is developed with corporations in mind and assessment tools are rapidly becoming monetized. Education is a profitable business with unbelievable influence on future generations. Education apps and programs alone are creating billions of dollars in revenue. Production suites are vying to influence the future business of the younger generations by instilling their products in the formative years of these kids’ lives. It is becoming essential that teachers continue their learning outside the classroom so that they do not fall prey to the ignorance of social and cultural influences by assessment and curriculum. This is difficult when considering the workload that teachers currently have, and when the burnout rate for new teachers is 30% within 5 years. This is only the beginning of the evidence of how unsustainable the learning curve for teachers is. Not only do we have to educate ourselves and be mindful of the voices in our curriculum, but we now have to be mindful of the voices and influences in our assessments as well.  

 However, these assessment tools are not all doom and gloom. There is a light at the end of the tunnel when we consider these assessment technologies as possible avenues for reconciliation. It is our responsibility to decolonize our classrooms and provide paths for reconciliation, not only with the course material but with assessment strategies as well. These assessment tools can now focus on the knowledge that students have, rather than the skills that they possess. For students who struggle with reading or writing, voice-to-text during assessments can still exemplify the knowledge that they contain. Allowing for assessments to have multiple representations, that allow for students to express their knowledge in a more meaningful fashion, only empowers the learner, and decolonizes the idea that knowledge can only be obtained and reflected through exams or writing (all of which are colonized skills). As we’ve seen in First Nations culture knowledge is represented through oral traditions. the ability to record and share their knowledge regarding a subject is logical. The idea of assessment technology being able to answer one of the 94 calls to action is encouraging as we attempt to facilitate reconciliation in education.

While most situations in society follow the concept of “the impact, not the intent”, education does not. In education, it is both the impact and the intent that are important. Teachers need to have intent and well-reasoned assessment strategies in our classrooms so the impact on our students is critical of the voices and influences of the business of Education. As technology continues to integrate itself into education, teachers must be more aware and critical of, not only, the material but also the technology that we bring into our classrooms and their impacts on our students both intended and unintended.