Performance Assessment

There’s a tension between project-based learning and standardized testing prep, but also a wide swath of common ground.

Looking for tools and strategies for effective assessment in project-based learning? To support you, we've assembled this guide to helpful resources from Edutopia and beyond.

Low standardized test scores are a reflection of being uninspired, not unknowledgeable. Teach your students how to care, lose their fears, and identify and overcome their obstacles.

Reflecting on learning and student voice and choice are core elements of project-based learning, and they’re also key to differentiation.

Stanford professor Linda Darling-Hammond shares how using well-crafted formative and performance assessments, setting meaningful goals, and giving students ownership over the process can powerfully affect teaching and learning.

Performance-based assessments share the key characteristic of accurately measuring one or more specific course standards. They are also complex, authentic, process/product-oriented, open-ended, and time-bound.

By replacing student grades with an end-of-quarter conference, you can change that persistent question of "Will I be graded on this?" to "What can I do better?"

Not every student benefits from in-class participation, immediate answers, inflexible grading, or harsh consequences. Learn the nuances for those requiring deeper recognition and a lighter touch.

After Arizona's Mesquite Elementary School developed a program to provide additional instruction time for students struggling with math, test scores shot to the top.

Those concise assessments about social-emotional skills and character on the back of a report card can become valuable talking points between schools, parents, and students.

When one school switched from traditional to standards-based grading, they saw positive changes in mindset, assessments, and communication -- but there's still room for improvement.

Feedback is necessary for learning. Be prompt, kind, and specific, and give students opportunities to reflect before revising.

Stanford professor Linda Darling-Hammond shares how using well-crafted formative and performance assessments, setting meaningful goals, and giving students ownership over the process can powerfully affect teaching and learning.

Edutopia blogger Matt Levinson, recognizing that students get overwhelmed by unfamiliar material and choke up on assessments, offers four confidence-building strategies: verbalizing, brain dumps, non-linear thinking creativity.

Is there a difference between performance goals and mastery goals? Yes -- and that difference can affect student outcome on assessments.