Company:Assessing-to-Learn (A2L)

A research project on the use of continuous formative assessment in the high-school physics classroom. The website provides participating teachers with a library of assessment items (carefully constructed questions) to choose from for their classes, and with an associated library of teacher aids which provide help with the pedagogically effective use of the items.

The Assessing-to-Learn A L project studied the implementation of continuous formative assessment in high-school physics classes Fully implementing the A L approach requires a significant change in classroom culture On a regular basis students are actively engaging their minds on questions and tasks thinking about ideas communicating with other students and reflecting on their own ways of thinking Collaborative Learning activites are an essential component of the methodology and students' responses to activities are collected tablulated and presented to the class for discussion preferably using a classroom response system see below Information gleaned from these results is then used to modify subsequent instruction and activities The most important aspect of this approach is the de-emphasis of answers in favor of reasoning and explanation of thinking The term formative assessment as used here means assessment for purposes of finding out what students don't understand and directing their attention to it It

Link

• http://a2l.physics.umass.edu/