Testing 3

TESTING 3

April 2007

The difference between formal and informal assessment techniques and instruments lies primarily in the conditions under which the assessment is done , the person administering the assessment and the assessment tools that are used . Formal assessments , according to Bennett (1982 formal tests are generally standardized , meaning that specific criteria for administration and score have been established overtime , that learners in a particular sphere are required to sit the test at the same time and that the format usually followers traditionally established guidelines . Formal assessments often take the

form of written -and-pencil tests and are often norm-referenced . Informal assessments , on the other hand , usually takes place within the classroom or school setting , are not nationally planned or directed and are usually criterion-referenced

Examples of formal assessments are formal oral exams and standardized multiple-choice achievement tests . Standardized multiple-choice tests are regionally or nationally administered exams that require responses to be chosen from options given . Teachers usually have little or no say in constructing this test but prepare their students for the test by following a curriculum which prescribes content areas to be examined Multiple choice tests are definitely score to mark and are also flexible in being able to measure both higher and lower abilities . They often require much less time for administration . They are disadvantageous in that they are very difficult to set , especially if higher objectives are to be met , taking up a considerable amount of time to develop effective on distracters . There is also the issue of guessing where students may tend to guess the correct answers , in some cases , giving the impression that they have achieved the learning target

Oral exams are one-on-one discussions between the teacher and the student either based on pre-established questioning format . They have the advantage of permitting an alternative to using -and-pencil to complete a test particularly for those who are weak in expressing themselves through writing . Additionally teachers are able to assess a very wide range of learning targets as the response time is much less compared to the amount of writing that has to be done for traditional written tests . However , oral exams are quite time-consuming as each student has to be evaluated separately , these tests could also pose problems of reliability given that not all students are evaluated at once and there may be collusion with the students who have not yet been examined

Examples of informal assessments are portfolios , teacher-made tests and quizzes , demonstrations and classroom observations . Portfolios are compilations that students make of the work they complete over the duration of the school year or school term , depending on the specification of the teacher . They could be best work portfolios which allow students to place only their best pieces for the period or they could be growth portfolios where students demonstrate their progressive improvement throughout the course . Portfolios are beneficial in that they permit a wide cross-section of the students ' efforts to be measured , they facilitate students ' involvement in the assessment process as...