Educators use to evaluate, measure, & document the academic readiness, learning progress, skill acquisition, or educational needs of students.
While assessments are often equated with traditional tests—especially the standardized tests developed by testing companies and administered to large populations of students—educators use a diverse array of assessment tools and methods to measure everything from a four-ye ar-old’s readiness for kindergarten to a twelfth-grade student’s comprehension of advanced physics.
Assessments also are used to identify individual student weaknesses and strengths so that educators can provide specialized academic support, educational programming, or social services. In addition, assessments are developed by a wide array of groups and individuals, including teachers, district administrators, universities, private companies, state departments of education, and groups that include a combination of these individuals and institutions.
Technology & Process
The purpose of an assessment generally drives the way it is designed, and there are many ways in which assessments can be used. Teacher-created assessments, which may also be created by teams of teachers, are commonly used in a single course or grade level in a school, and these assessments are almost never “high-stakes.” In short, assessments are usually created for highly specialized purposes.