Traditional Versus Authentic Assessments
Provide two examples in which traditional assessment is used.
Multiple-choice or matching
Essay
Other
Replace each with an authentic assessment.
Design four assessments that align to standards and instruction.
Identify each assessment as summative, formative, standardized, or self-assessment.
TRADITIONAL VERSUS AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENTS 2
Traditional Versus Authentic Assessments
Various methods exist for teachers to assess their students. Assessments help teachers to
understand better the current knowledge of students. The two commonly assessment methods are
traditional and authentic.
Traditional assessments methods widely used include short answers, essays and multiple-
choice tests and true and false tests. In true and false test, students are given two options to make
the right decision depending on the question asked (Dikli, 2003). Multiple choices test allows
students to select one correct answer in a list of options provided. Essays are flexible and help to
assess higher order learning skills of students. These traditional assessments can be replaced or
substituted with authentic assessment which allows learners to relate instructions to real world
experiences. The two example of authentic assessment includes portfolios and projects.
Portfolios allow students to display their work to determine whether they have mastered skills to
handle certain task. It helps to assess the capability of student to self reflect, and to make correct
judgment. Project as well allows the learners to display what learners know about a topic, as it
requires one to apply related concepts and prior experiences.
Standards defines what learners should know, understand and be able to do while
instructions provide framework on how to effectively teach that which learners should know
(Jones, 2002). Therefore, teachers can design different assessments that align to the standards
and instructions. Examples of formative assessment are to ask students to draw a concept map to
represent the way they understand the topic. This assessment aims to identify areas of
weaknesses, make improvement, and have low point value. Example of summative assessment is
to ask the learners to take a midterm exam. This assessment is high value and aims at assessing
learning progress at the end of the term. Example of standardized assessments is the queries
TRADITIONAL VERSUS AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENTS 3
designed by an expert or a teacher and aim at testing specific abilities of the learner such as
during admission to a certain grade. The learners are given time limit to respond to them.
Example of self-assessment question is where a learner develops own questions and solves them.
It aims to assess an individual capability in certain area.
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References
Dikli, S. (2003). Assessment at a distance: Traditional vs. Alternative assessments. The Turkish
online journal of Educational Technology, 2(3), 13-20.
