25 People Who Influenced My Thinking On Assessment

A few months ago, I had the privilege to share some of my ideas about assessment with an audience that is very data savvy.  Without realizing it, teachers are the product of interactions with present colleagues, former teachers and past students.  Beyond the ideas I've shared, I hope this presentation inspires you to think about who has had the greatest impact in your teaching.

In the original talk for MISA, I shared stories highlighting 50 people who have influenced my thinking on the topic of assessment and evaluation. I'm really happy with the look of the original slidedeck which is available below, but it's difficult to argue with the nice editing job the creatives did with the presentation.

Assessment in a networked world from Rodd Lucier

Exams as Circumstantial Evidence

While our high school students prepare for final exams, I'm left to ponder how these snapshots came to yield so much weight.

In a discussion with colleagues earlier today, I suggested that the written test is best considered as 'circumstantial evidence' of student learning. More often than not, and exam indicates little more than which student studied, and to what degree they paid attention to the right material.

Rather than rely on the information provided on a written test, I await the day that teachers rely on anecdotal evidence as the best measure of student learning. Certainly an educator's first-hand observations taken in documentation of rich performance tasks, or culminating projects would be more telling than first draft handwritten exam responses. Teacher-student discussions in the midst of such experiences allow all types of learners to 'show what they know'.

It was back in April when members of the blogosphere publicly debated in response to Will Richardson's query "When Are We Going to Stop Giving Kids Tests That They Can Cheat On?" The shortest blog post I've read this year, generated great discussion on this topic.

As experts in learning, it is teachers themselves who need to rally against the traditional exam. While it will take a special teacher to even open this conversation in a staff room, the discussion following Will's post is a terrific place to begin the dialogue.


For a humourous example of how I survived oral exams in university, you might be interested in re-visiting the "Tale of the Tell-tale Toes" episode of the Teacher 2.0 podcast. New today: Choice Matters.

Photo Credit: ccarlstead; beatsrhymesnlife