Looking at assessments differently

Last week, my year 10s sat an assessment. I had spent a number of lessons going through key concepts. I structured my homework so that students were practising retrieval of content within this topic as well as previous topics. I asked many, many questions on mini-whiteboards and got my students rehearsing key concepts. I tried to get my students thinking hard in lessons.

On the day of the assessment, a few of my students were nervous: what if they don’t do well? what if they forget everything? Maybe they should have revised by not just reading their notes.

One of my students was really worried- they struggle to remember facts despite really trying in lessons and doing their homework each week. They get quite anxious about assessments. When I tried to reassure them by reminding them that they did quite well the last time, they said: ‘why do teachers always say I did well? When I get my test back, I’ve got less than 50%’.

This made me think of how I usually feel when I mark these assessments. I shake my head when a student has forgotten something I spent ages explaining. I get upset when more than one student has not read the question carefully and missed a vital instruction. I feel frustrated when students have left questions blank when they practised similar questions in lessons.

And then I thought about the years of doing Mock exams with Year 11s. In Science, I have always had two sets of Mock exams at two different points in the year. Year 11 students tend to do much better in the second round of Mock exams compared to the first. I used to think this was mostly because the first round of Mocks would surprise students as to how much effort is required in order to do well and they start building in better habits and revising more. But recently, I have started to see that one of the reasons for the increase in performance is the fact they have practised the process of completing a Mock exam once and are better prepared for it the second time round.

All of this has made me realise that there needs to be a shift in our mindset towards assessments.

Why was I doing assessments?

To be perfectly honest, I was doing them:

• because that’s what has always been done
• to see if students remember key content and can apply it
• to give students practice of exam questions in exam conditions (silent, timed)

I think the latter two reasons are still important. Even though I give my students exam questions to practise in lessons, an assessment gives students something to focus their revision on, helps me identify gaps in knowledge despite all the checks for understanding and practise in lessons.

Obviously, it is important to practise answering exam-style questions in lessons so there is a bit more time to dissect the thinking behind student answers. However, an assessment allows for this practice under different conditions, which can have an impact on how a student responds. Sometimes, a student who has slowly built up good study habits with much struggle may revert to older, ineffective habits when anxious about being judged by a grade or outcome.

My mindset wasn’t quite right

This negative mindset was influencing my students. I would say things like ‘this assessment is very important because I can see if you’ve been revising at home’ or ‘how could you have gotten this question wrong when I have explained it so many times!?’. Inadvertently, my negativity was making some of my students feel anxious.

What if a student did try to revise, thinking they were doing all the right things but still didn’t do well on the assessment? Would I still think they haven’t put in the effort?

How do I frame assessments now?

Now, I say there are a few, important reasons I set assessments:

Practise revision technqiues and organise their time efficiently

To help my students with this, I do three things. I talk about revision throughout the topic so it isn’t something we simply do at the end of a topic to prepare for an assessment. I model self-study techniques such as writing and drawing labelled diagrams from memory on mini-whiteboards. And I set regular homework to reflect the type of questions I want my students to be thinking about. The homework not only serves the purpose of practising answering questions but also provides my students with an opportunity to revise independently away from my direct support and guidance.

Practise exam questions because even though they may know the content, working out what the question is referring to can be tricky for a 14-15 year old who has not really had much experience with similar assessments

I do this in lessons where I can control how my students tackle the question, how they perservere when they are unsure and how they can use resources to support them. Modelling how I would approach questions under the visualiser is powerful too as it shows students exactly what to look out for and how to annotate a question effectively.

Answer questions in a timed, silent environment to ensure there is maximum thinking and focus

We practise this in lessons during silent, independent work. Initially, this is not timed to allow students to freely think about the questions but as the routine builds and student confidence increases, I am more strict on how much time I give to students to answer certain questions.

The score is not as important as the performance in answering questions.

Have they been able to remember simple, straightforward facts? Have they identified the key idea that the question is referring to? Have they read through their fill-in-the-blank responses to ensure the sentences make sense? Have they worked out the variables in the experiment that has been described in the question?

Two students might get the exact same score or percentage but one has completely left the 6-mark question blank and guessed at any multiple-choice questions, getting some right by chance, while the other student may have actually tried to work out the questions but confused different concepts.

I reflect on these points as I mark assessments instead of solely focusing on what they did not or could not do. Of course, I still note down things I need to reteach or clarify but I am also looking out for patterns and whether the mechanics of answering questions needs more practice.

Looking at assessments differently has not only helped my students see them as part of the learning process we develop in the classroom but also helps me view student performance as useful information to improve my teaching, support and encouragement.