Formative Assessment

Formative Assessment Techniques in CBSE

Formative Assessment is a tool used by the teacher to continuously monitor student progress in a non threatening, supportive environment. It involves regular descriptive feedback, a chance for the students to reflect on their performance, take advice and improve upon it. It involves students’ being an essential part of assessment from designing criteria to assessing self or peers. If used effectively it can improve student performance tremendously while raising the self esteem of the child and reducing the work load of the teacher.

Features of Formative Assessment

• is diagnostic and remedial
• makes the provision for effective feedback
• provides the platform for the active involvement of students in their own learning.
• enables teachers to adjust teaching to take into account the results of assessment
• recognizes the profound influence assessment has on the motivation and self-esteem of students, both of which are cruicial influences on learning
• recognizes the need for students to be able to assess themselves and understand how to improve
• builds on students’ prior knowledge and experience in designing what is taught.
• incorporates varied learning styles into deciding how and what to teach.
• encourages students to understand the criteria that will be used to judge their work
• offers an opportunity to students to improve their work after feedback,
• helps students to support their peers, and expect to be supported by them.

Formative Assessment is thus carried out during a course of instruction for providing continuous feedback to both the teachers and the learners for taking decisions regarding appropriate modifications in the transactional procedures and learning activities.

Suggested Tools for Formative Assessment

Language

• Listening Comprehension
• Reading Comprehension
• Debate/ speech/ Group Discussion/ Role Play /Presentation
• Dramatization/ Dialogue/ Conversation/ Commentary
• MCQs/ Quiz
• Grammar Exercises.
• Writing/ Completing a poem, story, script, play, diary entry etc.
• Web Charts, Concept Mapping
• Visual Representation
• Letter, E-mail, data interpretation, article, bio sketch and dialogue completion

It is suggested that at least one out of four tasks should be used for assessing convesation skills in the form of listening comprehension or convesation.

Mathematics

• Data handing and analysis.
• Group projects
• Problem solving
• Maths Lab Activities
• Quiz/ oral questions
• Experiments
• Presentations
• Chart, model making
• Visual Representation
• Simple and interesting assignments
• Mathematical puzzles based on various theorems.

It is suggested that for Mathematics at least one activity out of four should be used for assessing performances in maths lab activities.

Science

Experiments

Information gathering and deducing Presentations on science concepts/ experiments Investigations for stated problems MCQs and Science Quiz Simple and interesting assignments Group assignments and projects

Model Making

Science symposium/ seminar.
Preparation of various compounds/salts

explanation of different natural phenomenon using scientific principles.

It is suggested that for science, at least one out of four formative assessments in the year are experiments.

Social Science

Written assignments involving inference, interpretation and evaluation Commentaries

Simple projects (group & individual) Presentations (group & individual) Quiz and MCQ’s Models and charts. Debates

• Symposium / Seminar
• Conducting intervenes of historical figures
• Role plays
• Dramatization of historical events

Procedure for Formative Assessments

• The suggested split up of syllabi will be followed by teachers for formative assessment.
• The minimum number of formative assessment tasks as suggested in the annual plan have to be conducted. However, teachers can give more than the minimum number of tasks depending on the need and time available.
• The performance of students in each task will be assessed on the basis of assessment criteria given.
• The total of marks obtained by each student in the formative tasks will be calculated and reduced to 10 marks. For instance, if three tasks of 5 marks each have been given for FA 1 and a student obtains 3, 3 and 2 in these tasks, the total obtained by the student will be 8 out of 15. The weightage for 10 will be (8 -r 15) x 10 = 5.33 = 5 = Grade C2 (The total will be rounded off to the next whole number if the decimal is 0.5 or more. If less, it will be ignored). Similarly the mark will be calculated for FA2, FA3 and FA4 and the total will yield the marks in formative assessment out of 40% marks for the whole academic session.

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