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Very good article on what different types of formative assessment are and why and how to use them. Part of the Scholastic Teaching Resources website, which contains many good tips and tools.

Gives examples of very young learners using blogs as digital portfolios. Good discussion of formative and summative assessment as well.

This is a huge list of options for formative assessments with explanations of how to use them and why.

These are some interesting ideas to assess students and get a fuller picutre of their interests and what they know, understand, and can demonstrate.

"MasteryConnect makes it simple to share and discover common assessments and resources, track mastery of standards, and collaborate. Built-in grading tools save teachers time." A place for teachers to share their vision of the Common Core; pin and upload resources aligned to standards; share common assessments; use grading tools for tablet, mobile device, Web, etc.

This two-step exam process sounds like a great way to do online-exams: "The two-stage exam is a relatively simple way to introduce collaborative learning and formative assessment into an exam. Their use is rapidly growing in the physics department at the University of British Columbia, as both students and faculty find them rewarding. In a two-stage exam students first complete and turn in the exam individually, and then, working in small groups, answer the exam questions again. During the second stage, the room is filled with spirited and effective debate with nearly every student participating. This provides students with immediate targeted feedback supplied by discussions with their peers. Furthermore, we see indications that the use of this exam format not only ensures consistency across interactive course components, but it also positively impacts how students approach the other collaborative course components. This is accomplished without losing the summative assessment of individual performance that is the expectation of exams for most instructors. In this paper we describe how to implement two-stage exams and provide arguments why they should be part of physics courses that use interactive engagement and social/collaborative learning methods." The paper is from The Physics Teacher, AAPT.

"Part of the strength of the TELL Project is its built-in ability for teachers to self-determine how well they currently meet the criteria defined in the Teacher Effectiveness for Language Learning Framework, relative to the growth they would like to make. To assist teachers in this aspect of reflective practice, TELL makes available self-assessment documents that allows an educator to pause and consider their current practice to identify possible areas of professional growth." The subtitle of this article is that "People don't learn from experiences, they learn from reflecting on their experiences." Has downloadable worksheet to help you find out if you have a safe and supportive learning environment.

Very handy guide to tools for formative assessment -- get some variety in your testing.

This article by Larry Ferlazzo suggests a number of ways to engage students in formative assessments, with responses from teachers about what they have tried with their students.

"Etienne Wenger (of Cultivating Communities of Practice fame), Beverly Traynor, and Maarten De Laat have recently published a new conceptual framework for understanding and assessing value in such interactions. It includes a nice overview chart (figure 1)..." An interesting article on the value(s) of communities (CoPs).

This is a great way to learn about art and is now connected to Khan Academy for additional practice and assessment or self-assessment. Created by two art history professors. Also pages to help you teach with Smarthistory.

T/H to Glenn Hervieux 13 Dec 15 01:30:03 Great writeup by Tony Vincenton Quizizz, quiz game that can be used for formative assessment and how it compares to Kahoot!.

"So far the learning style debate has been mostly two tiles of a different color laid side by side-you are either fer it or agin it-we should assess student learning styles to improve learner outcome verses learning style assessments are unreliable, thus they should not never be used. However, I see the debate more as a mosaic that allows multiple patterns to occur." This blog has some very thoughtful comments on using learning styles effectively, based on actual studies of how students learn. A refreshing change from the bandwagon of LS proponents. His other blog posts are well worth exploring.

This software helps learners develop their basic paragraph writing skills. Students learn how to write an effective paragraph -- developed by reason, detail, sequence, example, and cause and effect. The full version of the software provides 15 interactive writing activities on a variety of topics. Choosing from a menu of topics, students are guided to generate ideas, write a topic sentence, body of a paragraph, and a conclusion. Each interactive activity includes the following steps: pre-writing, writing, organizing, revising, rewriting, and publishing. The software is a great tool for assessment and self-assessment, for individual practice, and may be especially useful in classes where a teacher is not able to provide personal attention to individual student. -- From Lena Shvidko The focus on process in writing is important, from pre-writing to developing an idea. Would probably be appropriate for both young and adult learners.

50 different examples of formative assessment, by a specialist in "new visions for public schools." These are inventive and will keep students guessing while enabling you to find out what they know -- or don't. This is a slideshow that can be played automatically, and is under CC so can be freely copied and used.

This blog entry describes what a rubric is and how to create rubrics for your own purposes. "Authentic assessments typically are criterion-referenced measures. That is, a student's aptitude on a task is determined by matching the student's performance against a set of criteria to determine the degree to which the student's performance meets the criteria for the task. To measure student performance against a pre-determined set of criteria, a rubric, or scoring scale, is typically created which contains the essential criteria for the task and appropriate levels of performance for each criterion. "

"...why not replace some traditional testing with opportunities for creative expression? I've included some such options in my list of alternative assessments. Every one of these tasks includes natural differentiation for different levels of ability. They are written in general terms and can be adapted and applied as required. Use the ideas individually or combine aspects of different ones."

These tools help you ensure on the fly that students understand what you are teaching.

"Using Google Forms, teachers can create custom checklists that allow them to quickly record observations for all students on one form. With a place to record the date and objective being observed, the form is reusable. Google Forms also conveniently organizes all observations in one place. Teachers can collect data over as many days, and for as many objectives as they wish. Keep in mind that it's not necessary to record an observation for every student every time." Blog by Nick LaFave helps teachers use technology to become more efficient and effective at real-time assessment.

Dozens of websites for creating rubrics, viewing samples, and a large section on Common Core state rubrics. As always with lists of lists, you will need to do some digging around to find what you need.