Performance-based assessments are a superior way of evaluating student knowledge and skills. When done well, they are teacher created and externally validated, arise out of classroom practice, aligned to learning standards, and authentic to student learning. We have created this Fact Sheet for those interested in advocating for and supporting quality performance-based assessments instead of state and local evaluation systems based on standardized testing (as opposed to using tests as an occasional “education thermostat” in the manner of NAEP).
What are Performance Based Assessments?
Performance Based Assessments require student completion of a task by applying knowledge, skills and work habits. In undertaking the task students perform or produce something that demonstrates that they have mastered specific skills and competencies.
Assessment tasks may involve:
Producing a product
Performing an activity
Reporting on an investigation
Students demonstrate understanding and apply knowledge by:
Explaining processes and methodologies
Solving problems
Explaining phenomena
Forming hypotheses
Answering questions
Conducting inquiries
Creating original work
Some examples include
Solving a non-routine math problem and explaining and defending the methodology
Designing and conducting an experiment to address a real-world hypothesis
Investigating, researching and answering a debatable historical question
Creating a podcast about an issue affecting the school
Conducting a trial of a literary character
Talking about a novel with an adult
Engaging in a conversation in a foreign language
Producing an original work of art and having it critiqued
Interviewing members of a community about a public health issue
Designing and building a costume for a school musical
Done well, performance-based assessments
Grow out of the curriculum; they are not imposed on curriculum
Are given after students and teachers have thoroughly studied and debated material
Are part of a more meaningful and engaging learning process
Are open ended and relevant in the real world
Require application and transfer of learning
Are fair and culturally responsive
Outline clear criteria for success
Result in original products or success
How do Performance Based Assessments work in a school?
Teachers learn to design, validate, and implement high-quality performance assessments and reliably score resulting student work through professional learning. Rubrics and feedback modules are designed to give students information about the substance and quality of the work and for avenues of improvement.
Like in the real world, students have the opportunity to practice and revise their work – subject to feedback and collaborative processes – before final performance or submission.
Multi-step assignments measure how well a student transfers and applies knowledge and complex skills. Students demonstrate proficiency in ways that will be expected of them later in college, career, and life.
Performance assessments in the classroom that are integrated into students’ daily work, drive quality instruction, and assess student growth over time.
Why are Performance Based Assessments good for student learning?
Performance Based Assessments allow students to explain their thinking, evaluate ideas, investigate and research their own questions, and truly demonstrate learning. Performance Based Assessments allow all students to demonstrate what they know and can do through real-world application, preparing graduates for college, career, and beyond.
Why are Performance Based Assessments good public policy, better than traditional standardized tests?
Dependence on standardized testing in K-12 education to assess student knowledge and skills is outdated for the complex higher order tasks of the modern world. They are not “authentic” measurements of progress – they are divorced from the daily inquiry-based processes and student-teacher and peer interactions of the daily classroom. Because of their inherent limitations, biases, time constraints, and stakes, they are harmful to our most vulnerable students. Students’ futures should not be based on simply a 1-3 day test; rather, assessing students and their futures should be based on a more holistic approach to more accurately reflect students’ abilities.
Standardized tests negatively impact teaching and learning by limiting and channeling the learning process to a single commercially produced instrument. They narrow curriculum as “teaching to the test” becomes the standard practice; they devalue teacher professionalism by calling into question the capacity of those with daily engagement with students to evaluate student capacity and progress; and they in the aggregate they warp public perception of school quality by reducing school evaluation to a few test score data points. On the whole, standardized tests are a mediocre and misleading way to capture student performance or teacher effectiveness.
High-stakes Standardized Testing
X Narrows the curriculum
X Devalues teachers
X Misinforms the public about school quality
Performance Based Assessments
✔Grow out of curriculum
✔Professionalize teaching
✔Accurately reflect schoolquality and culture
How do Performance Based Assessments provide transparency and accountability?
Teacher-generated, curriculum-embedded performance assessments create a richer means of assessing student achievement and serve as the primary student learning measure. When examples and demonstrations of student work are made public and presented to the community they provide genuine accountability to major stakeholders. The accountability is more genuine than standardized testing as the work is an authentic reflection of the actual schooling and not a mere proxy for class and, all too often, race.
Are Performance Based Assessments valid and reliable evaluations of student learning?
Provided that exhibitions and demonstrations are available for community and public inspection, assessments are judged according to clearly defined task appropriate standards and rubric, and tasks are aligned to learning goals and standards, Performance Based Assessments are valid and reliable evaluations of student learning. They more validly and reliably assess the panoply of factors and skills that are important to student learning and development than standardized tests.