Assessment and evaluation
Approaches to assessment and evaluation
Assessment is the process of obtaining meaningful information about the outcomes of teaching and learning and then conveying this information to individuals and groups.
Assessment of children’s learning and development should always focus on individual children over a period of time and avoid making comparisons between children.
Te Whāriki, page 29
Assessment of individual students’ progress is essentially diagnostic. Such assessment is integral to the learning and teaching programme. Its purpose is to improve teaching and learning by diagnosing learning strengths and weaknesses, measuring students’ progress against the defined achievement objectives, and reviewing the effectiveness of teaching programmes.
The New Zealand Curriculum Framework, page 24
Evaluation involves making judgments about the results of a programme or a learner’s achievements.
Evaluation is the process of making a judgment about the effectiveness of a teaching and learning programme, or about an individual’s progress, based on assessment information.
Assessment: Policy to Practice, page 10
It is important that:
- the assessment procedures provide information that can be used to improve the ways in which the language programme meets the learning needs of the learners
- families and caregivers are part of the evaluation process
- assessment and evaluation procedures are ongoing
- learners are involved in assessing their own progress.
Teachers are more likely to gain useful information when they use a range of appropriate assessment procedures that are relevant to the learning needs of the learners. Te Whāriki provides suggestions for appropriate assessment of younger children. Teachers in schools need to include, in their programmes, formal and informal methods of assessment in different contexts.
At each curriculum level, New Zealand Sign Language in the New Zealand Curriculum suggests learning and assessment activities that include self-assessment, peer assessment, and teacher assessment.
Teachers can refer to www.tki.org.nz/r/assessment/ for regularly updated information on assessment.
The National Qualifications Framework, assessment against standards, and the National Certificate of Educational Achievement
New Zealand Sign Language in the New Zealand Curriculum is the guiding document for schools and teachers developing a teaching and learning programme for learners of the language. Teachers use the curriculum as the basis for work towards unit standards and achievement standards, which contribute to national certificates on the National Qualifications Framework (NQF). These standards are not units of work in themselves; their function is to specify standards for qualification assessment purposes. As such, they should be integrated into appropriate teaching and learning programmes designed to help students to achieve the required outcomes.
Teachers will generally manage the assessment of their students’ achievements towards the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) within the school. The New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA) provides advice on managing appropriate assessment systems and procedures for the NCEA.
Standards for schools encompass levels 1–3 of the NQF. These qualification levels equate to levels 6, 7, and 8 of curriculum documents within The New Zealand Curriculum Framework.
The NCEA is the main qualification for senior secondary learners.