For Tutor Carole only! - Implementing Authentic Assessment

Chapter 9 from the book:

Hardin, B. J., Wortham, S.C. (2015) Assessment in Early Childhood Education (7th ed.).  [Vitalsource Bookshelf Online].  Retrieved from https://kaplan.bitalsource.com/#/books/9781323290804/

In-text citation:

(Hardin & Wortham, 2015)

CHAPTER 9 Performance-Based Assessment Strategies

Suzanne Clouzeau/Pearson

Chapter Objectives

As a result of reading this chapter, you will be able to:

1. Describe performance-based strategies and their purposes.

2. Explain types of performance-based assessments and how they are used.

3. Discuss how to classify and organize performance assessments.

4. Explain how standards affect performance assessments.

5. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of using performance-based assessments.

Understanding Performance Assessment

We have discussed a variety of types of informal and formal assessments such as observation, checklists, rating scales, and teacher-designed assessments. In this chapter, we discuss how assessments contribute to a broader strategy—performance-based assessment. Each assessment discussed previously contributes to the collection of assessment information that is part of performance-based assessment. The strategies used to conduct these assessments permit the teacher to measure a child’s performance.

Before proceeding further, we should explain what is meant by performance-based assessment and how it is seen as a positive alternative to the use of standardized tests to measure children’s development and learning. Traditional formal methods of measuring learning have focused on assessing what the child knows. Achievement tests are accurately labeled in that they measure what the child has achieved. Performance assessment is advocated as a contrast to high-stakes testing. Early childhood educators such as Meisels (2000, 2014) deplored the situation in which tests determine what teachers teach, what children learn, and whether children fail or are promoted. Rather than depend on tests that are a single indicator of what a child has learned, Meisels proposed that the teacher should have a generative or transformed role with children. The teacher–learner process permits the learner to use his or her own skills to learn new skills.

Performance assessments require more in that they measure what the child can do or apply, in addition to what the child knows. Moreover, performance assessment includes completion of a task in a realistic context. Performance assessments require the student to perform some action or activity that demonstrates understanding and application.

Performance-based assessment is considered particularly useful with young children because it measures progress as well as achievement. Children in the early childhood years are proceeding through rapid changes in development that are described as complex because of the interactions among maturation, experience, and learning (Illinois State Board of Education: Early Childhood Education, 2012).

Current needs in the workforce require the kinds of learning reflected in performance assessment. The needs of businesses and other workplaces in the 21st century require that workers be able to solve problems that are at odds with the fact-oriented curriculum found in public schools. The workplace of the future will require that workers find new ways to get work done, and students will need to be able to think critically and analytically rather than simply demonstrate content knowledge (Fadel, Honey, & Fasnick, 2007; Lai, 2011; New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce, 2007; Stanford School Redesign Network, 2008). Supporters of performance-based assessment propose that it reflects higher-order thinking skills, informs teacher instruction, is done in real-world contexts, and can be used for formative and summative judgments (Stanford School Redesign Network, 2008).

Authentic Learning and Assessment

Another term frequently used for performance assessment is authentic learning, or authentic performance assessment . The Illinois State Board of Education: Early Childhood Education (2012) describes authentic assessment as “the documentation and analysis of a student’s actual work collected over time in his or her real world environment. It tracks students’ successes rather than failures. Most importantly, work sample portfolios combined with well-trained teacher observations and knowledge about research-based authentic assessment programs drives instruction” (p. 3). An important element in authentic assessment is that it is linked directly to authentic learning (Baldwin, Adams, & Kelly, 2009). State and national standards for early childhood and elementary school are also significant when considering performance assessments.

Advocates of authentic assessment propose that authentic achievement must accompany authentic assessment. If we are to use authentic or performance assessment to understand how children can apply or use what they have learned, the learning experiences they are provided must also be authentic or meaningful. Meaningful learning includes intellectual accomplishments that are similar to those undertaken by successful adults and involve tasks and objectives that engage the mind. When children are engaged in authentic learning, they are given opportunities to link new information to prior knowledge and engage in problem solving.

Authentic learning is based on construction of knowledge and focuses on higher-order thinking. The purpose is to move beyond the knowledge level and to construct new knowledge. This type of learning includes children’s communication of their construction of knowledge and application of knowledge in meaningful contexts, such as some type of performance (Illinois State Board of Education: Early Childhood Education, 2012).

Like authentic learning, authentic assessment is meaningful. It requires the teacher to have continual interaction with student work. The teacher engages in dialogues, questioning, suggesting, observing, and guiding to encourage children. The purpose of this approach is to enable children to demonstrate how they can use what they understand and to represent that learning in some type of product or performance. Teachers not only use performance assessments to reflect authentic learning, but also use the results of these assessments as resources to extend and deepen student learning (Kleinert, Green, & Harte, 2002); (The Glossary of Education Reform, 2013).

Interrelated Nature of Performance-Based Assessments

Different types of informal and performance-based assessments have been discussed in both this chapter and earlier chapters. At this point, it is important to describe how these assessments are used in an interrelated manner to understand the characteristics of a child’s performance. For example, observation can be the basis for assessing a child’s performance on a directed assignment, whereas a checklist might be used to record the child’s progress on the same assignment. In the following sections, we explore the characteristics of performance assessments and how the teacher uses them to evaluate the development and achievement of the whole child.

The Role of the Teacher

The teacher has the primary role in selecting the types of performance assessments to be used and how they will be used. Because teachers evaluate and use the assessment information, they also have the responsibility to decide which strategies will be most effective for their purposes.

Performance assessment occurs continually in the early childhood classroom. Information is collected throughout the day when children are working in centers, playing outdoors, participating in small-group instruction, and performing whole-group activities. The teacher observes and participates in these activities to acquire the information about each child’s progress and the child’s own thinking about what and how he or she is learning.

Collecting information is only a part of the teacher’s role. Interpreting and using the data are another responsibility. First, the teacher must obtain enough information to know the child’s abilities and needs so that appropriate planning can further growth and development. Second, the teacher must collect comprehensive information about each child so that all areas of development and learning are addressed. The teacher’s goal is to design and implement a program that is appropriate for the child’s physical, intellectual, and social development. Likewise, the program should be developmentally appropriate for all the children.

Meisels (2000) adds another dimension to the teaching role. The teacher’s role is transformed, in that the teacher’s approach to teaching is different in authentic learning and assessment. The teacher provides meaningful learning experiences that children would have never experienced otherwise. At the same time, the teacher empowers the children to learn more independently and spontaneously.

The challenges of the Common Core Standards (CCSS) have also raised the expectations that teachers will have to improve their teaching and assessment practices. Performance assessments themselves assist teachers to learn about the standards and gain the necessary tools to teach knowledge demanded by the CCSS (Darling-Hammond & Falk, 2013). Teachers gained the most expertise when “designing, scoring, and evaluating the results of the assessments” (p. 6). Darling-Hammond and Falk further explained as follows:

Researchers found that teachers scoring the assessments led to teachers working on instruction, which makes it excellent professional development. Examining and assessing students’ work helps teachers learn more about what the students know and can do, as well as what they think. Doing this in the context of standards and well-designed performance tasks stimulates teachers to consider their own curriculum and teaching. (p. 6)

Assessments that are consistent with a relationship of trust and authority between teachers and children also have a different approach. Early childhood educators should be aware of the following (Meisels, 2000):

• In an early childhood setting, it is essential to address yourself to the personal and unique attributes of the children in your care.

• You need to learn to listen, diagnose, examine, hypothesize, intervene, evaluate, and then reflect and redesign.

• Your goal should be to try to create a relationship of trust with children—one upon which learning is based. (p. 18)

Thus, in performance assessment, teaching, learning, and evaluation result from a partnership relationship between teacher and child. Moreover, the teacher uses performance assessment strategies to collaborate with children on the nature of their accomplishments and the next steps in their learning.

The teacher in the classroom described in the box feature about a pizza project is focusing on emerging literacy skills. The strategies that are being used for performance assessment are checklists, observations, videos, digital recordings, and work samples.

The teacher uses checklists to document reading and writing skills. Children drawing an illustration for a big book demonstrate their understanding between pictures and text. As children write menus for the “Pizza Hut,” the teacher can observe and document left-to-right skills in their writing skills or their use of uppercase and lowercase letters.

Observations with anecdotal notes can provide more detail about the process a child uses in reading or writing. A video or digital recording can document an entire episode. This type of documentation provides information on various children engaged in an activity that can be analyzed for assessment of what children can do.

Finally, work samples provide the teacher with specific evidence of accomplishment. In the classroom activities described in the scenario, the teacher would have work samples of big-book illustrations, menus, and a Pizza Hut sign for documentation of performance.

A Teacher’s Assessment Role in a Kindergarten Classroom

Upon entering the classroom of 5-year-olds, a buzz of activity captures the visitor’s attention. Children working in small groups are busily pursuing a number of activities. One group is drawing illustrations for the big book that the class wrote describing their trip to Pizza Hut. Another group is creating menus for the restaurant they are setting up in the dramatic play area. “Don’t forget to put ‘We have pepperoni’ on your menu,” one child says. The other children nod their heads and continue drawing and writing on their papers. One child is bent over a large sheet of construction paper, with marker in hand. He is carefully copying the words “Pizza Hut” from the word wall the children have created. When finished, he tapes the paper to two chairs he has placed in front of the dramatic area. “Here’s the sign,” he tells the others. Three other children are looking at a recipe book and discussing the “gredients” they will need to make the pizzas. Another group is looking at books about restaurants in the literacy corner.

Source: Ratcliff, N. J. (2001/2002). Using authentic assessment to document the emerging literacy skills of young children. Childhood Education, 78, 66–69.

Purposes for Performance-Based Assessment

What, then, are the purposes of using performance-based assessment with young children? First, the importance of measuring young children appropriately has been an ongoing theme in this text. Contrary to many of the standardized tests and more formal strategies that have been criticized as inappropriate to the young child’s development, performance assessments can be good tools for evaluating progress in development. Because they are designed to measure a child’s performance of a real or designed task or activity relevant to the desired learning, performance observations are directly related to the child’s development and achievement (Baldwin, Adams, & Kelly, 2009).

Second, performance assessments are integrally related to instruction. The performance activity is a natural outcome of ongoing curriculum and instruction and not a separate, unrelated type of experience that is unfamiliar to the child. When using performance-based evaluation, the classroom teacher needs to know how to design appropriate, related assessment tools, interpret assessment results to understand the child’s progress and plan for further instruction, and interpret performance assessment results to parents and administrators (Adamson & Darling-Hammond, 2010).

Finally, performance assessments are used to evaluate whether early education programs are meeting the needs of young students. Effective performance assessment tools help clarify the goals of preschool programs to provide developmental curriculum. Progress assessment reflects both individual developmental progress and the accomplishment of developmental program goals. The teacher then has the responsibility to report program accomplishments in a meaningful way to administrators (Adamson & Darling-Hammond, 2010; Caffrey, 2009).

In the next sections, we discuss the types of evaluation strategies that use performance assessments. Although most of the tools are selected or created by the teacher, others use examples of the child’s work. Both the teacher and the child plan some of the assessment activities, while others occur spontaneously when the teacher takes advantage of an ongoing activity or event to conduct an assessment.

All of the evaluation strategies discussed are adapted to the individual differences in children. Children who are ELLs may be assessed differently according to their progress in learning English. The child who cannot hear may be interviewed using sign language, while a child without vision may have many sensory materials included in the assessments. Directed assignments are modified according to the needs and abilities of each child. Likewise, contracts would reflect individual learning abilities, and games would be adapted to make it possible for children with special needs, including second-language needs, to participate.

Types of Performance-Based Assessments

Many strategies can be used to conduct performance-based assessments. Like checklists and observations, performance-based evaluation has been used for many decades; however, in this context, it may have a broadened purpose or a more comprehensive role as part of a system of evaluation. The assessment strategies appropriate for use with young children are interviews, contracts, directed assignments, games, work samples, projects, and portfolios.

Interviews

A teacher studies a child’s performance on tasks to understand progress.

Suzanne Clouzeau/Pearson

Teachers use interviews to find out what children understand about concepts. Interviews are especially appropriate for young children who are just beginning to develop literacy skills and cannot yet express themselves with a paper-and-pencil activity. The strategies followed in interviews complement the techniques used by Piaget to understand children’s thinking. By questioning and asking more questions based on children’s responses, Piaget determined not only what the child understood but also the thinking processes used to organize responses to the questions (Seefeldt, 2005). The Early Childhood Assessment Mathematics Manual produced by the New York City Board of Education (2009) described a mathematics interview as follows:

The mathematics interview is a rich assessment technique. The teacher asks the child to solve several mathematical tasks and to explain their thinking as they proceed. The teacher observes and questions the child. This gives the teacher access to how each child figures out particular mathematical problems. Each child’s understandings and current strategies can be identified as well as any misconceptions they may have. (p. 2)

Interviews can be described as unstructured , structured , or diagnostic . An unstructured interview can occur when children are playing, working in centers, or otherwise engaged in classroom activities. The teacher becomes aware that it is an opportune time to engage the child in an interview and takes a few minutes to question the child (Morrison, 2013).

Structured interviews are planned by the teacher and conducted to acquire specific understandings about the child. For example, the teacher might want to determine the beginning reader’s understanding of a story. After a reading of the story, the teacher asks probing questions to elicit the child’s thoughts about the meaning of the story. Likewise, concepts in mathematics can be assessed through a structured interview when the teacher asks oral questions about a concept or process and explores the child’s responses with further questions. Kamii and Rosenblum (1990) described an activity to determine the kindergarten child’s understanding of small addends by dropping beads into two glasses. The child was interviewed about the sum of the two groups of beads to assess the child’s progress in mental arithmetic.

Diagnostic interviews serve an additional purpose: to determine the child’s instructional needs. The interview may be informal or structured. The teacher’s questioning is directed more at understanding what kind of help the child needs through responses to questions. If the teacher notices that the child is confused or making errors, the diagnostic interview can reveal the difficulty the child is experiencing in thinking about the concept or skill.

Teachers can use several techniques to enhance the effectiveness of interviewing for assessment. In addition to taking notes when conducting an interview, teachers can make digital recordings of the child’s responses for later review. Seefeldt (2005) suggests that when interviewing children about a social studies concept, responses need not be limited to talking. The child could act out a concept, find an example of the concept in pictures, or draw the things he or she knows about the concept. These possibilities would be helpful for children who are native speakers of another language or otherwise have difficulty expressing themselves verbally.

Interviews with young children should be short. One tip is to limit interviews to 10 minutes. Other tips are (1) to continue questions after the child’s initial responses to find out more than whether the child’s response is correct and (2) to give the child plenty of time to think about and respond to the questions. The child needs to feel comfortable with the process if pertinent responses are to be elicited.

Contracts

Contracts serve a dual purpose. They provide a plan between the teacher and the child and a record of the child’s progress. Contracts of activities the child will engage in are designed for a period during a day, for the whole day, or for several days. Preschool children need pictures or other visual representations of activities to be completed. Primary-grade children can follow simple written instructions. After the child has completed an activity, some type of check-off system can be used to record the accomplishment.

A Structured Interview to Assess Classification Skills

Nykesha Hillmon’s kindergarten class has been studying classification skills. Over a period of weeks, Nykesha has conducted lessons on sorting objects into two groups by using the physical characteristics the objects have in common. The children have worked with the classification of nuts, rocks, and classroom plants. Today, Nykesha has placed an assortment of beans in the science center. She is interviewing Tyrone, who has been asked to make two groups of beans. As Tyrone is in the process of forming the groups, Nykesha begins the interview with questions she has planned earlier:

Nykesha: Tyrone, can you explain how you decided to make the two groups of beans?

Tyrone: Well, one group of beans is round. They are all round.

Nykesha: And the other group?

Tyrone: They are all the same as this one (lima bean). I don’t know what to call them.

Nykesha: Good. You have one group of beans that are round and another group of beans that have the same shape. You have made your groups by using their shape. Can you think of another way you could make two groups?

Tyrone: (After some hesitation) I could make groups of big ones and little ones.

Nykesha: Could you think of another way?

Tyrone: I don’t think so.

Nykesha: How about using their color?

Tyrone: Oh, yes. I could put the ones that have brown together, and the rest that don’t have brown together.

Contracts can also be used to record accomplishment of skills and concepts. The teacher and the child can use the contract as a guide for conferences and interviews or as a recording system for the teacher to indicate when the child has completed an objective or needs more opportunities to interact with a concept. Over a period of time, completed contracts can provide information on progress and accomplishments.

Directed Assignments

Directed assignments are an extension of teacher-designed assessments, discussed earlier. They are also similar to interviews, except that a specific task is involved in acquiring the child’s understanding, rather than an interview. Children who are beginning to read independently might be asked to read a story and discuss it. Preschool children might be asked to use concrete objects to solve a problem in mathematical thinking. The important point is that the teacher makes a specific assignment or task for the purposes of assessment. Discussion and questioning may be a part of the process, but the child’s ability to carry out the assignment is the focus of the assessment process (State of Connecticut State Board of Education, 2007).

Using Contracts to Assess Performance

Graciela, a second-grade student, is discussing her mathematics contract with her teacher, Luis Garza. Luis plans contracts with the students on Monday of each week and conducts conferences with the students throughout the week to monitor their progress. Graciela has worked on her contract for 2 days. Her contract on Monday and Tuesday included the following:

Monday:

1. Small-group lesson on subtraction

2. Center activity solving subtraction problems

3. Worksheet of subtraction problems

Tuesday:

1. Game with a partner solving subtraction problems

2. Subtraction worksheet

3. Conference with Mr. Garza

Luis discusses Graciela’s work to date. They review her work, which includes the worksheets and problems solved in the math center. Luis notices that Graciela has made several subtraction errors. He questions Graciela and then gives her blocks to help her to work out the subtraction problem. After she has described how she arrived at her answer, he tells her to work out the problem with the blocks again. After the conference, Luis makes a note to observe Graciela the following day to determine whether she needs further help with the subtraction process.

Games

Games can be used to understand children’s progress with a skill or a concept. Although more than one child may be playing a game at one time, the teacher can use observation to assess each child’s abilities and thinking. Kamii and Rosenblum (1990) suggest that the teacher use games for systematic observation of an entire class. Two children or a slightly larger group play the game until all the children have been assessed. The ability to make 10 with two numbers is one example of a skill that can be assessed through the child’s performance in a game. Cards from 1 to 9 are arranged in groups of nine at one time. The child shows all the pairs that can be combined to make 10. In addition to determining whether the child has mastered the skill, the teacher can observe the process the child uses to solve the problem. If the child arranges combinations quickly, a higher level of progress of mental addition has been achieved than that of a child who must count up from the first card to get the sum with the second card.

Games may be used for concepts and skills in other content areas and with very young children. For example, playing peek-a-boo with an older infant or toddler can inform the teacher about the child’s attention span, ability to maintain eye contact, and the appropriateness of his or her emotional reactions.

Over many decades, games have been developed for reading skills. Card games to identify letter knowledge are one ready example. Board games can be adapted or developed for language arts, mathematics, and social studies. A game similar to Trivial Pursuit, in which children must respond to an oral or a written question related to a topic being studied, is an example of how games can be used as an assessment activity to test the child’s ability to perform a task or solve a problem.

Work Samples

Teachers and children are equal participants in the use of work samples for performance assessment. Work samples are examples of all types of children’s work that can demonstrate the child’s developmental progress or accomplishments (Morrison, 2013). For preschool children, work samples may be clay models of animals that reflect the child’s understanding of concepts in a thematic study related to animals. Other work samples include paintings, emergent writing, and dictated interpretations of wordless books. Primary-grade children might have samples of book reports, creative writing that has been illustrated, and work pages of computation problems. Other media, such as photographs, videos and digital recordings on electronic tablets or computers, might be used.

Digital cameras and electronic tablets are especially useful for this purpose. They can be used to document children’s work, as well as serving as a mechanism for transferring work into an electronic form. When classes engage in project work, photographic samples can be made of the project’s progress from the beginning to the end of the topic being studied.

Work samples are often included in discussions about portfolios because portfolios become the means through which work samples and other types of information related to performance assessment are stored. A system for selecting and organizing work samples is important if the collection is to serve appropriately for performance assessment (Meisels, 2010).

Assessing Progress with Games

Joan Harrison, a first-grade teacher, is using a board game to assess reading words. The purpose of the game is to assess children’s knowledge of words that have been used in reading activities. Each student has an individual bank of words from books he or she has read. Kim Soo and Martha are playing the game. The children take turns drawing a word card. If they name the word correctly, they can advance one square on the board. The first child to reach the end wins the game. Words that are missed are put in a separate pile, and Joan notes them in her notebook so that she can work with the words in small-group activities.

Projects

A project is an activity conducted by a child or a group of children that is lengthier than a classroom activity conducted during a single class period. The project can be part of a unit of study, such as a science or social studies unit, or part of a theme that is studied by a class. A product of some type results from the project. For example, a second-grade class may study spring wildflowers. A group of students may gather samples of the flowers, identify them, and describe their characteristics. Each flower is dried and attached to the completed information. The completed booklet of wildflowers becomes the product of the project that could be evaluated.

Projects are flexible in terms of meeting student needs. Children with limited English skills may engage in projects that expand language while working with new concepts. Student interests are a part of the project; therefore, different groups may vary in how they conduct a project. For children with disabilities, a project approach can be used to tailor learning opportunities according to a child’s abilities and needs.

Portfolios

The portfolio was one of the most popular methods of documenting authentic assessment in the 1990s. In looking for alternatives to standardized tests, drill worksheets, and other assessment measures that reflect skills development rather than developmental progress evolving from the student’s own demonstrations of performance, school districts across the United States have implemented portfolios as a preferred type of reporting performance-based evaluation. Some states have initiated the use of portfolios in early childhood education programs (Illinois State Board of Education, 2012).

Portfolios are a process or method whereby student performance information can be stored and interpreted. Portfolios may be a folder very similar to collections of student work that many teachers have used for decades for reporting to parents. They may contain examples of papers that students have completed, as well as checklists, anecdotal records, summary reports for a grading period, and any other materials that students and teachers think are relevant to demonstrate the student’s performance (Morrison, 2013).

Portfolios may also be the vehicle used for assessing and reporting the student’s progress and accomplishments to parents and administrators. How portfolios are designed and used will be discussed in Chapter 10.

Classification and Organization of Performance Assessments

Although all performance assessments are considered informal measures, they can be categorized as structured or unstructured and direct or indirect. These organizational patterns are similar to structured and unstructured interviews but are more comprehensive in the types of assessments that are included.

One approach to categorizing assessments is by the type of activity used for assessment. Unstructured (or nonstructured) performance assessments are those that are part of regular classroom learning activities, such as writing samples, projects, checklists, and teacher-designed tasks and tests. Structured performance assessments are predetermined or designed to include questions or tasks that require problem solving, synthesis, and analysis. Questions are open ended, and all students are administered the questions through similar test administration procedures.

Another perspective of the two classifications is as spontaneous or structured. Similar to Lee’s definition, spontaneous assessments evolve from the teacher’s natural day-to-day interactions and observations in the classroom. Structured performance assessment is not only planned but also must meet the standards for reliability and validity required of standardized measurement instruments. Such assessments are carefully designed and have specified scoring criteria, as well as well-defined behaviors that are to be measured.

Performance assessments can also be classified as direct or indirect. Direct performance measures require students to use knowledge in some type of application; indirect performance measures measure what students know about a topic (Stiggins, 2008). An example of an indirect measure is a paper-and-pencil test. An example of a direct measure is taking measurements of a table to determine how large to make a tablecloth to fit the table. The distinction between these performance measures is assessing knowledge versus assessing application of knowledge.

The Role of Observation

Strategies for observation were discussed in Chapter 5, and the importance of using observation to evaluate the development of young children was emphasized. A discussion of the role of observation within performance assessments reinforces that importance. When considering the measurement of the young child’s performance, observation is the most effective strategy (Frost, Wortham, & Reifel, 2008; Jablon, 2010/2011; Reifel, 2011). Observation behaviors such as attending, examining, heeding, considering, investigating, monitoring, studying, and watching enable the teacher to understand and know the child and what the child can do in real-life circumstances and common learning situations (Jablon, 2010/2011).

Observation should occur throughout the day in all types of classroom activities. Strategies for observation, including anecdotal records, running records, observation with checklists and rating scales, and time and event sampling, can all have a role in performance assessment. To ensure that the desired performance is observed and recorded, the following components should be determined prior to conducting the observation:

• Purpose—What do we want to know?

• Main Emphasis—Who or what is being observed? What behaviors might be exhibited? Why is the observation needed?

• Method of Documentation—What information is needed? How will it be recorded? How frequently?

• Use of the Observation—How will observation results be used? What next steps would be taken to further the child’s development?

Gathering and documenting information through observation is not enough. Analysis and use of assessment data must also be facilitated as a result of the observation. Therefore, the child should be observed at different times and places and using different materials before determining whether new knowledge has been developed (Frost, Wortham, & Reifel, 2008). In addition, teachers should spend time reflecting on the information that has been gathered. The purpose of this reflection is so that teachers will use assessment in an intentional manner to plan for children’s future learning opportunities. To properly collect and reflect on observation data, teachers might include planning for observations with individual children and groups of children. After data is collected and analyzed, teachers can plan for future instruction based on their findings.

Observation is the foundation of performance assessment. It is used with interviews when the teacher observes the child’s responses and behaviors. It is integral to directed assignments as the teacher observes the child completing the assignment or task. Observation enables the teacher to understand the child’s thinking and knowledge when engaging in assessment games. Observation complements other strategies used for unstructured and structured and direct and indirect performance assessments. Finally, checklists, rating scales, and teacher-designed assessments of various types incorporate observation as part of or all of the process of understanding the child’s performance (Baldwin et al., 2009).

The Role of Documentation

The term documentation has been used throughout this text to mean a method of recording a child’s progress or accomplishments. Thus, observation, checklists, rating scales, and rubrics can document development and learning, as can assessments related to mastery learning.

Documenting Infant Development

Sugar is 6 months old. She is in the infant room in a corporate-sponsored child-care center near a large insurance company. Her parents both work for the company.

Caregivers at the center observe the children daily. They are tracing the infant’s development toward developmental milestones. Sugar recently learned to roll over. She is now enjoying rolling over frequently during her periods of play. Now she is developing the skills to be able to sit up by herself. She is in the process of using her arms to lift her upper body to an upright position. Each day, the caregiver notes what actions Sugar uses to learn to sit. These will be reported to the parents at the end of the day. When Sugar is consistent in being able to move to a sitting position, she will have reached another physical milestone. The caregivers and parents will have a chronological documentation of this stage of Sugar’s development.

In the context of performance assessment, documentation can take a broader meaning, particularly when it is linked to an early childhood program and child-centered or constructivist learning experiences. In Reggio Emilia schools (Wurm, 2005) and early childhood programs using the Project Approach (Helm & Beneke, 2003), the curriculum is child initiated. Although teachers have a major role in preparing curriculum, what is to be learned is not predetermined. Rather, as projects proceed in both programs, children’s ideas and questions for exploration take the work in more than one direction or are expanded from the original plan. Documentation in these curriculum approaches is a process of documenting the progress of the activities to better understand the children’s interests, thinking, and problem solving within their activities (Wien, 2011). A major purpose of observation and videos, digital photographs, and children’s work is to note how children reacted to experiences and to record the chronological progress of a period of work (Wurm, 2005). The displays and sharing of work at the end of a project is a culminating activity. Displays of the work accomplished by the child serve as documentation of what was accomplished that can be shared with parents, other teachers, and students in the school or preschool program. A child’s diary is used as an example of documentation of a child’s progress in a Reggio Emilia school (Edwards & Rinaldi, 2009).

The Role of Rubrics

In Chapter 6, rubrics were described as being essential to performance assessment. Different types of rubrics were defined and the process used to develop rubrics was discussed. Examples of different kinds of rubrics were provided to demonstrate their flexibility and adaptability to different developmental stages and content areas in preschool and primary grades. In this section, it might be helpful to reemphasize why rubrics are essential for performance assessment. Checklists, rating scales, and teacher-designed assessments tend to focus on whether a developmental milestone or skill has been achieved or how well it has been achieved. Performance assessments, on the contrary, focus on process and progress in development and learning. Teachers must be grounded in how children develop as well as how children use emerging mental processes to acquire knowledge and new concepts. Rubrics provide the framework to assess processes of learning that focus on child-initiated accomplishments. The assessment strategies discussed earlier in the chapter—interviews, contracts, directed assignments, games, work samples, portfolios, and projects—can be used with rubrics. (See Chapter 7 for examples of rubrics.)

For example, Figure 7-7 (see page 179) can be used in structured interviews. The teacher may read a story to the class and then interview children individually to discuss the story. By asking questions such as “What happened (to a character) in the story?” or “Can you tell me the story in your own words?” the teacher can assess comprehension of text in an emerging reader.

Likewise, a kindergarten teacher can use Figure 7-8 for a developmental assessment using work samples or a directed assignment. The teacher can use children’s writing efforts to assess progress in the emerging ability to write.

When working with children who engage in thematic projects, the teacher may use the following range of four points or levels to establish the structure of a rubric to evaluate the projects:

• Begin again

• Revision needed

• Acceptable

• Well done

For example, a kindergarten class may study the topic of “homes.” After investigating different types of homes in the surrounding neighborhood, small groups select a type of home to study. Construction of a model of a type of home is the task of small groups to represent what they have learned. The teacher designs the following rubric to establish performance standards:

1. Begin again

Group is unable to initiate task.

Teacher redirection is needed to initiate an appropriate approach.

Initial efforts show little evidence of understanding the task.

2. Revision needed

Project work is incomplete; needs elaboration.

Project does not reflect the information learned.

Additional planning is needed to achieve the desired results.

3. Acceptable

Project is completed.

Project reflects the purpose of the task, although details and elements are missing.

Information about the project could be expressed more clearly.

4. Well done

Project shows clear understanding of the concepts learned.

Project fully accomplishes the purposes of the task.

Project includes details and elements essential to communicate learned information.

This rubric is generic in that it can be applied to different types of thematic studies. Although it can be applied to projects reflecting the study of homes, it can also be adapted to other projects and topics. It can be simplified or made more detailed as circumstances indicate.

Standards and Performance-Based Assessment

How do state standards for early childhood affect authentic learning and performance-based strategies? Because standards for learning achievement might be linked to mandated standardized tests for accountability in public education and Head Start programs, many educators may assume that authentic learning and authentic assessment are not compatible with mastering state standards. There has been much information on documenting achievement and accountability through such testing, but performance assessment should not be overlooked as the major tool in verifying what children have learned. Performance assessment is particularly important for understanding development in the early childhood years.

To link standards and performance-based assessments, teachers must understand how standards are integrated into the curriculum and how assessment emerges from the implementation of learning experiences. Meeting standards is accomplished by making them a part of best practices rather than as a separate part of the curriculum.

Connecting Standards to Authentic Learning

The first step in linking standards with performance assessments is to connect standards to the curriculum. The task is to develop a relationship between the standards and best practices for young children in quality early childhood programs. Child-centered learning in an environment rich with opportunities for a variety of activities, both indoors and outdoors can be used to address standards (Baldwin et al., 2009; Drew, Christie, Johnson, Meckley, & Nell, 2008).

One approach is to relate state standards to content areas in the curriculum. Teachers study the standards and match them to the instructional activities planned for the children. The content areas of the curriculum and the standards are organized so that the relationship is mapped out for the teachers.

FIGURE 9-1 Planning web correlated with standards

Source: Baldwin, J. L., Adams, S. M., & Kelly, M. K. (2009). Science at the center: An emergent standards-based, child-centered framework for early learners. Early Childhood Education Journal, 37, 71–77. Reprinted with permission of Springer, p. 75.

If curriculum is planned within projects or the study of topics, the state standards are analyzed and matched to the topic being planned (Jacobs & Crowley, 2010). One way to chart the relationship is to use a curriculum web for a topic or project. Figure 9-1 shows a planning web for a study of frogs with the content standards to be addressed (Baldwin et al., 2009).

Connecting Standards to Performance Assessment

Assessment related to standards incorporates all of the strategies that have been discussed in this book, and especially in this chapter. Whatever type of assessment is used is matched to a standard or several standards. Evidence of a child’s accomplishments in activities planned for a project is also evaluated based on applicable state standards. Figure 9-2 shows an example of assessment of a child’s performance based on the teacher’s observation, the child’s explanation, and the standards in science that were addressed. The teacher maintains a child-centered, developmentally appropriate classroom, an integrated curriculum, and performance assessment that has a direct relationship with state standards (Baldwin et al., 2009).

Learning is a process, and children experience many learning activities before they accomplish a standard. Authentic performance assessments conducted over a period of time demonstrate the child’s path to learning (Gronlund, 2006). Moreover, because advances in development are of primary importance in the early years, performance assessments are the best indicators of progress toward meeting early childhood standards.

FIGURE 9-2 Standards correlated to anecdotal observation

Source: Baldwin, J. L., Adams, S. M., & Kelly, M. K. (2009). Science at the center: An emergent standards-based, child-centered framework for early learners. Early Childhood Education Journal, 37, 71–77. Reprinted with permission of Springer, p. 76.

As discussed earlier in the chapter, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are the most recent effort to improve student learning. The standards are intended to serve as a national approach to learning that will replace individual state standards. The CCSS have been adopted by a majority of the states, but concerns about the rigor of the standards have caused some states to question the move. Nevertheless, the higher standards required by CCSS encourage the use of performance assessments both as training for teachers, and to accomplish problem solving and creative thinking on the part of the students (Darling-Hammond & Falk, 2013; Darling-Hammond & Hyler, 2013).

Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Performance-Based Assessment

Advantages of Using Performance-Based Assessment

Performance-based evaluation for assessment of young children has definite advantages. Although performance assessment is recommended for children of all ages, it is particularly suitable for children in preoperational and concrete operational stages of development. Because young children learn best by acting on the environment, it logically follows that assessment that permits the child to demonstrate ability by performing some action is most compatible with developmental capabilities. Performance assessments, then, are fitting for the development of children in the early childhood years. Some arguments for using performance assessments for evaluation are the following:

1. Performance assessments are conducted in the context of what children are experiencing, rather than in isolation from classroom curriculum. In addition, they are conducted within the teacher’s knowledge of families and what is authentic to them. Assessments are adapted to differences in language, culture, and ability. Earlier in the chapter, it was recommended that assessment be an integral part of curriculum and instruction. Whenever possible, performance assessments are conducted as part of a lesson, during center activities, or serendipitously when the teacher observes desired learning demonstrated spontaneously. Performance assessments are meaningful and timely (Meisels, 2014).

2. Performance assessments take advantage of the premise that children construct their own understanding. Early childhood educators today prepare curriculum activities with the comprehension that the teacher does not transmit knowledge; instead, the child gradually forms or produces new knowledge through repeated encounters with concepts and information. Performance assessment provides the teacher with tools to observe and document the child’s progress. This provision means that assessment goes beyond assessing whether the child has mastered the teacher’s learning objectives. The child’s progress toward mastery using Vygotsky’s (1983) zone of proximal development can also be evaluated. The zone described by Vygotsky refers to the variability between what the child can currently do and what the child can master potentially in the future. The teacher can determine whether the child is unable to demonstrate an ability or understanding, whether the child can show some of the desired behaviors with assistance, or whether the child can perform independently. Also, the focus of the assessment is on the child, and not on the child’s responding to the teacher. The teacher still plays a major role in the assessment, but the child’s performance is the key and the teacher responds to what the child is doing. Moreover, performance-based assessments serve as a model for what teachers should be teaching as well as what children should be learning (Lai, 2011).

3. Performance assessments provide a variety of means whereby the child can demonstrate what he or she understands or can do. The child’s ongoing work examples, art products, play, conversations, emergent writing, and dictated stories are a few examples of ways that children can perform. Some of the performances can be recorded as a result of the teacher’s observation or interviews, whereas others can be documented by work samples. Because assessment is integrated with instruction and daily activities, the possibilities for observing and interpreting accomplishments are almost unlimited.

4. Performance assessment is continuous or ongoing. Unlike more formal assessments such as tests, end-of-chapter assessments, and reporting-period evaluations, performance assessments reflect daily opportunities to be aware of the child’s thinking and work. They provide extended performances over time rather than during grading periods (Lai, 2011).

5. Performance assessments provide meaningful information for parents to understand their child’s progress and accomplishments. The information is more in-depth than in more traditional assessments (Meisels, 2014). They also enable parents to contribute to and participate in the assessment process. Teachers can use performance assessments of all types in parent conferences. Because teachers have visited the homes and are familiar with the parent (see Chapter 10), they can adapt the conferences to be most meaningful for the parents. Likewise, parents can become more aware of behaviors their child is using at home that demonstrate developmental advancement and share their observations with the teacher. Once parents understand the significance of the child’s activities and their relationship to development and learning, they can be partners with the teacher and child in facilitating opportunities for the child.

Meisels (2014) summarized the benefits of performance assessment for teachers of young children. The teacher should be able to:

• Recognize that children can express what they know and can do it in many different ways

• Evaluate progress as well as performance

• Evaluate the whole child

• Involve children in the process of assessing their own growth

• Establish a framework for observing children that is consistent with the principles of child development

• Contribute to meaningful curriculum planning and the design of developmentally appropriate educational interventions

• Give parents specific, direct and understandable information about their child

• Collaborate with other teachers, thus enhancing their own professional skills (p. 2)

Disadvantages of Using Performance-Based Assessment

Performance assessments have disadvantages or limitations. Like all other informal assessments, they are subjective; teacher bias and interpretation are part of the process. Teachers must be constantly alert to the need for objectivity when evaluating young children. Also, performance assessments increase the responsibility and accountability of the teacher in administering and interpreting evaluations. This opportunity for more meaningful assessments is accompanied by the need for teachers to be skilled in the assessment process.

Although some of the strategies used to evaluate children in performance assessments are not new, the approach as the primary means to assess and give grades to students is considered an innovation. Like any educational innovation, problems and difficulties can cause teachers and administrators to become disenchanted with the process and to doubt the effectiveness of the practice. This is the case with the current concerns about the Common Core State Standards. Therefore, it is important to be aware of and understand the implications and limitations of performance assessment, as well as the benefits. Following are some of the concerns that measurement specialists propose about the use of performance assessments:

1. Performance assessments are time consuming. Teachers need time to conduct observations, record data, and interpret information in planning future instruction. All performance assessments require extensive involvement of the teacher. Record keeping adds to paperwork responsibilities; moreover, teachers must consider how to fit assessment into otherwise busy days. Teachers must develop the ability to do several things at once and to keep up with reflection on information and ideas they gain from studying the child’s performance activities. For example, the teacher can keep a notepad handy to jot down notes during the course of the day. Assessments can be made using observation in the course of teaching lessons to note which children are consistently accurate and which students are struggling with a concept. During project work, the teacher can observe children’s actions and note advances in physical and language development. All of these methods are integrated into the school day, making specific assessment activities needed less often.

2. Authentic assessment can be more complex than more traditional types of assessment. Because assessment is integrated into instruction, teachers must clearly understand what they are looking for in assessment. Assessment with young children might be interdisciplinary or measure more than one type of development when it is a part of integrated curriculum and child-centered activities. The teacher must determine explicit standards of performance for development and learning objectives, no matter how incidental or integrated the assessment process is. The more complex and integrated the curriculum is, the more difficult the performance assessment process will be in terms of interpreting the implications of the child’s performance. A related issue is in scoring performance assessments. A common concern is who will determine the quality of performance assessments when they are used for grading or state-level evaluations. A related issue is the possibility of rater error (Givens, 1997; Lai, 2011).

3. More traditional forms of assessment have had the goal of evaluating the child’s achievement. Performance assessment has the goal of evaluating progress as well as achievement. Teachers may have difficulty incorporating this new role of understanding the child’s progress and implications for curriculum planning for that child. Teachers must not only develop new competencies in acquiring assessment information but also become more competent in using progress information to further the child’s development. Teachers may find this requirement very confusing and be uncertain about how skillfully and appropriately they are using performance assessments (Adamson & Darling-Hammond, 2010; Caffrey, 2009).

4. There are also concerns about the validity and reliability of performance assessments. Early childhood assessment tools must be developmentally appropriate, valid, reliable, and user friendly. As described in the previous section, the difficulty of using performance assessments would raise doubts about how user friendly they are. To be valid, the tools must correlate with concurrent measures being used to assess young children. Likewise, assessments should be internally consistent and assessed similarly by various assessors. Informal procedures used in performance assessments must provide evidence of validity, reliability, objectivity, and freedom from bias if they are to be considered feasible (Darling-Hammond & Hyler, 2013).

5. Parental involvement and education are a requirement when implementing performance-based evaluation. Parents are familiar with traditional evaluation and reporting practices. School districts must plan to educate and prepare parents before moving into performance assessments. Parents need to be knowledgeable and comfortable with how the innovative assessment process is used before they encounter it in their child’s grade report or in a parent–teacher conference. Unfamiliar terminology and assessment procedures can cause a lack of confidence in and support for the school and teachers.

Most of the disadvantages and limitations discussed previously seem to be related to proper preparation and training for performance assessments. Too often in the past, schools have embraced and implemented curriculum and instruction innovations without training teachers and administrators properly. Some of the authors cited in this chapter consistently discuss the need for extensive training and preparation prior to using new performance assessments. As with any other change or new approach to curriculum or assessment, adequate training and knowledge about performance assessments can do much to ensure that they will be a successful and appropriate alternative for the assessment of young children. Because performance assessments inherently have the potential to measure young children’s development and learning in a realistic and meaningful way, the limitations can become either difficult obstacles or perceptive cautions that can be used to facilitate the appropriate and skilled use of new tools.

Quality performance assessments are part of a quality assessment system. In the United States today, a comprehensive system is important to prepare for the implementation of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) at national and state levels. At the early childhood level, the Rhode Island Department of Education and the National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment, Inc. (n.d.) proposes that: “Assessments include a variety of different methods that allow children to demonstrate evidence of learning and can range from observations, student writing samples, performance tasks, to large scale standardized tests” (p. 2). Further, “A well-constructed comprehensive assessment system provides continuous, coherent, and high-quality information on student performance that teachers, school leaders, and district and state administrators could use to improve teaching and learning…(Rhode Island Department of Education & the National Center for the Improvement of Education Assessment, Inc., n.d., p. 4). This approach to assessment in early childhood programs is consistent with practices for appropriate assessment first supported in the 1990s and now advocated for all levels of education in the new century. Performance assessment was neglected with the focus on standardized tests in recent decades; however, it is now a key to reaching the higher goals set for Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) initiated the development of the Common Core State Standards. Author Linda Darling-Hammond (2010) proposed a comprehensive student assessment system to meet the principles of CCSS to be addressed at state and district levels. In a paper written for CCSSO, Darling-Hammond used examples of high-achieving educational systems both in the United States and beyond to provide a framework for assessment systems addressing CCSS. Darling-Hammond (2010) characterized high-achieving systems as ones that, “Seek to implement their standards with assessments that measure performance in authentic ways and with intensive teacher engagement process as teachers work with others to develop, review, score, and use the results of assessments” (p. 2).

Earlier in this text on assessment in early childhood education characteristics of quality for individual components of performance assessment were discussed. High-quality components of performance are then combined to design a comprehensive assessment.

Summary

The word “perform” is a key to understanding performance assessments. A child performs or demonstrates what is understood and what the child can do with that knowledge. In traditional assessments the child shows understanding of knowledge. In performance assessments the child is able to apply what has been learned.

In this chapter we discussed the merits of performance assessment as a process that deepens understanding of the child’s learning. We have discussed performance-based evaluation as an alternative or authentic method of assessing young children.

A number of methods or strategies can be used to evaluate a child’s development or learning through performance of what he or she understands and can do. Interviews, contracts, directed assignments, games, work samples, projects, and portfolios are among the assessment activities that permit young children to demonstrate their ability to understand and apply new skills and information.

Performance assessments complement each other in how they focus on the child’s progress and accomplishments. In addition, informal assessment methods, such as observation, checklists and rating scales, and teacher-designed assessments, are used in the process of assessing through performance.

Performance assessment transfers responsibility to teachers for the instructional and assessment process. This empowerment of the teacher facilitates the teacher’s opportunity to design assessment that includes all areas of development and that is appropriate for the level of development of each child. It also allows the teacher to make a close connection between curriculum and evaluation. It also permits the teacher to consider learning and assessment within the family backgrounds of the children. Knowing that performance assessment should be meaningful, the teacher interacts with the family and home frequently to understand what type of performance is suitable for individual students.

Although performance assessment is more relevant and appropriate than traditional formal methods of measuring learning, it can also be more difficult. Teachers must accept the time that is needed to organize and conduct this type of evaluation; moreover, they must overcome limitations related to validity, reliability, and accountability. Care must be exercised in planning and implementing performance assessment if it is not to become an educational fad that fades after a few years.

Recent years have brought changing expectations for evaluating learning under the Common Core of State Standards (CCSS). The Common Core is the first effort to establish national standards that can be applied in any state. The Common Core requires a more rigorous curriculum and assessment. The standards bring a new meaning to performance assessments. Teachers must learn how to instruct, assess, and interpret what the student has learned. Through working with this process, the teacher develops a deeper understanding of levels of performance and how they are graded.

Key Terms

authentic achievement 214

authentic learning 214

authentic assessment 214

authentic performance assessment 214

contract 219

diagnostic interview 219

directed assignment 220

direct performance measure 224

game 221

indirect performance measure 224

interview 218

performance-based assessment 217

portfolio 223

project 223

structured interview 219

structured performance assessment 224

unstructured interview 219

unstructured performance assessment 223

work sample 222

Selected Organizations

Search for the following organizations online:

Association for Childhood Education International

Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD)

National Association for the Education of Young Children

Springer

Zero to Three

References

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