What is Authentic Assessment?
Authentic assessment occurs when the task set requires students to apply skills learnt to real world situations that occur outside the classroom. This might occur as a formative assessment (allows students to use their skills and teachers to assess comprehension and understanding during the learning process) or as a summative assessment (evaluates learning at the end of an instructional unit). Authentic assessment allows students to demonstrate knowledge as well as skills such as problem solving, creativity and critical thinking. This is a student driven process and asks students to create a product that responds to real world issues.
Authentic tasks…
* Test more than students’ ability to recall and reproduce factual knowledge.
* Connect with what students might be doing outside their classroom either presently in their family or community or in their future as high school graduates.
* Applies core knowledge learnt in order to solve complex problems.
* Requires students to learn and develop high level skills such as critical thinking, creativity and problem solving.
What are some examples of Authentic Assessment?
At UTS?
* Engineering students work in teams to address questions of social responsibility and communicate their idea to a panel of industry people
* Law students have an open book exam in which they have 24 hours to produce a brief for a client
* First year architecture and building students design an outdoor kitchen. They begin by observing real sites and then creating a drawing model for their own specific site
* First year physics students test equipment such as vacuum cleaner’s and TVs for Choice Magazine.
In NSW Schools?
* At Bankstown Girls High School, students design developmentally appropriate toys for kids at a local preschool and present to them for feedback
* At Granville Boys High School, students build mini F1 motorcars. Feedback came from UTS engineers and students raced in FI competition
* At Oberon High School, students develop marketing resources to promote local rock formations and displayed them in the local tourism office
* In one NSW school, students learned about algebra and geometry by developing their own lanterns and auctioning them for charity
What authentic assessment are you doing in your school? Go to the contribute or inspire others page and share on our blog what you are doing in your classroom!