Assessment Made Visible: Individual and Collective Practices

Abstract

In this article I argue that by connecting assessment to learning and instruction and by enacting assessment as a collective practice we can see new opportunities for learning. The concept of mediated action and the notion of a collective zone of proximal development are used to theorize assessment. Two cases are included to support and make empirically visible the conceptual argument. The first case involves student teachers who assess exam papers in an online environment. The second case involves peer-group assessment among learners in an upper secondary school. Through the conceptual argument and the supporting cases assessment emerges as a practice involving process as well as product and a practice in which learning, teaching, and assessment are mutually constitutive of learners' development. Finally, some implications for practice are discussed, including some challenges related to the tension between individual and collective approaches.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The writing of this article is supported by the strategic research effort Competence and Media Convergence (CMC) at the University of Oslo. For more information about CMC, see http://cmc.uio.no/. I thank Ingvill Rasmussen and Sten Ludvigsen at InterMedia, the University of Oslo, for constructive critique as this text progressed. I also thank the two anonymous reviewers and the editor for their valuable suggestions.

Notes

¹All names have been changed. All text is kept as in the original.

²All names have been changed. All text is translated from Norwegian.

³At the national exam in English, June 2005, eight learners from the foundation course were selected (by game of chance as is the custom in Norway) to sit for an oral exam of the group variant described previously. Compared to the learners' grades attained through classwork and tests over the year, exam grades decided by an external assessor showed the following: two learners moved from 5 to 6, one moved from 4 to 5 and one remained at 5, three moved from 3 to 5, and one moved from 3 to 4. In other words, this reflects a substantial improvement on learners' grades. This serves as an indication of the validity of peer group assessment activity.