Performance Assessments
Tests provide one limited way to assess your students' mastery of concepts and content.
They typically put the students under time constraints and rely on some level of memorization. They also inhibit creativity by forcing students to respond in the narrow confines of multiple choice, short answer, or essay.
To some extent these are necessary evils - but that's not to say that you can't alternate them with assessments that appeal to a different variety of students.
Performance assessments give students a chance to use their creativity and their talents to show that they've grasped the necessary concepts. The normal routine of question and answer is replaced by problematic prompt and creative response - with the student performing a sketch, creating a story, or delivering a speech.
The methods included in the "Performance Assessment" section are various ideas and suggestions for alternative assessments. This is far from an exhaustive list, but hopefully the articles can spark your own creativity and give you some guidelines for implementing these in your own classroom.
Featured Article: Comedy Skits
Some students are natural comedians. They were born to grace the screens of SNL or Mad TV. Unfortunately for them, they're still stuck in your class.
Writing and performing a skit can be a great task for creative and outgoing students. Coming up with a script takes a lot of creative thought, while performing the skit helps build confidence and communication skills.
This can be a great short activity to express the meaning of some vocabulary words, or it could be a culminating project for a Social Studies unit. Once you set the guidelines, the limit is your students' creativity. Check out the full article: Comedy Skits.
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