Designing tasks for alternative assessment
Successful use of alternative assessment depends on using performance tasks that let students demonstrate what they can actually do with language. Fortunately, many of the activities that take place in communicative classrooms lend themselves to this type of assessment. These activities replicate the kinds of challenges, and allow for the kinds of solutions, that learners would encounter in communication outside the classroom.
The following criteria define authentic assessment activities:
They are built around topics or issues of interest to the students
They replicate real-world communication contexts and situations
They involve multi-stage tasks and real problems that require creative use of language rather than simple repetition
They require learners to produce a quality product or performance
Their evaluation criteria and standards are known to the student
They involve interaction between assessor (instructor, peers, self) and person assessed
They allow for self-evaluation and self-correction as they proceed