We are returning now to some final thoughts about improving your classroom practice. Assessment for Learning (AFL) is a recent UK initiative which bears directly on your teaching. If you're an experienced teacher wanting to revitalise your work, AFL might be a good place to look. Your assessment practice might be over-settled, and having another think about what assessment is for is a way of shining a light on your teaching in general. The name of the initiative puts assessment in its place-it exists to support learning, nor simply to judge or report on it. It has been embraced by many as a way of doing more creative and varied things with assessment (peer assessment, self-assessment, and so on) and, while this is a good thing, and certainly better than nothing, it really only works when you're clear about the essential link between assessment and pupils' progress, and how this is driving the choices you're making. The process of 'marking' is in fact a complex mixture of activities with a range of functions and processes; it will help if you unpick this, and try to revisit some underlying principles. Let's consider some of these functions. As a teacher, you assess to gather information about the standard of pupils' work, perhaps to compare it with national expectations or with other pupils in the school. You may have to publish such information and comparisons to a range of different audiences. Perhaps your colleagues require diagnostic information. Perhaps parents want to know how things are going. Perhaps the