Aligning Assessments to Mastery Learning Objectives
The specific tasks or procedures you use in an assessment should require the student to display the skill or knowledge stated in the learning objective. For instance, if the main intent of your learning objective is for a student to build an apparatus, write a poem, or perform a physical skill, your assessment procedure must give the student the opportunity to perform. Assessment procedures that require a student only to name the parts of an apparatus, to analyze an existing poem, or to describe the sequence of steps needed for performing a physical skill do not require the performance stated in these learning objectives. Therefore, they would be invalid for assessing them: They are not aligned to the learning objectives’ main intents. A very basic requirement for the validity of classroom assessment procedures is that the assessment procedures should be aligned with the intentions of the specific learning objectives that you include in your assessment plan.