Walking Our Talk About Assessment With Preservice Teachers

Abstract

In this reflective study, six members of a Faculty of Education implemented or adapted research-informed assessment practices in their university Bachelor of Education teaching. These practices included aligning university course outcomes to assessment, separating achievement on university course outcomes from achievement of non-academic outcomes, collaboratively creating achievement indicators for provincial curriculum outcomes, co-constructing criteria with university students for assignments, setting up opportunities with university students for peer feedback before an assignment is submitted for marking, and administering and marking a test according to research-suggested practices. This article describes the implementation of these practices and analyzes the challenges and successes experienced as these teacher educators strove to model assessment practices that are expected of preservice teachers when they enter the profession. The primary goal of implementation was to increase congruence between teaching and practice in terms of assessment. Keywords: assessment; preservice teacher learning; self-study