Assessment is viewed as the process of collecting information with the purpose of making decisions about students.

Rowntree (1974) in Measurement and evaluation OUM modul (prof dr john arul Phillips (2012) views assessment as human encounter in which one person interacts with another directly or indirectly with the purpose of obtaining and interpreting information about the knowledge, understanding, abilities and attitudes possessed by the person. For example, based on assessment information, we can determine whether Ali needs special classes to assist him in developing reading skills or whether Abu who was identified as dyslexic needs special attention. So the key words in the defination of assessment is collecting data and making decisions. However, to make decisions, one has to evaluate, which is the process of making judgement about given situation. When we evaluate, we are saying that something good, appropriate, valid, positive and so forth. To make an evaluation, we need information, and it is obtained by measuring using a reliable instrument. In the context of education, assessment is perfomed to gain an understanding of an individuals strengths and weakness in order to make appropriate educational decisions. Salvia and Ysseldyke (1995) state the best educational decisions are based on information, and better decisions are usually based on more information. Based on the reasons for assessment provided by Harlen (1978) and Deale (1975) two main reasons may be identified are assessment to help learning and assessment to improve teaching. Regarding learning process, assessment is aimed at providing information that will help make decisions concerning remediation, enrichment, selection, exceptionality, progress and certification. With regarding to the teaching, assessment is provides information regarding achievement of objectives, the effectiveness of teaching methods and learning materials.

PURPOSE OF ASSESSMENT

To help Learning

To Held Teaching

TO HELP LEARNING Diagnostic assessment is performed at the beginning of a lesson or unit for a particular subject area to assess student readiness and background for what is about to be taught. This pre instructional assessment is when you decide that you need information on a student, group of students or a whole class before you can proceed with the most effective instruction. For example, you can administer a Reading Test to year one students to assess their reading level. Based on the information, you may want to assign weak readers for special intervention or remedial action. Alternatively, the tests may reveal that some students are reading at an extremely high level and you may want to recommend that they be assigned to an enrichment program. Assessment is also conducted to make decisions on exceptionality. Based on the information obtained from assessment, teacher may make decisions as to whether a particular student needs to be assigned to a class with exceptional children. Exceptional students are students who are physically, mentally, emotionally, or behaviorally different from the normal population. For example, based on assessment information, a child may be discovered to be dyslexic and may be assigned to a special treatment program, or a student who has been diagnosed as having learning disability may be assigned to a special education program. Certification is perhaps the most important reason for assessment. For example, the PMR and SPM are examinations aimed at providing students with certificates. The marks obtained are converted into letter grades signifying performance in different subject areas and used as a basic for comparison between students. The certificate obtained is further used in selecting students either for further studies, scholarships or jobs.

Besides certification, assessment is conducted for the purpose of placement. Student are endowed with varying abilities and one of the tasks of the school is to place them in classes according to their aptitude and interest. For example, performance in the PMR is used as the basic for placing students in the arts or science stream. Assessment is also used to stream students according to aacademic performance. It has been the tradition that the A and B classes will consits of high achievers from the end-of- semester examination.s or end-of year examinations. Placement tests have been used in re-schools to stream children accordning to their literacy levels. The practice of placing students according to academic achievement has been debated for decades with some educationists arguing against it and others supporting its merits. Communicate to parents Families want to know how their children are doing in school, and family members appreciate specific indicators of students progress. Showing examples of a childs work over time enales parents to personally assess the growth and progress a=of their child. It is essential to tell the whole story when reporting information about performance progress. Talking with families about standards, sharing studet work smpales,, using rubrics in conference and differenting between performance and progress are some ways to ensure that families are given an accurate picture of student learning. School administration and counseling A school collects assessment information in order to determine how the school is performing in relation to other schools for a particular semester or year. Assessment results are also used to compare performance over the years for the same school. Based on the results, school administrators may institue measures to remedy weakness such as chanelling more resources into teaching students who are performing poorly. This kind of measure is pertinent, in view of the increasing number of students who are unable to read and write at the satisfactory level. Assessment results (especially relating to socio-emotional development) may be used by school administrators and counselors in planning interventionstrategies for at-risk students. Assessment by counselors will enable them to identify students presenting certainsocio-emotional problems that require counseling services or referral tp specialists such as psychiatritis, legal counselors, and law enforcement authorities. TO IMPROVE TEACHING IF 70% OF YOUR STUDENTS FAIL IN A TEST, DO YOU INVESTIGATE whether your teaching-learning strategy was appropriate, attribute it to your students being academically weak or the fact that they did not revise their work? Most educators would attribute the poor performance to latter. Assessment information is valuable in indicating which of the learning outcomes have been successfully achieved and which instructional objectives students had most difficulty with. Assessment results are valuable in providing clues to the effectiveness of the teaching strategy

implemented and teaching materials used. It also indicates whether students had the required prior knowledge to grasp the concepts and principles discussed. Assessment data may also provide insight into why some teachers are more successful in teaching a particular group of students while others are less successful.

Assessment can be done at various times throughout the school year and a comprehensive assessment plan will include both formative and summative assessment. The point at which assessment occurs and the aim of assessing distinguish these two categories of assessment. Formative Assessment Formative assessment is often done at the beginning or during the school year, thus providing the opportunity for obtaining timely information about students learning in a particular subject area or at the particular points in a program. Classroom assessment is one of the most common formative assessment techiniques. The purpose of this technique is to improve the quality of student learning and should nit be evaluative or involve grading students. In formative assessment, the teacher compares the performance of a student to the performance of other students in the class and not all students in the same year. Usually, a small section of the content is tested to determine if the learning obejectives have been achieved. Formative assessment is action-oriented and forms the basic for improvement of industrional methods. For example, if the teacher observers that some students have not grasped a concept, he or she may design a review activity or use a different instructional strategy. Likewise, students can monitor their progress with periodic quizzes and performance tasks. The results of formative assessment are used to modify and validate instruction. In short, formative assessment are on-going and include reviews, and observations of what is happening in the classroom. Summative Assessment Summative assessment is comprehensive in nature, provides accountability and is used to check the level of learning at the end of the program. For example, after three years in secondry school, student take the PMR, which is summative in nature since it is based on the cumulative learning experiences of students. Summative assessments are typically used to evaluate the effectiveness of an instructional program at the end of an academic year or at a pre-determine time. The goal of summative assessment is to make a jugdement on a student competency after an instructional phrase is completed. For example, national examinations are administered in Malaysia each year. It is a summative assessment to determine each students acquisition of knowledge in several subject areas during a period of between two and three years. Summative evaluations are used to determine if students have mastered spesific between competencies and letter grades are assigned to assess learner achievent. NORM-REFRENCES VERSUS CRITERION-REFRENCES TESTS The main difference between norm-referenced tests and criterion referenced tests lies in the purpose or aim of assessing yor students, the way in which content is selected and the scoring process which define how the test result are interpreted.

Norm-Referenced Tests The major reason for norm-referenced tests is classify students. These tests are designed to highlight achievement differences between and among students to produce dependable rank order of students across a continuum of achievement from high achieves to low achieves (Stiggins, 1994). With nor-referenced test, a representative group of students is given the test and their scores form the norm after having gone through a complex administration and analysis. Anyone talking the norm-referenced test can compare his or her score against the norm. For example, a score of 70 on a norm-referenced test will not mean much until it is comared to the norm. When compared to the norm, the students score is the 80 th percentile., which means that she performed as well or better that 20% of students in the norm group. This type of information can be useful for deciding whether or not the student needs remedial assistance or is a candidate for the gifted program. However, the score gives little information about what the student actually knows or can do. A major criticism of norm-referenced tests is that they tent to focus on assessing low level, basic skills. Criterion-Referenced Tests Criterion-Referenced Tests determine what students can or cannot do, and not how they compare to others (Anastasi, 1998). Criterion-referenced tests report how well students are doing relative to a predetermined performance level on a specified set of educational goals or outcomes include in the curriculum .Creterion-referenced tests are used when teachers wish to know well students have learned the content and skills which they are expected to have mastered. This information may be used to determine how well the student is learning the desired curriculum and how well the school is teaching that curriculum. Criterion referenced tests give detailed information about how well a student has performance on each of the educational goals or outcomes include in that test. For instance, a criterion-referenced test score might describe which arithmetic operations a student could perform or level or reading difficulty he experienced.

WHAT TO ASSESS