Isn’t alternative assessment time-consuming?
Yes and no. First, if, as many experts suggest, assessment is “married” to or made inseparable from instruction, it becomes part and parcel of the way teachers work in the classroom. Assessment becomes an instructional strategy for teachers, a learning strategy for students, and one of the most valuable ways for teachers and students to spend classroom time. And, the computer helps mightily with the storing, organizing, and reporting so teachers can concentrate on evaluating student efforts, and working with the students. Second, what is your priority as a teacher? To minimize your work? Or to help students learn? In a Commentary in the 6/25/97 Education Week, Theodore Sizer of the Coalition of Essential Schools, points out (once again) that learning is a messy business which takes time. Teachers know this, but it’s not cool to say so. It is, however, classroom reality. And it is time we come around to the idea that we need to spend time and that it’s okay to spend time on alternative
