How does internal and external assessment work for IB courses?

Overview of assessment in the IB program

In addition to the regular classroom formative and summative assessments provided by teachers, there are specific assessments in each IB class. There are three kinds of IB-specific assessments: internal assessments, external assessments and exams.

Internal assessments

Internal assessments are completed by students as part of regular classwork, are scored by the ICS teacher and then a representative sample from the subject's collection of internal assessments are sent to the IB to be moderated by IB examiners. Internal assessments are a form of authentic assessment because they enable students to conduct a largely independent inquiry project using the methods of producing knowledge appropriate to the subject. For example, in Groups 1 and 2 students perform oral exams where they use language to analyze a text or image. In Group 3 subjects students conduct subject-specific research such as a field study in Geography or gathering primary data from a Business or NGO for HL Business Management. In Group 4 experimental sciences students design their own experiments and write them up in a lab report. In Group 4 computer science students work with an actual client to develop a product. In Group 5 students conduct a mathematical exploration where math is applied to the real world. Finally, in group 6 Visual Arts students conduct a public Exhibition of their work and Theatre students work collaboratively to produce a piece of theatre.

External assessments

External assessments are also completed by students as part of regular classwork, but rather than a sample, all of them are sent directly to the IB to be marked by IB examiners. At ICS the external assessments are found in Group 1 classes where HL students write a literary essay, in Group 6 classes where all work that is not the internal assessment is externally assessed, in Theory of Knowledge class with the TOK essay and the Extended Essay.

Exams

Exams held over the course of four weeks starting in late April and May of grade 12. Exams are further sub-divided into "Papers" that focus on specific content or skills within the course. Then again within the same course Papers may be different based on SL or HL. Looking just at the Group 4 experimental sciences courses as an example, Paper 1 requires students to complete multiple choice questions. Then Paper 2 requires responses of varying length and complexity from single word answers to multi-part responses including diagrams or graphs. In both Paper 1 and Paper 2 the HL papers require more content knowledge and therefore are longer. Then for the HL courses there is Paper 3, which is much like Paper 2, but focuses only on content required for HL students.

Bringing it all together to create a final score

A student's internally assessed work is combined with any externally assessed work and the results of May examination papers to form the final IB score awarded in July. For more on how the IB Diploma is scored, please navigate to the page How do I earn the IB Diploma?

Grade descriptors

The IB has created 1-7 grade descriptors for each subject group and for selected courses. These grade descriptors "consist of characteristics of performance at each grade...[and] are also intended to help teachers explain the academic requirements of the IB Diploma Programme to students, undertake formative assessment, report progress and predict candidates’ grades." Looking at these grade descriptors can provide an overview of the skills and dispositions needed to do well in each subject group. Below you will find the highest level of descriptor for each subject group or course, if available, that ICS offers.