Assessment

What is assessment?

Assessment is a way of finding out if learning has taken place. It enables you to ascertain if your learner has gained the required skills, knowledge, understanding and/or attitudes and behaviours needed at a given point in time towards their learning programme.

Assessment also provides your learners with an opportunity to demonstrate what progress they have made and what they have learnt so far. If you don’t plan for and carry out any assessment with your learners, you will not know how well, or what they have learnt.

Assessment is not another term for evaluation; assessment is of the learners whereas evaluation is of the programme.

You are therefore constantly making judgements and you should also be aware of the impact that your comments and grades can have on your learners’ confidence when you make a decision and provide feedback. Comments which specifically focus on the activity or work produced, rather than the individual, will be more helpful and motivating to your learners.

End-point assessment (EPA) is the term used in apprenticeship programmes. The end-point assessor is independent from the person who has trained the apprentice, and only assesses them at the end of their programme. There are end-point assessment qualifications available for those who carry out EPA.