Alt, D. (2018). Teachers’ practices in science learning environments and their use of formative and summative assessment tasks. Learning Environments Research, 21(3), 387-406.

Benett, R. (2011). Formative assessment: A critical review. Assessment in Education, 18(1), 5-25.

Cizek, G. (2010). An introduction to formative assessment. In H. Andrade & G. Cizek (Eds.), Handbook of formative assessment. New York: Routledge.

Harlen, W. (2006). On the relationship between assessment for formative and summative purposes. In Assessment and Learning (pp. 103-117). Sage Publications.

Klenowski, V. (2009). Assessment for learning revisited: An Asia-Pacific perspective. Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 15(3), 263-268.

Torrance, H. (2012). Formative assessment at the crossroads: Conformative, deformative and transformative assessment. Oxford Review of Education, 38(3), 323-342.

Andersson, C., & Palm, T. (2017). The impact of formative assessment on student achievement: A study of the effects of changes to classroom practice after a comprehensive professional development programme. Learning and Instruction, 49, 92-102.

A random sample of 22 Year 4 teachers in mathematics from a middle-sized Swedish municipality participated in a teacher professional development programme in formative assessment. The content of the programme was formative assessment conceptualised as a unity of different, integrated strategies. The study examines the effects on student achievement of the changes in the teachers’ formative classroom practice that followed the professional development input. Results show that, after controlling for pretest scores, the classes in the intervention group significantly outperformed the classes in the control group in a posttest administered one school year after the end of the programme (p = 0.036, d = 0.66). The study contributes to the understanding of under-studied areas of the impact of professional development in formative assessment, and the impact of teacher practice based on formative assessment conceptualised as a unity of different formative assessment strategies.

Brookhart, S. M., Guskey, T. R., Bowers, A. J., McMillan, J. H., Smith, J. K., Smith, L. F., Stevens, M. T. & Welsh, M. E. (2016). A century of grading research meaning and value in the most common educational measure. Review of Educational Research, 86(4), 803.

Grading refers to the symbols assigned to individual pieces of student work or to composite measures of student performance on report cards. This review of over 100 years of research on grading considers five types of studies: (a) early studies of the reliability of grades, (b) quantitative studies of the composition of K–12 report card grades, (c) survey and interview studies of teachers’ perceptions of grades, (d) studies of standards-based grading, and (e) grading in higher education. Early 20th-century studies generally condemned teachers’ grades as unreliable. More recent studies of the relationships of grades to tested achievement and survey studies of teachers’ grading practices and beliefs suggest that grades assess a multidimensional construct containing both cognitive and non-cognitive factors reflecting what teachers value in student work. Implications for future research and for grading practices are discussed.

Spector, J. M., Ifenthaler, D., Samspon, D., Yang, L., Mukama, E., Warusavitarana, A., Lokuge Dona, K., Eichhorn, K., Fluck, A., Huang, R., Bridges, S., Lu, J., Ren, Y., Gui, X., Deneen, C. C., San Diego, J., & Gibson, D. C. (2016). Technology Enhanced Formative Assessment for 21st Century Learning. Educational Technology & Society, 19(3), 58–71.

This paper is based on the deliberations of the Assessment Working Group at EDUsummIT 2015 in Bangkok, Thailand. All of the members of Thematic Working Group 5 (TWG5) have contributed to this synthesis of potentials, concerns and issues with regard to the role of technology in assessment as, for and of learning in the 21st century. The group decided to focus primarily on formative assessment rather than summative assessment and high stakes testing. Formative assessments and feedback provide an important opportunity to support and enhance student learning. Recognizing shifts in education towards blended and online learning with problem-based and inquiry-based approaches led to considerations of technologies that could effectively support formative assessment and informative feedback to 21st century learners. The paper concludes with a summary of conclusions and recommendations of the working group to be taken up in subsequent efforts.

Harry Torrance (2012) Formative assessment at the crossroads: conformative, deformative and transformative assessment, Oxford Review of Education, 38:3, 323-342.

The theory and practice of formative assessment seems to be at a crossroads, even an impasse. Different theoretical justifications for the development of formative assessment, and different empirical exemplifications, have been apparent for many years. Yet practice, while quite widespread, is often limited in terms of its scope and its utilisation of the full range of possible approaches associated with formative assessment. The paper reviews these issues and explores them in relation to the development of formative assessment in higher education. HE is taken as ‘test case’ of the paradoxical implementation of formative assessment, whereby the aim is, ostensibly, to develop independent and critical learners, while in practice highly conformative assessment procedures are being designed and developed. The paper argues that developers also need to attend to the divergent possibilities inherent in formative assessment, if their aspirations for a more transformative practice are to be realised.