Testing

     Testing and assessment are the two trickiest parts of teaching. They are crucial to understanding what your students are learning and where they are at. It is tricky because a lot goes into making a proper test. You always have to make sure your test is reliable and valid to ensure it is a proper measurement of knowledge learned. You also want to make sure you use different types of tests to assess different skills. Mixing multiple choice and listening will help ensure different skills are being tested. Multiple choice items are defined as being closed-ended because they are either right or wrong. Writing response questions are defined as open-ended because they have multiple ways of answering. Both of these assessments help test a student's knowledge of the material.
    Testing is always difficult because you must decide if you will make your own test or if you will use one provided to you. Using an already made test is much more time efficient but if not overlooked properly, it can be unreliable or invalid. If you make your own test you must consider all of these variables and it is very time costly. Making your own assessment can be very beneficial though. It can be more closely aligned with the material you are teaching in class, therefore, it becomes much more valid. You also have the freedom to use any activities you want rather than being closed in.
    There is also a difference between formative and summative assessment. Formative assessment is a more informal type of assessment that can help teachers measure students on a daily or weekly basis. These assessments can be helpful for students to measure where they are at in learning the material before taking a comprehensive chapter test. A summative assessment is typically a comprehensive test meant to measure much more knowledge.It is useful at the end of the semester to see what the student learned throughout the semester or year.