The Distinction between "Testing" and "Assessment"

The Distinction between "Testing" and "Assessment"

Our line of argument is that testing is a small part of assessment. It needs to be part of the picture. Many people who are anti-testing end up sounding anti-evaluation and anti-measurement. A good test has a role to play. The language that we like to use is, it's an audit. It's a snapshot. You don't run your business for the audit. You want more than a snapshot, you want a whole family album. But the audit and the snapshot have a place in the larger picture.

What can the test do that more complex, performance-based, project-based things can't do? Look for discrete knowledge and skill for the individual student. Many projects, because they're so collaborative, end up making you wonder, well, what about the individual student? What does the individual student know?

For instance, in some state-based, performance-based assessment, they always had a parallel paper-and-pencil test for the individual student so that you had enough data on the individual. A different way to say it -- and this is what scientists and researchers say -- is triangulate the information.