Assessment for Learning

Assessment is probably the most important thing we can do to help our students learn. We may not like it, but students can and do ignore our teaching; however, if they want to get a qualification, they have to participate in the assessment processes we design and implement. For that reason I believe it is worth thinking through, individually and collectively, what we currently do and exploring how we can do our best to ensure that our assessment practices help rather than hinder learning. In this paper I will explore these issues, play with a negative exercise about what we can do to hinder learning and conclude with some pointers towards integrating learning and assessment.