Testing, Assessing and Teaching

Being able to create, provide and live learning experiences from testing and assessing should define the new generation of teachers that is about to start their labour as well as the new generations of students who will receive lots of benefits from these experiences.

It is mandatory to keep on looking for new ways of integrating former theories with new happenings and tools around the world, and this is the reason why it becomes so important to know that the role of teachers and tests nowadays has transformed into a wider and flexible practice, and that we should take advantage of that and start working on improving the way test and assessment is carried out in our classrooms.

The continuous assessment that we -as teachers- do on each class, from all the comments and opinions that our students give is nothing more than the proof of the commitment and dedication that we have to our profession and to our students. On the other hand, it is necessary to be aware of the responsibility that we have at the moment of giving feedback to our students... As I said before, it is time to turn some ancient practices and start looking for more effective ways of helping our students, so that their learning process goes beyond what they expected and we give them the chance to overcome whatever difficulty they find.

Finally, I find very important to know the difference between testing and assessment, since it gives us enough clarification to understand what we need to do and what students need to do in each one, and, in this way do the one that fits our needs the most, without forgetting our students as well.