This job aid reviews the basic considerations you should make when designing or revising assessments.
Formative vs summative
| When you need to… | Choose | Key characteristics |
|---|---|---|
| Monitor learning and help students practice | Formative | Low-stakes, feedback-focused, ongoing |
| Evaluate mastery | Summative | High-stakes, graded, milestone-based |
Examples
Here are some examples to spark ideas:
Summative assessments
- History – Write a research paper analyzing the impact of key events on modern society.
- Marketing – Create a comprehensive marketing campaign for a hypothetical product.
- Programming – Develop a fully functional web application.
Formative assessments
- Biology – Complete a concept map of the cell cycle.
- Art – Submit sketches or drafts for instructor feedback.
- Math – Take a short quiz on solving equations, with automated feedback explaining their errors.
Because objectives define what students should be able to do, your assessments should serve as ways to measure those specific skills. Alignment also provides students with a clearer understanding of how well they’re progressing through the course.
Examples
Here are examples of an assessment that is not aligned and how you may change it to better assess the objective:
Learning objective: By the end of the course, students will be able to analyze a patent proposal.
Misaligned assessment
- Students will complete a multiple-choice exam.
- Why? The assessment requires a selection or identification task, which does not align with the stated objective.
Aligned assessment
- Students will analyze a patent proposal and fill out an official patent review form from the USPTO.
- Why? The assessment requires an analysis task, which aligns with the stated objective.
Consider breaking up your larger assignments so students work on various components throughout the course.
Why this works:
- Gives students time to improve
- Creates multiple opportunities for feedback
- Reduces last-minute issues
Example
A summative assessment with:
- Week 5: Outline
- Week 6: Draft
- Week 8: Final submission
To maximize the efficacy of your written feedback to students, try to make sure that it is:
- Descriptive: Directly refers to what students did.
- Constructive: Balances what they did well and what they need to improve.
- Actionable: Provides clarity on what to do next.
- Prioritized: Focuses on key issues.
- Timely: Delivered soon after submission.
Depending on your course length or pacing, you may consider adjusting these strategies.
