Formative assessment is a way to assess students work in an informal way after each lesson.
The purpose of formative assessments are to see where students are struggle and help them, if no one gets it the you must reteach the lesson.
I did a unit in science that had a summative assessment but I could have several formative assessments to make the summative assessment. When studying plant and animal habitats. Have the students come up with a creature and a plant every day the student should journal about how the plant and animal (creature) survive in the same habitat based on what they learned that day. They should include climate, adaption, shelter, food and so on. At the end of the lesson the student can man dioramas of the habitat along with their two creations.
In my placement we studied landforms. The students then made their own islands including each land form. The students were given a list and after we taught them to make the dough. We had the students look at a model for while and then left then to their own devices. Before we the dough was dry we asked the students to point out their landforms. We then reminded them what the landforms they missed looked like and sent them to add them. The islands dried over night we add the water (blue paint) then land (brown paint). The final day of painting, we added grass (green) and lava (red). The last day the students were given a card and number stickers. The card had the list of landforms numbered. They labeled each one and then brought it to my host teacher or me. We read off the list and had them point to where the landform was this was their assessment grade for this lesson along with a few points for participation.
Some strategies for making an effective formative assessment are use manageable chunks assess and then move on to the next task. Provide detailed feedback that helps the students understand their strength. Finally don’t hover and assess when needed instead of over or under assessing.
High quality formative assessment help the teacher identify students who need more help and their misconceptions. It encourages students to engage in more complex thinking and problem solving.
Challenges are they take time to complete and perform. Many teachers don’t know how to use high quality formative assessment.
