Design Formative Assessment Strategy

Build a systematic formative assessment strategy that provides timely, actionable feedback to learners and instructors during learning, before high-stakes summative assessment.

Why This Is Best Practice

Adopted by: OECD educational reform recommendations, PISA framework, US Common Core assessment standards, all major national curriculum frameworks Impact: Black & Wiliam (1998) meta-analysis of 250+ studies shows formative assessment produces effect sizes of 0.4–0.7 (equivalent to 2-grade improvement); Hattie (2009) ranks feedback as #1 influence on student achievement (ES = 0.73) Why best: Formative assessment closes the gap between where the learner is and where they need to be — in real-time, during instruction, when it can still influence learning. Summative assessment after the learning period is too late to improve the outcome being measured.

Sources: Black & Wiliam "Inside the Black Box" Phi Delta Kappan (1998); Hattie "Visible Learning" (2009) Ch. 9; OECD "Formative Assessment" (2005)

Steps