Don't fall into the myth of literacy assessment.

Primary and secondary schools will enter the first examination of this semester next week. Teachers in all schools are actively preparing for the student assessment work, in order to understand the learning effect of students during this period of time, and to serve as a reference for the improvement of teaching and learning.

In recent years, with the emergence of CBA, some teachers have adopted a large number of CBA questions in the mid-term or final examinations of schools, incorporating life-oriented and contextualized contents. However, if the questions are lengthy and time-consuming for students to answer, it is difficult for students to understand the meaning of the questions at an average level, and for students with a lower level of proficiency, they may be in a position of guessing the questions, thus losing the nature and spirit of the assessment.

Literacy assessment questions are not bad, but it is a difficult challenge for teachers to design a literacy question that is discriminating, because literacy questions have to take into account knowledge, competence, attitudes, and values, so how easy can it be? If teachers do not have the skills to conduct literacy-led assessment, and are just following the trend, relying on their own half-knowledge and experience, not only will the questions they design not be able to stand up to the test, but the assessment will also be skewed, and the interest and confidence in learning will even be eroded.

Assessment is an important process of reviewing student learning and is one of the most important ways for teachers to judge the effectiveness of teaching. Do not fall into the myth of literacy-oriented assessment and neglect the assessment of important knowledge in the curriculum, which is the basic skill of learning and is particularly important for disadvantaged students. The purpose of education is to bring every child up, not to let them sink down and regard learning as a daunting task. Only when children have confidence and a sense of achievement, and enjoy learning, can the function and effectiveness of education be realized.

Text/Editorial from Mandarin Daily