Community-based assessment pedagogy

Abstract

This article attempts to structure student assessment practices in the classroom. Informed by fourth generation evaluation, it discusses a pedagogy based on a recursive framework of writing, assessment, and reflection activities that move students toward productive praxis. Implemented over three semesters at a land grant university in the U.S., this pedagogy moves away from teacher-centered assessment and evaluation of student writing, and pushes students to do these things for themselves. It promotes a classroom in which students take control of all writing assignments, their instructions, assessment criteria, and the practices and reflective activities that go along with their writing. It encourages a community of writers that are implicated in each others’ writing and assessment practices, and gets them to critically engage with these practices. The article offers theoretical justifications and qualitative data from three semesters and suggests conclusions based on them.