Formative assessment: possibilities, boundaries and limitations

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. A programme of work initiated in 1993 to provide timely studies of significant innovations in education. The series is aimed at a broad OECD‐wide audience of educational policy‐makers, practitioners and the public. Each study in the series focuses on an area of importance for policy and practice, provides concrete case studies as exemplars and identifies issues of policy and implementation. 2. In relation to theories of learning there are connected theories of mind (see Murphy, 1999 Murphy, P., ed. 1999. Learners, learning and assessment, London: Paul Chapman. [Google Scholar]) which fall into two categories: symbolic cognition or processing and situated cognition. A symbolic processing view of mind is concerned with an individual's internal mental processing as the way to understanding learning. The learner is seen as separate from the environment and mind is symbolically represented as somewhere where learning can be stored and retrieved when required (like a computer). A situated view of mind is concerned with the interaction of human knowledge and the environment, the two being seen as inseparable. In this view of mind, learning is integral with the social world.