Thoughts on Assessments

As I read the article "Principles of Effective Literacy Assessment" I couldn't help but wonder how authentic the fourth principle (Assessment should be a collaborative, reflective process) really is. I think if you let students pick out what they want in their portfolios after they see their grade, of course they are going to pick out the work they really did well on. If you let them pick ahead of time, they will pick only the easier assignments to be evaluated and, in turn, they may not try as hard on more challenging assignments because they know it won't be graded. Either way, I don't think it is an authentic picture of the student and if used, it should be used sparingly along with other assessment tools like the ones mentioned in the article "Authentic Classroom Assessment in Action: Ms. Rodriguez's Classroom." She seemed to have a real handle on assessing her 28 students even though it seems like a lot of work. I think the key to successful assessing is to use a variety of assessments. If you use only one way, it just wouldn't be authentic.