Assessing the Whole Child

      As an educator, I don’t necessarily agree with standardized tests that our students take to measure academic performance. A lot of factors go into the education and intelligence of the whole child, and any deviation can affect the child’s performance. Tests can only be given on the assigned day, and we have no idea what that child has already experienced before coming to school that may affect their performance on the test in a negative way. Some children may have come to school without breakfast, not gotten enough sleep the night before, may be feeling sick or nervous, or may be experiencing family or personal troubles at the time of the test. If they do poorly on said test, is it because they don’t have the necessary skills and intelligence, or because of the factors I mentioned earlier?

      I believe our children should be tested in a qualitative way. Assessments should be in depth, but unstructured. Academic history, observation, interaction, and interviews should be used to get an overall picture of academic progress, strengths, and needs. By assessing in this way, we can gather information over a period of time instead of just on one particular day in which the child may or may not be experiencing negative outside factors.

Assessment in Ghana

The Ghana BECAS project focused on the development of a new comprehensive National Education Assessment (NEA) and School Education Assessment (SEA). The Ghana BECAS project was a three-year project funded by USAID whose objectives were to:

• Design and implement a comprehensive educational assessment system to ensure that various measures of learning and achievement used at different levels and times in the basic education system are systematized. The new system allows assessment information to be clear, non-contradictory, easily interpreted, and used for diagnosis at the level intended-national, district, and school.
• Establish realistic expectations in the setting of examination standards, both in terms of content and difficulty, while at the same time reflecting the essential understandings that underlie the designated curriculum specified by the Ghana Education Service (GES).
• Provide information in an accurate and timely fashion that is less subject to local adjustments and interpretations, using modern scanning equipment and secure environments for test scoring at the National and Regional offices.
• Encourage the use of examination results for program and school improvement through the GES and consultative processes.
• Build capacity in the GES to manage the new comprehensive educational assessment system through training, counterpart development, and creation of a functioning Assessment Unit.

Ghana BECAS focused on supporting the development of tests that relate to grades one through six in the basic education system. The emphasis throughout test development was on the educational relevance and appropriateness of the tests. Every effort was made to develop a comprehensive framework for the various tests, based upon the essential understanding that underlies the curriculum (www.equip123.net).

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