Teachers often require students to keep subject matter journals for the entire school year. Students use these journals to record their experiences with the subject matter. For instance, in Social Studies they may be studying the Nina, the Pinta, and Santa Maria and the student may wonder who was the youngest person on board or the oldest person on board. The journal gives them a place to explore those questions.
It is also a place to record problem solving strategies. What was the problem? What strategies did the student use to find a solution? Which strategies worked and which failed? Artistic students can include drawings or create puzzles about the subject matter. Even more importantly, journals allow the student to individualize the learning and provides a window for the teacher into how best to improve learning experience for that child.
Students, especially, elementary school students need to understand how they are doing as they progress through the subject matter. One way of providing that insight to use a rubric that allows a student to self-assess their progress and to make necessary adjustments or ask for assistance.
Rubrics measure student learning using specific criteria usually in a table form. For example a rubric for an essay on the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria might measure the use of specific spelling words, the use of specific geographical places, and the names of five important people in the event. To complete the rubric, the teacher provides the number of spelling words, geographical places and people that a student would need in their essay in order to achieve a specific score, (i.e. excellent, good, needs improvement, or poor). Armed with this information, students can be assured of their score.
Educators use observation as another tool for alternative assessment. Many teachers have created an observation rubric for the classroom and will typically observe one or two students closely each day, evaluating them using the rubric.
Teachers also allow students to use an observation rubric in peer reviews. Peer reviews allow the observed student and peer reviewer an opportunity to experience the learning in new and deeper ways.
Journals, self-assessment, rubrics, and observations are just a few of the many alternative assessment tools available to educators. The more rounded and varied the assessment tools the sharper the picture of a specific student's learning experience.
More and more educators today use a portfolio of student work to make their learning assessments. In addition to the tools already mentioned, alternative assessment portfolios can include videos, dramatizations, music and songwriting, experiments and essays.