Formative and Summative Evaluation

Formative and Summative Evaluation

In conversations about the evaluation of teaching, one often hears several terms bandied about, describing different types of assessment. It is useful to clarify these terms and the purposes of these different techniques:
FORMATIVE EVALUATION is aimed at personal teaching improvement; it is designed to provide an instructor with information he/she can use in current and future classes. Our “Student Evaluation of Teaching” (SET) (and the accompanying consultation with TRC staff) is a kind of formative evaluation. One takes advantage of another kind of formative evaluation when inviting a TRC staff member to the classroom to observe what happens there and discuss it. Formative evaluation is best done before the semester ends, so that one has a chance to make changes that will directly impact the learning going on in the classroom. Such evaluation is confidential and not used for purposes of tenure or promotion decisions. It is conducted as a con...