Embedding assessment for learning

This chapter reviews the challenges involved in embedding Assessment for Learning (AfL) practices in classrooms in different contexts. It starts by identifying the values ascribed to AfL by its advocates, and some of the reasons for its incorporation in assessment reforms around the world. It then analyzes the principal features of AfL that were commonly incorporated in AfL initiatives and sets out some of the concerns that these features caused for various stakeholders. The chapter discusses the stumbling blocks that have tended to impede curriculum reform in the past and suggests an approach, labelled “principled pragmatism”, to overcome these barriers. The approach prioritizes the realities of the context of implementation in shaping the scope and nature of any reforms to assessment, and proposes that the reforms should synthesize new and existing practices in a multidimensional and multipurpose form. Copyright © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V..