Formative and summative assessments in classroom learning

¶ … formative assessments, are designed to be cumulative in nature. Formative assessments give feedback to the teacher regarding the students' comprehension of the lesson plan and enable the teacher to tailor his or her instruction to address student needs. Summative assessments have the goal of evaluating the success of the learning process for the student, teacher, administrator, or other relevant parties in a terminal fashion. State tests are one example of summative assessments; so are end-of-chapter reviews. Summative assessments occur too late in the learning process to fundamentally change the instruction in the classroom, although they may influence how later instruction takes place (Garrison & Ehringhaus 2007).

There is generally a lower level of student involvement in the summative assessment process. Even with chapter reviews, teachers are attempting to see if students have mastered the goals that were set for them class at the beginning of the unit. While teachers may tailor the requirements of formative assessments to help students better understand the material, summative assessments have objective goals. With standardized formative assessments, the teacher has no control over the content at all, and the students may not have specifically engaged with the concepts on the test.