ASSESSMENT METHODS IN TEACHING HISTORY

MIDLAJ CH
AZIM PREMJI UNIVERSITY,
BANGALORE

INTRODUCTION
According to Colman and his colleagues (1966), student learning is an output that responds to
various economic inputs such as expenditures, facilities, equipment, and background
characteristics of teachers. In this model, the school is a non-opened black box (Adam Gamoran,
Walterg .Secada&Corab .Marrett, 2000). According to this metaphor Dylan William and Paul
Black say that the responsibility to know what is happening inside the classroom is not only to
teachers because first, it is at least possible that some changes in the inputs may be counter-
productive—making it harder for teachers to raise standards. Secondly, it seems strange, even
unfair, to leave the most difficult piece of the standards-raising task entirely to teachers (Wiliam,
1998). So I think the learning is a continuous activity so the assessment system should be
interactive with both teaching and learning, rather than a snapshot getting from summative
assessment it should be a continuous video type which enables the teachers getting the clear picture
of every student's ability and progress. So the importance of formative assessment with various
tools makes both experience and the achievement of learning much better. Teacher as a manager
inside the classroom can know what is happening to the student in cognitive social and emotional
levels.
Assessment methods of social science should be the reflections of the student learns and the
achievements of the learner on the objectives of the subject. The tendency of assessing children
merely for the grading or passing to next class, looking only the some of the learning areas, should
be discouraged. Today mainly social science subjects are assessed on the basis of the rote learning
and factual knowledge that the student has. But the social science subjects has a wide area of
objectives other than the prevailing notion of the subject, our assessment system sometimes fails
to face this problem and leading a wrong way of assessment. Both summative and formative
assessments should be prepared to help the learner to achieve maximum learning level by getting
proper facilitation and feedback from the teachers.
The assessment methods should be designed in order to enable each student as self-evaluator by
using methods and tools like self and peer evaluation methods. The ideal school assessment should
not be narrowed in labelling students by giving those grades. The assessment should be a clear
picture of the student achievement. According to the implementation of the CCE (Continuous and
Comprehensive Evaluation) the NCERT says that the assessment, a crucial element of the teaching
and learning process, is to be carried out for purposes beyond the measurement during the
instructional process which will engage and motivate the learners by emphasising progress and
achievement rather than failure and defeat (NCERT, 2016).
The importance of feedback is high in this model because a clear and qualitative feedback is very
helpful all stakeholders whether it is student or other related school committees. A professional
teacher can manage this avoiding all negative aspects of giving feedback like comparing between
two pupils or based on bias.
SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT
The summative assessment gives the idea where the student stands at a point of time like the end
term exam, which provides a measurement of where the student stands according to the curriculum
standards. This will give the information whether the student has accomplished the goals of the
unit in terms of knowledge and skill acquisition. As all the assessments need, here the desired goal
will be achieved by preparing good tools those are valid and reliable. For social science, it should
be standing to get the objectives mentioned in the curriculum. So rather than closed-ended
questions, it needs open ender questions. Because social science should be connected to the
environment of the child and his cognitive development so it needs good critical and analytical
ability on different sources of facts and evidence especially in history.

FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT
Learning is a continuous activity so the instructor should be eager about knowing the every
improvement and difficulty of the learner. This helps the teacher to improve the learner’s level and
reflect upon classroom activities that existed before and how to improve it after. The idea of
formative assessment gives a better idea about the student’s attainment during the learning process
in order to improve the teaching and facilitation of each student. The purpose of formative
assessment is to provide teacher and student with feedback that can direct future teaching and
learning (Myers, 2016). In these methods we can use formal and informal assessment activities as
tools in order to check the student level, it may be individual or group engagement or any method
that will give the desired objective of the child.
Continuous assessment makes the child to the stage of reflecting and analysing him/herself on their
level and progress. Assessment system like CCE if it is continuing in the school system it will
support for the overall the development of the learner because it is all-inclusive, cumulative and
diagnostic oriented that can be used to improve the progress of learners and develop self-awareness
amongst learners so as to progress 6 before it is too late. Consequently, the results obtained and
the feedback turns out to be more valid, reliable and more indicative of the holistic ability of the
learner (NCERT, 2016).
“The term ‘Continuous’ emphasises that the evaluation of the identified
areas of personality is a continuous ‘process’ rather than a combination of
isolated unconnected ‘events’; that it is built into the total teaching-learning
process as its integral part and is thus spread over the entire span of an
academic session. The second term ‘Comprehensive’ implies that it
attempts to cover different aspects of personality beyond the academic ones,
i.e. abilities, skills, qualities, interests, attitudes, values, outdoor activities
 etc. and not just academic achievement. The third term ‘Evaluation’ implies
that the purpose of the total endeavour is not just the measurement of the
level of achievement and proficiency of students but also their improvement
through diagnosis and remediation/enrichment.” (H.S. Srivastava (2010),
Curriculum and Methods of Teaching, p. 66)

One thing to understand here is that the assessment should not be only for the recording data and
documentation of the test; above that the teacher has to give appropriate feedback to stakeholders.
This feedback should be qualitative and descriptive, with the suggestion that helps the learner to
scaffold the knowledge; otherwise, the value of the continuous assessment would be only like the
grading or awarding a rank based on the one-shot standardized assessment.
In this way, we can fulfil the dream of no child left behind because of lack of assistance and
inadequate mentorship by remediation and enrichment. Day today assessments, for example, the
oral questions and the response from the children varies from child to child so an experienced
teacher can understand why the child answered in a certain way and what supportive strategies can
I take to improve the learning capacity of the child considering how the child learn and which one
is the learning style of the learner from Visual, Aural, Read/write, and Kinaesthetic sensory
modalities that are used for learning information.
OBJECTIVES OF THE HISTORY ASSESSMENT
NCERT position paper says that the main objectives of the teaching social science in secondary
stage are
 to develop analytical and conceptual skills in order to understand socio-economic change
and developments in India and outside
 To see the social issues critically like poverty, discrimination, ideological wars, invasion
etc.
 to make a good citizen
So the history as the part of social science is interrelated with other subjects like geography,
political science/civics, economics etc. so teaching history should be considering this aspect of
an interrelation between and interdict. So the teacher should have vertical and horizontal
subject knowledge.
So we can say the objectives for history formative assessment will be
 To check the ability of the child to remember the interrelated timeline of events and
recognize the facts and evidence.
 To find the capability of the student to infer and interpret between secondary and
primary sources comparing the various possibilities.
 To detect the analysing capability of the learner by differentiating and organizing
knowledge.
  To observe the power of the pupil to evaluate and critique the information from primary
and secondary sources.
 To get the teacher the sufficient continuous and qualitative information about the
progress of the child in order to give appropriate feedback to the stakeholders.
The assessment should be conducted only after knowing the characteristics of the textbook and curriculum.
For example, the NCERT textbooks are designed on the themes so the assessment would be according to it
while other designs of deferent boards have their own allocation and categorization of textbook and teaching
materials. As the history is the one part of the broad disciplinary of the social science the teacher should
have the vertical and horizontal content knowledge about the interrelated subjects that the student learns in
his level; so that the teacher can connect the knowledge that child has and should be attained within the
certain period of time or academic year. Generally, the teacher in the upper primary is general to all social
science subjects even though the meta-cognition about the various aspects of the response getting from the
child will help him/her more to reach the real goal of the assessments.

SAMPLE ASSESSMENT TOOLS

There are many tools and techniques those are very useful in continuous formative assessment
methods like Observation, Checklists, Assignments, Checklists, Portfolio, Projects, Rating Scales,
Anecdotes and Cumulative Records, Photographs and etc. I have chosen some methods that are
useful in the assessment methods.
Tools and items of Objective of the tool and items implementation
assessment

1. MCQs of VARK This will help the teacher to find out
assessment. With the learning method of each student
16 items and 4 whether is it is by Visual, Aural,
distractors for each Read/write or kinetic. This will
item. enable the teacher to develop
assessments and remedial classes
according to each child's capacity.
The teacher should understand the ability
of the child that which way he/she learns
using these capabilities. And use different
techniques and tools of activities for each
category until they are balancing between
these capacities. For this teacher should
observe other aspects of the learner also.
(Teacher can also use online websites
helping to develop the VARK MCQs)
2. Oral assessment This will help the teacher to This will help the facilitator make a good
based on pre- understand the whether the child idea about how to introduce the new
defined questions has the connection with previous chapter. She/he can introduce different
on previous chapters which are connected with pedagogy skills based on previous VARK
chapters in history the current chapter i.e. the instructor test.
connected with the can find how much the student
This will be conducted individually or in
current chapter. recall or remember from previous
group of students as the teacher think
chapters and how the idea is for him
beneficial and feasible way to record the
with current chapter.
response for analysing the qualities
This lights into the student's ability mentioned in objectives
to recall recognise and
identify.(both knowledge and
comprehensive part)

3. Group discussion This tool is designed to find out the The teacher should supervise the
and presentation ability to interpret, clarify and infer discussion and give them support on
on given questions the facts comparing the primary and leading their discussion successfully.
and clues of secondary sources. This will guide
The teacher has to assess each group
pictorial sources the child beyond factual knowledge
according to individual contribution also.
related to the to the reasoning on the given
The grouping will be on the basis of
lesson. sources comparing between the
VARK assessment to balance and develop
The presentation visual materials. The teacher can
each student's ability. The teacher can use
may be making also test the values and attitudes of
the self-assessment and peer assessment to
concept map, the children towards the given
evaluate the works.
presenting timeline material.
or summarizing the
discussion

4. Project work This will enhance the analysing The difficulty level will be according to
This will be the capacity of individual child by their capacity to handle. The teacher can
theme of the giving him the opportunity to give some examples like collecting
chapter and explore himself in the activities. pictures. Or preparing short assignment
collectively This will give the child capacity to visiting any historical place related to the
decided between investigate the historical facts sans chapter.
teacher and bias as he engages with first-hand
The teacher has to make some preparation
students in experiences.
for it and make the students aware of the
available context
The teacher can find the project, for example, the field visit can be
and resources.
observational skills of the learner after generating questions from students
 This may be
and to how he got the diversity of by active engagement of the teacher with
after exploring
our culture relating various social them. The assessment will be either oral or
a historical site
science subjects. written open-ended question which will
which has
lead to more analytical questions.
relevance with
past.
CONCLUSION
We have discussed the various aspects of the assessment methods in history teaching. In total, the
history as a social science subject should be for the holistic development of the learner so the
teacher should have a better idea about the navigation of the teaching process. As we know a good
teacher needs 1. Good knowledge of the content matter 2. Content pedagogical knowledge 3.
Knowledge about the characteristics of the learner. So the knowing the learner only achieved with
systematic assessment system so he can arrange the knowledge in order to be effective for the
better learning outcome. So the misunderstandings about the assessment system like exam
orientation and labelling should be changed, to effectively use the system for finding the level and
difficulties of the student in understanding of the subject.
What we could understand here is that the social science assessment is one of the most difficult
parts for teachers because it needs good hard work enough time and hard work.

APPENDIX

1. SAMPLE OF VARK MCQs

http://vark-learn.com/the-vark-questionnaire/the-vark-questionnaire-for-younger-people/

2. ORAL ASSESSMENT SAMPLE QUESTIONS

I. Why Europeans started sea expeditions following the industrial revolution?

a. What were the technology influenced these voyages to discover new geographical
areas?
b. How this event influenced by political situations of the Europe?
II. What is mercantilism? How it affected on the competition between nation states?
a. How Renaissance affected the new beliefs and way of thinking?

3. GROUP ACTIVITY AND PRESENTATION

 Every group has to present their opinions based on these pictorial clues connecting to the
historical facts and evidence analysing the pictures. It may be any kind of role play, theatre
or narration according to the resources of the school and students.

Activity for group 1

Activity for group 2

Activity for group 3

Bibliography
Adam Gamoran, Walterg .Secada&Corab .Marrett. (2000). Th eOrganizationalContext o fTeachin gan
dLearning: ChangingTheoreticalPerspectives. In M. T.Hallinan, Handbook of the sociology of
education (pp. 37-64). USA: springler.

Myers, J. (2016, 11 7). Assessment and Evaluation in Social Studies Classrooms: A Question of Balance.
Retrieved from www.learnalberta.ca:
http://www.learnalberta.ca/content/ssass/html/pdf/assessment_and_evaluation_in_social_stu
dies_classrooms.pdf

NCERT. (2016, 11 5). Exempler Package CCE Social Scince Upper primary stage. Retrieved from
www.ncert.nic.in/:
http://www.ncert.nic.in/departments/nie/dee/publication/pdf/CCE_SocialScience.pdf

Wiliam, P. B. (1998). Inside the Black Box Raising Standards Through Classroom Assessment. London:
Granada Learning.