Are you looking for some fun formative assessment ideas? Then check this article out! But do you wanna know my favorite one? It’s to use red and green cards or red and green stickers! They are a super quick way to check if your students understand what they were supposed to learn. Let me explain why it works!
When I first learned about formative testing, it wasn’t explained to me very well. A coworker said that students were supposed to do mock tests as a way to be tested formatively. So this meant for the students to do a test before a test. What’s the fun in that? While I understand the value of working this way – as sometimes students need to know how they are tested as well – it is no fun. Formative testing can be done in quick and easy and engaging ways. Here’s how!
Formative assessment definition
Formative testing, per Wikipedia, ‘is a range of formal and informal assessment procedures conducted by teachers during the learning process in order to modify teaching and learning activities to improve student attainment.’ This means that we’re checking students’ understanding, but they’re not graded on it. The process should show both student and teacher where students are at in their learning process, and so this can be done in various ways.
Some formative assessment benefits include:
- Timely feedback for students. They can improve where they need to ahead of tests for a grade.
- Better learning outcomes for students, as they had the chance and knew exactly what to improve before being tested for a grade
- Feedback for teachers as to which students need what extra help, what subjects need more teaching time now and in the future, and a reflection on our own teaching skills and abilities.
- By testing formatively before giving a grade, all students will feel validated and seen in their learning process, and it will also reduce test anxiety in students.
Fun formative assessment in the classroom: red and green cards and stickers
One of my favorite formative assessment ideas are to use red and green cards and red and green stickers! As the colors suggest, the green cards and green stickers are for answers that can be True, Yes, In favor, Correct, etcetera. And red cards and stickers are for False, No, Against, Incorrect, etcetera. The questions you ask students about the learning should therefore be answerable in these two ways: yes or no, true or false, correct or incorrect, etcetera.
What you do in case of the cards is:
- You provide each student with a red and green card.
- Then you ask a question to the whole group and request students to hold up the green or red card in answer to that question.
- Students will hold up either green or red, and you can instantly see who knows the correct answer and who does not.
- Tell students the correct answer as well so that they can self assess too.
In case of the stickers, you must provide a surface for students to stick them on. These can be sheets of paper with statements on them that you hang up on the wall or lay out on the desks. Or it can be the whiteboard you write prompts on. (Does require peeling off of stickers later). Then the process works roughly the same way:
- You provide each student with a set of red and green stickers. (stickers for each prompt you want them to answer)
- Then you ask questions to the whole group in the aforementioned ways and request students to stick the correct color sticker in answer to that question next to the prompt.
- Students will stick their stickers, and you can instantly see who knows the correct answers and who does not.
- Tell students the correct answers as well so that they can self assess too.
Other formative assessment tools examples
A few other formative assessment examples in English language teaching that I find useful and use all the time are:
- Personal whiteboards
- Sticky notes / exit tickets
- Online quizzes
- Mind map
Check out this article that explains these a little bit more!
Now, red and green cards are easy to make out of red and green paper that you cut in pieces. I have laminated my set, because I want to use them over and over again. If your school does not provide colored paper, then you might like to invest in some Astrobrights. Click here to grab some!
Stickers I always grab from my local post office, but I found them cheap here too. Of course, while I found the link for you I saw all these cute labels, and now I need to buy them from Amazon too. I’m not in control guys 🙂
So if you liked these two formative assessment ideas, give them a try! They’re easy to do and prepare, and your students will be so engaged. Have fun!
Related articles:
Top 5 awesome formative testing examples for fun and easy assessment
How can I use sticky notes to make teaching fun and engaging
