Why is Creativity important?
Does Assessment in Art Matter?
Assessment of the creative arts is a difficult task as it “cannot be measured exactly by transparent and objective outcomes and do not lend themselves to empirical measurement”. Effective assessment of the creative arts is an essential part of providing a targeted and purposeful curriculum. Identifying student needs enables teachers to direct their instruction in order to cater for diversity within the classroom.
(source material.https://improvingcreativeartseducation.weebly.com/assessment.html)
What type of Assessment should I use?
Process Based
Formative Assessment is ongoing feedback, process based, and can be interpreted as reciprocal between student and instructor. Formative assessment happens in the moment of learning and doing.
Arts Assessment for Learning Formative Assessment examples
Product Based
Summative Assessment is to evaluate students learning at end of learning period.
Art Education Assessment Summative examples
Assessment of the creative arts is a difficult task as it “cannot be measured According to Saskatchewan K-8 Curriculum:
Assessing Process and Product in Arts Education
Evaluation includes assessment of the learning outcomes that address the creative/productive, cultural/historical, and critical/responsive goals of the curriculum. Evaluation of these grade-specific outcomes includes assessment of students’ creative and responsive processes,as well as any culminating products that may result from their arts experiences.
During creative and responsive processes, the teacher observes and provides feedback on each student’s struggles with problem solving, willingness to try new things, and application of knowledge, skills, and critical and creative thinking. While some aspects of the arts education program include the development of a concrete product (such as an exhibit or public performance), many products of learning in the arts are actions or behaviours that take place over time and are not easily captured for later reflection and appraisal. Two major challenges of student assessment in the arts education program are determining observation criteria and documentation methods.
It is important to involve students in the development of assessment criteria. Self-evaluation is essential to developing students’ abilities
in the arts. Students should learn that artists reflect on their work throughout the creative process and that self-reflection and ongoing assessment is an essential part of creativity. Students can act as full participants in the assessment and evaluation of their own growth
by collaborating with the teacher in setting personal goals and planning for their learning, engaging in reflection and self-assessment, documenting their processes, and developing student-constructed performance tasks.
Artistic products or presentations are not to be evaluated in isolation, but must always be evaluated in conjunction with the students’ creative problem-solving processes, their intentions, and the arts education outcomes.
It is important to note that this curriculum recognizes that asking good questions, challenging oneself personally, and exploring new ideas and ways of working are essential factors in artistic development. This presents a risk to the students in that the final product or presentation may not turn out as well as it might have if they had “played it safe” and worked in a more repetitive or familiar way.
Students may be reluctant to challenge themselves or take risks with their work if students know that all their work will eventually be on display or presented to others publicly. Because much of their daily work in arts education will be process-oriented and of a problem- solving nature, it should be made clear to students that not all of their work will result in a public presentation. Should a teacher or the students themselves desire, on occasion, to show some of their work to others, it is essential to involve the students in the selection and purpose.
It is important for both teacher and students to note that while students must be encouraged to take pride in their artistic products, the creative process is equal in importance to the resulting product.
A variety of strategies is required to assess and evaluate student progress in both process and product in arts education.
For Rubric Assessment please read Saskatchewan Arts Education Curriculum Guides K-8
Assessment Techniques
The following is an overview of the traditional and performance-based techniques frequently used by teachers in visual art education assessment and evaluation. Select and incorporate those that best complement your existing program.
Portfolios
Portfolios are an excellent way of balancing the assessment of both process and product as students can demonstrate their ideas, self-assessment and revisions on projects. As they can be used to store sketches, working drawings, notes, and final artworks, some refer to them as ‘processfolios.’
Sketchbooks/Visual Journals
This is a great way for students to reflect on current projects or collect images for future ones. Notes or thoughts can be written or drawn; images can be student-created (drawing, photography) or ready-made from magazines, newspapers, packages, etc. They provide students with a private space to practice drawing/painting/photography skills and to track themes and/or ideas that interest them. In turn these can then be used as preliminary sketches for other artworks or as elements for collages.
Students’ Demonstrations
Students’ acquisition and/or application of skills and techniques can be assessed as they work on projects or when asked to demonstrate for others. Record your observations using checklists or anecdotal records. Focus equally on their experience of the process of art-making as on their final product.
Integrated Performances
This form of assessment combines new learning on a topic and assessment into one simultaneous experience. Performances should encourage creative thinking, open-ended responses, and the synthesis of previously learned material. Conducted individually or in groups, these tasks can be plays, simulations, innovative written assignments or projects. Criteria for assessment must be clearly identified at the outset.
Tests
A wide variety of tests can be used to assess students’ learning in the visual arts as they can be used to assess cognitive skills (such as knowledge gain or retention) or metacognitive skills (such as comprehension or problem-solving.) Traditional tests include visual identification of artworks and ‘pen and paper’ tests to assess art historical knowledge, but with a little imagination, tests can be made more games-based and done in groups rather than individually (eg. artwork bingo, solve an art mystery, art auctions, etc.)
Writings
Like tests, written forms of assessments can be done in a traditional manner, or take a more imaginative form. Instead of a straightforward essay on the biography of an artist, ask students to take on the role of the artist and write a letter to a friend from their perspective, perhaps describing an artistic challenge they are facing (eg. Van Gogh writing to Gauguin.) Have them write a poem or a story to complement an artwork’s style, or a critique of an exhibition in the neighbourhood. At minimum, provide opportunities for students to combine literary demonstrations with visual ones, illustrating their words with pictures; this offers students different ways to excel in the same assessment vehicle.
Group Discussion
Group discussions can be useful in assessing oral responses to works of art. Criteria can include frequency and quality of individual participation as well as quality of interaction with others, and should be clearly identified in advance. Combining this with a follow-up technique, such as a journal entry, allows an opportunity to assess those not verbally-oriented.
Critiques
Critiques can be done by the student (self-critique), by his/her peers, or by the teacher in written or oral, public or private form. They can be conducted mid-project or at the end, but should always be positive in tone, noting what was done well and what can be improved on. Opportunities for revision or re-making a project based on critiques should be offered.
Self-Assessment
Given the subjective nature of art-making, students must be given opportunities to reflect on their own work and assess whether or not it achieved the criteria of the project and/or their own personal goals. This can be achieved through checklists, written reflections or interviews with the student.
Conferences/Interviews
These can be conducted between student and teacher or may be expanded to include peers or parents. Students should be encouraged to verbalize their experiences and analyze the results of their work. They can be centred on one project or a number of works in a portfolio.
Exhibitions and Displays
While these are the traditional way of sharing students’ achievements with others, they are not always the best. If exhibitions are desired (by students, parents or school administrators,) try to include a range of students’ work in every display (rather than just those of the ‘best’ artists) and involve students’ whose work is not displayed in other capacities in the exhibit – as curators, label writers or tour guides.
(Source Material: http://home.oise.utoronto.ca/~hinwood/art_assessment.html For More Info: Read Donna Kay Beattie’s Assessment in Art Education (Davis Publications, 1997) available from Fitzhenry and Whiteside in Toronto.)
EXAMPLES OF ASSESSMENTS:
A Pocket Guide to Arts Assessment