Reference Framework for Planning Learning and Evaluation Activities

4.5 Instruments to support learning, teaching and evaluation
The following section presents instruments designed for different purposes. They can be used for
teaching, in which case they help clarify requirements and the most important concepts. Checklists
provide students with essential guidelines to support learning. With the necessary adaptations, they
can be used to develop examinations, and they can also be adapted and used along with the
evaluation criteria in the specifications for learning support, teaching and evaluation.
These instruments are above all intended to enrich teaching practices and to encourage teachers to
use a variety of information gathering techniques and formats. Evaluation that is done using the proper
instruments and later discussed is apt to interest the students. Often, evaluation in the course of
learning allows students and teachers to discuss their respective expectations: evaluation results at
different points of the learning process can be compared. The evaluation can be added to the students’
portfolio.
The following are a few examples of instruments for gathering information and indicators of progress.
The following pages contain six complete and partial checklists. Other instruments used for evaluation
or to support learning can be found in the appendix.
Five types of instruments are presented:
• diagnostic evaluation
• checklist
• evaluation checklist and uniform scale
• evaluation checklist and descriptive scale
• log
Diagnostic evaluation
At the beginning of the learning process, diagnostic tests help the teacher situate each student by
identifying his or her particular weaknesses with respect to skills and competencies in other subjects
(e.g. English and math). The teacher can use the results of this evaluation as a departure point for
teamwork, remedial activities, questions, research projects, laboratory work, visits to companies,
discussions and so on. Later, the same test can measure the progress of learning. The following scale
helps teachers measure the students’ achievement of mathematics prerequisites.
54 Planning Activities to Help Students Acquire Competencies