Assessment in the Learning Organization: Shifting the Paradigm

In this book, Arthur L. Costa and Bena Kallick have assembled a collection of writings by outstanding educators who have taken up the challenge of improving assessment in their schools. They approach their task from a relatively new perspective, one informed by Peter Senge's concept of the "learning organization" and by the late W. Edwards Deming's concept of total quality management through continuous improvement of processes.

The chapter authors--all of them practicing educators--relate strategies from their districts, reflect on personal experiences with students in their classrooms and schools, and share insights they've gained in working to create a renaissance in assessment. In doing so, they describe how assessment is related to many of the practices advocated by Senge and Deming:

- Bringing congruence and integrity to organizational goals and assessments through systems thinking.
- Using feedback spirals to promote continual learning.
- Changing existing mental models for the role of assessment in schools.
- Stating purposes and outcomes in the form of a shared vision.
- Using team building and critical friends as resources for continual learning.
- Identifying a developmental continuum that helps teachers and learners set milestones along the pathways to personal mastery.

This book not only provides practical examples of ways to immediately improve assessment in your own classroom, school, or district, it also explains the theories on which you can build your own effort to continually improve assessment processes--and thus make your school a true learning organization.