Pros And Cons Of Continuous Assessment

Incorporating Continuous Assessment with Exams Examinations have been the gold standard for measuring the performance of students at the university level in the educational system. However, it may be possible that continuous assessment is more accurate for measuring overall student performance due to the fact that students are given different types of tasks to assess their knowledge, such as homework, papers, and quizzes. Exams have many pros and cons, but measuring a student’s performance solely on exams seems to be an outdated strategy. A combination of exams and continuous assessment is necessary in order to accurately assess student performance because they both have advantages and disadvantages. Although continuous assessment may be increasing

The first and most obvious drawback is that “Standardized testing evaluates a student’s performance on one particular day and does not take into account external factors. There are many people who simply do not perform well on tests” (“Pros and Cons of Standardized Testing”). Due to the fact that students are required to honor the date of exams given to them by their professors, unexpected circumstances, such as getting sick or a family death, can occur causing subpar performance. This does not allow the student’s performance to be properly assessed because the student may have physical symptoms, such as a runny nose, headache, coughing, or sneezing, that interferes with his or her test-taking abilities. Additionally, there may be emotional strain that has the student preoccupied, thus making them less focused on the exam. Another disadvantage of exams is that they “Can create a lot of stress on both educators and students” (“Pros and Cons of Standardized Testing”). It is well-known that university-level students have many late nights studying information they believe to be on their exams days before midterms and finals, which causes them to be fatigued, stressed, and anxious. Similarly, professors may become frustrated at only being able to teach information that is going to be on the exam, which can hinder overall knowledge about topics in the

This allows university-level students to be more involved in their classes by using more of their creativity in order to obtain knowledge. Continuous assessment “can take the form of daily work (e.g. essays, quizzes, presentation and participation in class), projects/term papers and practical work (e.g. laboratory work, fieldwork, clinical procedures, drawing practice)” (“Assessment”). Instead of measuring student performance solely through the student’s marks on one exam, the student’s performance is based on a variety of tasks throughout the period of the class. If the student is a poor exam taker, he or she will still be given a fair chance at displaying their understanding of information throughout the semester at various checkpoints. However, the biggest drawback of continuous assessment is that “Too many assignments may result in justice not being done to them all” (“Assessment”). Students can be overwhelmed by the quantity of assignments they need to complete in short periods of time. However, this disadvantage is easily resolved if professors allow for the pacing of students as they go through the learning process. Continuous assessment allows for “Fairness, accuracy and consistency in assessment” (“Continuous Assessment