ASSESMENT

Assessment is a way of finding out what an individual knows, understands, thinks and what he or she can do, then we must tolerate this kind of systematic collection and analysis of information to monitor and improve student learning. But what is the relevance of assessment to parents? Parents may feel disempowered and marginalized in formal decision-making arenas. They can form the impression that decision have already been made and that there is little space for influencing them. This resonates particularly in child protection proceeding and this involving parents. Parents needs information about the assessment and what about of their children in school. A teacher cannot monitor and report his every student to their parents what they are doing. With relevance to assessments, parent will be aware if their children are performing well in their class. Parents can look at the result of every assessment that a teacher ask the student to do. With that, the parents also have an important role in the assessment of learning. If a child is not performing well in their class, the parent must know the reason why. There are a lot of reason which might be possible that happened. The result of the assessment can be a guide to know why a child is not doing good in class. The other relevance is that parents must be aware of every activity that a child do inside or out of the classroom. No matter where are the students are as long as what their doing is about academic puposes, regardless of the age of the child, parents have two major responsibilities in the area of assessment. The first is to actively participate in making decisions about which types of information are needed. The second is to assist the assessment professional in obtaining the most comprehensive information about your child, the visual condition, and the changes that you have seen over the years in your child's functioning. It is extremely helpful to provide the assessment professional with specific questions or concerns that you may have about your child. For example, do you feel that the development of daily living skills are not progressing as rapidly as you had hoped? Are you pleased about the way your child interacts with adults, but concerned about social interactions with peers? Do you see signs of increasing social withdrawal as your child becomes older? Specific questions can assist in planning the assessment not only in terms of types of evaluations requested, but also in the selection of a specific test to be used. Like teachers, parents have always a major role in assessing their child's knowledge. With the implementation of the new idea, the law requires that parents play a greater role in this critical aspect of program planning. All of the decisions your team makes about your child's program rest on the quality of the assessment that is done. Begin now, long before your next IEP meeting, to think about the quality of assessment that has been done on your child. Do you have copies or have you read through all the assessment information? Do you have information collected to share? Do you understand what the tests indicate in terms of your child's strengths and needs? If not, have you scheduled appointments to meet with the team members who can explain the assessment data? Do you think there may be other areas where new assessment information should be gathered? Have you discussed with your child's teacher or diagnostician what types of testing might be needed to address this concern? It never too soon to begin to prepare for your role in the assessment of your child.